Yogurt

Alene was a bit out of sorts today; tired and quiet. I don’t think she slept well. We put in a dvd this afternoon and she slept through most of it. 

She told me also, that she’d finished her book- the John Grisham one. Her bookmark was at about the 2/3 mark so I know she didn’t finish it. I did finish my book today and she asked to read it. I know she won’t because there’s all these Russian names that I had a tough time following. The book bounces around from years past to the present day which may be confusing for her. Oh well, she can try, right?

There wasn’t any conversation about Dan the mower man or the money for the trailer. However, The a/c repairman, Mo, came today so she pulled out her wallet to pay him and I saw the envelope that holds the trailer money. As long as she doesn’t decide to move/hide the envelope, it will make it to Denver and she and Abbey can deposit into Alene’s account. 

There are many things I’ve noticed this trip with Alene that are foreign to me. One thing, and she’s not done this, that I remember, for all the years I’ve known her, is that she changes her mind on a whim. For instance, there are several containers of yogurt in the refrigerator. I’m not a yogurt lover and I know she does like it. But once I told her I don’t care for yogurt, she suddenly hates it. The next morning, and the next, she’ll ask me if I want a yogurt and I say “no thanks”. She’ll ask me if I like yogurt and I’ll say no. She’ll put hers back in the refrigerator and won’t eat it because “she doesn’t like it”. Of course this doesn’t pertain to everything, but there have been 6 or 7 things, not just food either, that she’s changed her mind based on what I say. It’s almost like she doesn’t remember if she likes things or not, but wants to go with the flow.

There’s still a lot of yogurt in the fridge. 

I think one of the traits of a dementia patient is that they have a difficult time focusing - like reading a book or watching a movie.  However, on the flip side, they obsess about things big time!  As Abbey puts it, Alene becomes “hyper-focused” on certain events or actions or conversations and can’t let them go. I’ll give examples as we spend more time together but for now, what I’ve noticed is that when this happens, the ONLY thing she hears, is the voice in her head. No matter what is said, or who says it, it doesn’t matter.  She only hears and pays attention to her head voice. It can be exhausting because that’s all she’ll talk about until there’s some sort of resolution she’s happy with. 

It’s 9:15 pm and there’s a big storm happening outside right now. Lightening, thunder, wind and heavy rain.  I don’t mind a storm, but please no tornados!

Watching a movie


Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

The Funny Farm

Image
 Arrived!  There’s a delay in posts to the blog because there’s no wi-fi here. I’ll do my best with this early in the morning. Also, I decided not to send out the link until I arrived. We got here Sunday late afternoon and Alene, Abbey and her friend Deena were waiting. Abbey and Deena left very early Monday morning for Alabama where Deena lives.  Abbey will fly back to Denver on the 18th. Alene looked very tired and a bit disheveled…she cried. We had dinner, visited and went to bed.  We were all up early Monday; Abbey and Deena left and Alene and I just talked and laughed until we decided to go into town (Ogalalla) for some groceries. The FF is 25 or so miles from town but we cross over the dam and it’s scary how low the water is. Also visible from the road is some of the damage that the tornado caused a couple weeks ago as well as damage from a recent hail storm. Alene said she’s got 22k in damage to the back of this place from hail. Now to Alene: On the plus side-there haven’t been
Read more

History and The Planning Stage

She said, “Why don’t you come and spend the summer with me at the Funny Farm ?” “She” is Alene, my dear friend of 45 years.  The “Funny Farm” is a place near Ogallala, NE that Alene and her husband purchased with her sister and brother-in-law about 25 years ago.  Their kids were young adults, their first grandchild was just born and everyone loved to water ski, jet ski and just play in Lake McConaughy. They had a blast and laughed till they cried. They decided that the perfect name would be The Funny Farm.  Jerry, Alene’s husband, died 15 years ago. Tragically, he had just retired. A couple years later, Alene bought her sister and brother-in-law’s share of the Funny Farm (I’ll shorten this going forward to FF.) Since then, Alene’s daughter, Abbey, and her two girls along with other family and friends have enjoyed time at the FF. Sadly, it’s probably time to sell for a variety of reasons but mostly due to the shortage of water.  I know Alene loves the peace being at the FF. It’s a simpl
Read more

Backward Steps

Image
 I abruptly ended the last post as we were leaving to go to a park where I could walk DanaRiley. I thought I’d be able to walk her around her but outside of their lawn area, the roads have stickers and DanaRiley had some in her pads the other day. So we went to the vacant sports complex and walked, ran my car through a car wash to get rid of some of the 5000 dead bugs on the window and front bumper, and we picked up a salad for lunch from Wendy’s.  Yesterday, Alene wondered aloud how it came to be that I was at the FF with her. If you read my first post, maybe you remember that she asked me to spend the summer here with her. I reminded her of that and she was stunned and remembers no part of those early conversations. But she believed me and we both laughed and said “crunch crunch” (her brain crunching). Well today she wanted to pay for the Wendy’s salads but didn’t bring her purse.  So I told her she could pay when we pick up a salad on our trip to California. She looked at me and slo
Read more