One of my patients eventually had to have her husband admitted to memory care. He was falling, he was angry, he outweighed her by 50 pounds and he was incontinent. When he fell, she could not get him up.
She went to our hospital Grief Group and came to see me, angry.
“They said he’s still alive!” she snarls. “I got mad and said, no, my husband is gone! He just left his body!”
“I’m so sorry.” I say. “I am sorry that they don’t understand.”
“I’m selling his stuff.” she says. “I don’t have any use for Ham Radio equipment. And HE doesn’t EITHER, now.”
She stomps out. I am sure she cried too.
That is how I think of Alzheimer’s. Neurons burning out from the present to the past. When the person can no longer talk, they are close. Then they are in the womb and stop eating.
Let them go, let them go, god bless them. Where ever they may be. You may search the wide world over but your memory person is free….
Why are the roses caged, you ask? What did they do? Nothing, they are being protected. I found that rose and transplanted it years ago, but our deer eat the buds every year. This is the first time that it has bloomed in the 21 years I have lived in this hours. Isn’t it beautiful?
I am listening to this:
I wrote this poem today. This is one of the poems where I have no idea where it will go when I start writing it. I start writing about judgement and it never ever goes where I expect. The poems go where I want to go in my deepest heart, in my soul. I am never where the poem is, the poems show me the way….. Then I try to go there. And it can take years….
I am being judged and watched
I have no issue with the Beloved
it’s the humans I don’t like
I twist people’s words but not with malice
when the antibodies are up it is hard to communicate hard to explain it is hard just to survive and I might be focused on survival first and comforting the people around me second
can you blame me?
how near to death have you passed? and how often?
first pneumonia heart rate 135 when I stood up
my doctor and I could not understand it
my doctor partners thought I was lying in 2003
second pneumonia after my sister’s death which was bad enough but the legal morass that she had set up with her daughter as the center
pitting me and her daughter’s birth father and my father against all the PhDs in the maternal family smart, smart, smart yet emotionally stupid
my niece is not an inheritance to be passed to whom my sister wants
she reluctantly came home and the myth endures that this is an injustice
third pneumonia one year after I find my father dead triggered by grief and the outdated will and the mess he leaves
and I don’t even get sued about the will for another year
I do not care if you want to believe what you want to believe it isn’t true and it hurt
and I learn to let go
with the fourth pneumonia
I see the liars surrounding me downvoting yes, it does matter except that one that I trusted that mentored me
has lied all along
that hurts too
let it go let it go let it go
and I let it go
each pneumonia is a time of change creativity I am lonely and sick and not trusting
as I improve slowly, slowly
I wander garage sales estate sales
and find things things that are beautiful things that enhance my joy
at the start of covid I was so down I was so sad I wanted to lie in the street and give up
the Beloved sent a spirit he says he is no angel
I see angels bright and dark after all they all fall
just as humans do
we all fall we all fall down
try to look perfect try to look virtuous tell yourself that you are good
that is the biggest lie of all
the bad parts of your spirit locked in the basement of your soul howl howl and want to be freed
and if one gets out and you reject her or him
he will return with nine friends yes that is what the bible says
she will return with nine friends
he/she MONSTER will free the others
and you will do bad things you will be terrible you will hurt people while you try to contain while you try to lock away while you try to chain your monsters your evil your self
let them go let the monsters go they are howling I hear them all the time when I meet you when I speak to you the monsters howl at me begging to be loved
yes, they want to be loved and I love them
but if I mention them
you get that look of horror
someone sees me someone sees my evil someone sees what I hide
I can’t help it raised in alcohol neglect and lies on my own as soon as I can walk
but I can’t walk away at nine months
so I find other escapes words songs books poetry rhymes numbers
and my sister when she is born
I do all the mothering
that I have longed for
even though I am three
we were talking about your monsters not mine
you must go in to the cave where you have locked them
and free them all
fall on your knees
and say forgive me forgive me
for I have sinned
bow your head
and hold out your arms
and what, you say, will the tortured monsters do?
will they smite you? will they burn you? will they lock you in their place?
mine didn’t mine were babies grief, fear, shame and I embraced them carried them up to the light and care for them
wash them diaper them feed them wrap them in warm blankets
Darn it. I went from two months of no hiking or beach walking to too fast too much… oops. Injured left tibialis anterior. Oxygen AND a boot. Dang blang curses… guess I have to behave slightly better.
Another outfit not appropriate for work: on the morning before the boot…. I am holding out my hand to be kissed. That area on my lower left shin is red… and later in the day I got in with ortho and got the boot.
flowered dress with long beads and above the elbow white gloves, hey, put that oxygen back on!
Ok, maybe it is not inappropriate for work. But it would be a little weird for work… I was going in the woods with my oxygen tank. “Local doctor of 21 years found eaten by cougar, which then died because it couldn’t digest the oxygen tank.” Heh.
When pneumonia nearly takes me out, I want COLOR. I think I managed it with this. The skirt is not only silly, but a little short for me to wear to work….
I am going to post a series of short essays I wrote on another site at the end of 2020. Because we have to work together and these are relevant. I will post one every day or two.
From Tuesday November 24, 2020:
I have just had a call asking for a Covid-19 test.
Not for symptoms.
Nope. Traveled from Washington to California with a buddy and “My sister thinks I should be tested.”
Me: “Oh, does your sister want you tested before you come to Thanksgiving?”
Patient: “Uh, I think so.”
Me: “First of all, the priority is for people who have symptoms or have been exposed. Secondly I am not ordering a test for someone who has no symptoms, chose to travel and then thinks it’s ok to go to a Thanksgiving dinner in another household if they get a negative. It’s not ok. You can test negative one day and be shedding virus the next. The quarantine after exposure is 14 days. The medical advice from the CDC, from the surgeon general and from me is STAY HOME.”
Others are asking for antibody tests. We don’t know if the antibodies mean you aren’t infectious. We don’t know how long they last. Typically with other covid viruses they don’t last long. In contrast, chicken pox virus gives lifelong immunity. We don’t know if a person can get Covid-19 again, though there have already been some cases. No, I won’t do an antibody test because the person “Just wants to know.”
Ok, I have been going through my clothes. I found both the pink bra and the wings in the bottom of a closet. So, I put them on. I did not actually step outside the house wearing this. I think I need a costume party. Anyhow, it’s rather fun trying these silly things on. I’d have to wear the wings over my White Coat to doctor in this outfit…..
be sure whatever you do do you’re careful who lasers your hoohoo vaginal rejuvenation should not be self done by the patient the person who fires the laser should having training and not just in tasers hoohoo lasers are selling like hotcakes making money for yahoos who clambake no yahoo should do do your hoohoo else you and your honey will boohoo
Discover and re-discover Mexicoβs cuisine, culture and history through the recipes, backyard stories and other interesting findings of an expatriate in Canada
Engaging in some lyrical athletics whilst painting pictures with words and pounding the pavement. I run; blog; write poetry; chase after my kids & drink coffee.
Refugees welcome - FlΓΌchtlinge willkommen I am teaching German to refugees. Ich unterrichte geflΓΌchtete Menschen in der deutschen Sprache. I am writing this blog in English and German because my friends speak English and German. Ich schreibe auf Deutsch und Englisch, weil meine Freunde Deutsch und Englisch sprechen.
KO Rural Mad As Hell Blog 
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