Thursday July 27th 2023

Editorial Team / Admin · Jul 27, 2023

Hello all!

Unable to sleep last night, finally dropped off after 5 and slept for 4 hr. The only thing on my "schedule" today is laundry. Hmmmm, may have a few more ripe cherry tomatoes, yay!

Dh had a preliminary appointment -- some kind of eye scan -- yesterday, r/t his cataracts. He has a preop appt in Aug and the surgery in Sept. He will be glad to get it done (both eyes at once)! It is such an easy surgery these days, for the most part. I remember the late 70's, as a new nurse, caring for post-cataract surgery pts who remained in the hospital 2-3 days, upright HOB, shield over the surgical eye, and we gave many eye drops. "You've come a long way, baby..." ??

Joe, good you enjoyed the meet-up! Will you go to the same place in Milwaukee? Do you still do furry conventions?

No Stars, I hope today brings you calmness and a way to formulate a useful plan for Mr. Stars and Nannie. Sometimes, when planning, it helps me to write things down, as a way of organizing my thoughts. And, hopefully, I don't overlook something important. You are in my prayers.

Have a good day!

nursej22, MSN, RN · Jul 27, 2023

Hi. We just got to Burlington VT, after. 3 1/2 hr drive from Boston. We stopped for lunch in a little town in NH. Dh and I took turns driving so it was tolerable. Only 1 instance of heavy downpour that made visibility scary. Going to meet ds and DIL for dinner in a couple of hours, and will be tourists in the mean time.

Joe, it's sounds like you may have found your "tribe". I'm glad you had a good time.
More ripe tomatoes! So jealous. I am looking forward to cataract surgery, but so far they are not severe enough. Next eye check due in Nov.
75 degrees here and the air feels like a wet sponge. Yuck.

Hi Annie. Are you back in your home?

Hi Tweety, I hope you had 2 good work days in a row.
Hi TMB. Has it cooled off any?

No Stars In My Eyes · Jul 27, 2023

96 degrees, with NO chance of rain.

11 AM-

I slept late because I REALLY needed to. Have had a nice shower, and now I have to go get Nannie up. Hubby is resting on his bed. I'll call to ask at doc's office if they have a social worker or case manager who can help me corral all the things I need re hubby's detox/rehab. Maybe I need to look in the yellow pages and call around another few places, too, (social services or ???) where they might help me with this c-r-a-p. (yeh, even if it is for a fee.) Actually, what I REALLY need is my own private secretary!

Hours later---

Had to leave another phone message to the "personal banker" who never returned my call yesterday.?

Had to write checks to pay bills. Will go to P.O. tomorrow to get stamps, and also pay the Spectrum bill at their store in a little strip-mall. My nail appt is at 9:45 AM, so maybe I can start out a little early and knock out a few things first. I will have to remind hubby that I will be out for several hours and he doesn't have to call me saying "Where ARE you?" like he always does. And I will have to also remind him to check on his stupid inventory of stupid vodka. I said, once again, that yesterday when I had to go get a sleeve of peach vodka, it was only a ONE TIME thing, so that he wouldn't be going through the DT's at the eye doc's office. But he cannot depend on me to go to the ABC store for him any more, PERIOD / EXCLAMATION POINT!

Having to do more laundry. Nannie made her bed and sat on it, leaving large bum-sized urine spots on a sheet, two blankets and the top bedspread, AND the extra blanket she puts on top of all that when she sleeps. I brought one out to the den to show-and-tell Nannie THIS is why I have to keep asking/telling her to NOT make her bed in the morning. Will have to repeat this to her every night and every morning for however long it takes for it to sink in....if it will ever sink in!

And, yes, dianah, I promise I have always been one to write things down in the notebook I call "my brain". I also have other pieces of paper with names, phone numbers, questions, etc, etc. ( and "ETC") in piles for each aspect of whatever I am dealing with and have to keep track of and deal with. (smh. Like I've said before, "way too much manure in my wheelbarrow")

It is so miserable outside and I don't want to go out now (3PM) because of the shift-changing traffic, the school buses and parents doing pick-ups of their kids, and all that errand-running stuff people out on the road for at this time of day.

The supper question will be coming up in 1/2 hour. Oh happy frabjous day!

toomuchbaloney · Jul 27, 2023

nursej22 said:

Hi. We just got to Burlington VT, after. 3 1/2 hr drive from Boston. We stopped for lunch in a little town in NH. Dh and I took turns driving so it was tolerable. Only 1 instance of heavy downpour that made visibility scary. Going to meet ds and DIL for dinner in a couple of hours, and will be tourists in the mean time.

Joe, it's sounds like you may have found your "tribe". I'm glad you had a good time.
More ripe tomatoes! So jealous. I am looking forward to cataract surgery, but so far they are not severe enough. Next eye check due in Nov.
75 degrees here and the air feels like a wet sponge. Yuck.

Hi Annie. Are you back in your home?

Hi Tweety, I hope you had 2 good work days in a row.
Hi TMB. Has it cooled off any?

Mid 70s today. Feels hotter in the sun but I'm a sissy anymore. I don't know how you guys deal with the heat and humidity.

Had a big thunder storm Tuesday that started a wildfire about 15 miles north of us. Hoping the breeze keeps the smoke away.

No Stars In My Eyes · Jul 27, 2023

I drove down to What-a-burger to get hotdogs and tater-tots for their supper, and had to get gas because hubby sat in my car this morning and ran the AC, which gobbled up the gas.

When I got home Nannie's recliner was empty, with the foot-rest still UP. Hubby said "I told her you would be back in 20 minutes." What a big help! So, when I went downstairs, she was sitting on the commode, her pants and socks and shoes were soaking wet. I had to dry her down and get her dressed and out to the recliner (where I had to put a fresh underpad). I looked at her bed and sure enough she had sat on the freshly laundered bed sheets and blankets and it was wet. I told her she was going to have to sleep in a damp bed tonight because I am NOT going to wash the sheets and blankets for a 2nd time today. I turned the ceiling fan on, hoping the wetness will dry some.

And then I went back up to the kitchen, where hubby had not even taken the food out of the bag. He was still at the table, so I had to get Nannie's supper on her tray and her meds, too, and bring it down to her. Went back upstairs and I put his supper in front of him. THEN *I* got to eat my, finally. Geeez!

Now I have to go get our clothes out of the dryer and fold them. GADS!

toomuchbaloney · Jul 27, 2023

No Stars In My Eyes said:

I drove down to What-a-burger to get hotdogs and tater-tots for their supper, and had to get gas because hubby sat in my car this morning and ran the AC, which gobbled up the gas.

When I got home Nannie's recliner was empty, with the foot-rest still UP. Hubby said "I told her you would be back in 20 minutes." What a big help! So, when I went downstairs, she was sitting on the commode, her pants and socks and shoes were soaking wet. I had to dry her down and get her dressed and out to the recliner (where I had to put a fresh underpad). I looked at her bed and sure enough she had sat on the freshly laundered bed sheets and blankets and it was wet. I told her she was going to have to sleep in a damp bed tonight because I am NOT going to wash the sheets and blankets for a 2nd time today. I turned the ceiling fan on, hoping the wetness will dry some.

And then I went back up to the kitchen, where hubby had not even taken the food out of the bag. He was still at the table, so I had to get Nannie's supper on her tray and her meds, too, and bring it down to her. Went back upstairs and I put his supper in front of him. THEN *I* got to eat my, finally. Geeez!

Now I have to go get our clothes out of the dryer and fold them. GADS!

You really need a break. Who else knows about your situation and daily burden?

nursej22, MSN, RN · Jul 28, 2023

It looks like North Carolina has regional Area Agencies on Aging that should be able to help. This list should guide you to someone you can call.
open .
https://www.ncdhhs.gov/area-agencies-agingjun2022pdf/open

No Stars In My Eyes · Jul 28, 2023

Hubby's bro never comes over here and hasn't for 9 years. His wife is the one who does 20 minute visits about 3 or 4 x a year. Hubby's dgt lives up in the mtns 2 + 1/2 hours away, and she very seldom comes here, maybe once or twice a year. My sister in Maine knows, my bro in Calif knows and calls me a Saint. ?The neighbors know hubby is a bad drinker and have occ helped me get him up off the ground when he has fallen outdoors. Several drivers going by have actually stopped when they saw him fall, to make sure he was okay. He hasn't fallen outside lately, though. Our PCP knows that I have to handle everything now and also tells us that "we" need a break (from Nannie). But hubby has become a worse drinker (ie more now than he used to), and can't do much of anything because of the emphysema and COPD causing him to have shortness of breath. He used to clean and run errands. He hasn't got a driver's license anymore....a cop took it when he stopped him and said it was out of date, but I think I have not been told the real story about that. I GUESS hubby won't go get another license due to being drunk most of the time.

Nannie's car, which hubby used to drive, has been sitting in the driveway with a dead battery, no gas, a flat tire, and the passenger's window won't close. He used it as a place to hide his booze and went out there to drink. Now he knows that I know he drinks, he carries some of the little vodka bottles in his athletic-wear pants. I am always picking up a bottle from beside his recliner or in the recliner's seat or elsewhere.

Hubby always says he is so appreciative of all I do. Including helping him get his stupid nasal canula back on several times a night, because he "can't figure it out". So simple to put on, unless one is snockered-blind on vodka and has taken some Xanax, doncha know.

Gah. So the short answer actually is, nobody who knows is willing to help...now including hubby.

Tweety, BSN, RN · Jul 28, 2023

G'day!

J22, hope you enjoy Vermont. I loved visiting Maine and New Hampshire several summers ago.

Stars, detox and rehab really is usually considered an urgent situation that people get into very quickly. Of course they want to know they can get paid. Seems like deja vu to me and we've had some conversations. So much burden on your shoulder. All the best.

Heat and humidity are a fact of life here, but so is air conditioning.

Didn't sleep the greatest myself. I was having a good day until someone on another floor had to leave at 1pm and naturally they pulled from my unit. After she left we got five admissions on that side. Sucked.

Night shift had a no-call no show RN. Sucked for them.

No Stars In My Eyes · Jul 28, 2023

The reason nobody wants to help here was originally because Nannie has had a bad reputation with the family members for a L-O-N-G time. She's quieted down since being put on Seroquel in the AM and PM, but NO ONE wants to take care of her. They know hubby drinks a lot because the sister-in-law used to work at the ABC store. But, I don't think any of them care that I am overloaded with everything now, because I am a "Yankee" and not like the women Southerners, which is a pretty stupid attitude for them to have, but typical. When hubby and I were first together I discovered the hard way that SiL and his dgt gossip something fierce (but not with each other because each has a poor opinion about the other.) His dgt thinks I am 'lazy' (hahahahaha!) and has never bothered to try to get to know the real me, and after I found out about her spreading her imagined stories about me, I quit confiding ANYTHING in either of them. But I am civil and 'friendly', though that apparently makes no difference. So, no help from any of them !

Ado Annie, ASN, RN · Jul 28, 2023

Hello, everyone.

Last night after picking up my pick-up grocery order at Walmart I went to the liquor store for a bottle of coconut rum. The convertible, for some reason, allows us to take the key out of the ignition even if the car is not in "Park". We're aware and I'm usually very careful. BUT as I was walking in, the guy working there came to open the door for me then suddenly looked past me and said "Your car!" as it rolled toward the street. We both ran after it and it stopped, well into the right lane. Fortunately there wasn't much traffic and I was able to get in and drive it back to the parking lot. I wonder if he thought he shouldn't sell me alcohol??

I haven't told Hubs about that. He loves that car. This morning I noticed a big goose-egg above my left elbow and wondered how I bruised it. Then I realized it Mus have been in my attempts to stop the rolling car.

Meanwhile, Twin A was on his way to a 7:30 doctor appt this morning when he called to say the car was overheating. When it rains, it pours. Hubs found the problem (a broken plastic part on top of the radiator) and fixed it this afternoon. Twin A was able to get a later appt and is being referred to a GI doc because they told him that bleeding hemorrhoids that bleed through onto his mattress are NOT normal.

Tonight when we sat down to dinner Gma started telling me that I'm awful and Hubs snapped at her. "Annie fixed this meal for you and you're b!itching? Stop it! I'm tired of it".

I appreciated his sticking up for me but it's not as if she can reason.

We ate cantaloupe that grew in our garden and it was yummy.