Looking After Daddy

I'm not really a part of the sandwich generation as my children are all grown and independent. But for two years now I have helped to care for my father. Fortunately, I have help from my wife Sharon and son Michael, who lives nearby.

Daddy is now 89 years of age and legally blind (although he has some vision.) He has serious short term memory loss, and other symptons of encroaching dementia. Even after the onset of blindness, he was able to live more or less independently for several years. But after surgery to repair an aoritic aneurysm two years ago, it was clear that he could no longer live alone.

Michael, a single father with a preschool age son, had space available in his house, while my house was smaller and space was a bit tight. So we all agreed that Daddy should live in Michael's house. He has a room to himself with a private bathroom. My house is five houses away, or about 500 feet. With his rolling walker, Daddy can walk between the houses on his own, and often does.

I walk over to Michael's house each morning and help Daddy get ready for the day. He can shower and use the toilet without help, but I usually help him get dressed. If I am later than usual, or he wakes up unusually early, he can dress himself. But it is difficult, and he prefers to have help. I prepare breakfast for Daddy and myself, while Michael takes care of his son, Cian, and himself. Usually it is orange juice, coffee, and cereal with soy milk. Plus morning pills. I make up his bed and take care of his laundry.

On week days, Daddy goes to the Westshore Senior Center during the day. Michael takes Daddy to the senior center and Cian to his daycare/preschool. Both places are fairly close to Michael's office. Usually Sharon picks up Daddy from the senior center at about 3:30 and brings him back to Micheal's house, where he naps until dinner time. He walks to my house and has dinner with us.

Daddy can manage eating fairly well. I serve his plate and cut up anything that needs it, but he can usually handle feeding himself. In the evening there is the ritual checking of the blood pressure. If it is too low, he doesn't get the blood pressure medication. But he always gets the other four kinds of pills.

Daddy's contribution to dinner is to "ask the blessing." I remember hearing the same mealtime prayer since I was four years old:

Han Father, we thank you for this food.
Bless it to the nourishment of our bodies.
Guide and direct us,
and forgive us of our sins,
we ask in Christ's name.
Amen.

"Han Father" was a mystery to me for years. But, as a little kid, there are lots of things that grownups say that you don't understand, and you just take them in stride. It never occurred to me to ask about it. I must have been a teenager before I realized that he was really saying "Heavenly Father" and just getting through the "Heavenly" part rather quickly.

Recently he has started to say "Bless it to the use of our bodies." One of the signs of encroaching dementia. He knows what he means to say, but can't pull up the right word.

After dinner, Daddy walks back to Michael's house. Usually I walk with him. Sometimes Michael and Cian walk with him, and I go over later. I always help him get ready for bed and turn down the covers for him. Then I dial the phone so that he can talk to his "girlfriend" back in Bradenton, for a few minutes. If the laundry basket is full, I take it back to my house.

Daddy annoys all of us by asking the same questions over and over, and telling us things that we already know again and again. I annoy him by grumbling at him for doing that. And I am typically not very satisfactory as his valet. I take too long to bring him a toothpick when he asks for one each night and to bring him a kleenex when he needs it and then to bring him the trash can so that he can throw it away. I often leave him sitting alone while I work at my computer in the next room, which he clearly resents.

Daddy's hearing is not too good, and especially his understanding. He doesn't hesitate to interrupt a conversation and ask for an explanation. Sometimes I explain and sometimes I just grumble at him for interrupting.

I don't mean to whine. I am well aware that the burden of caring for an elderly parent could be far worse. (http://newoldage.blogs.nytimes.com/) Right now it's really no worse than caring for a toddler, just not as much fun.

Bumper Sticker

Seen in a Bradenton Publix parking lot.

A Snake in the House

I found a snake in the house today. It was tiny, perhaps eight inches long and an eighth of an inch in diameter. Normally I take a live and let live approach to snakes. I encounter one in the yard ever so often, and always let it escape, or try to help it escape. Typically it disappears into the undergrowth right away, and I go about my business. These snakes have always appeared to be nonvenomous. But the tiny snake in the house looked like a rattlesnake.

It had markings that I associate with a rattlesnake, and its behavior was quite different from that of the snakes that I have encountered outside. Rather than slithering away as quickly as possible, it took on a defensive posture, raising its head into the air with about a third of its length, and shaking the tip of its tail as if it had rattles, which it didn't.

I decided right away that I had to kill it if I could. It goes against my nature to kill any living thing. I am not radical about this, but usually animals and bugs that intrude into my house are simply escorted to the door and dispatched into the back yard. This did not seem like the right approach with a rattlesnake, even a baby one.

I tried to kill it as humanely as possible. I found a three foot long two by four in the garage, which I used to hold the snake down, and lopped off its head with a large knife. (A garage knife, not a kitchen knife.) Even with me looming over it with the two by four in hand, it didn't try to escape. As I positioned the two by four so as to get a good angle with the knife, it struck at the board multiple times.

It was a clean cut, like a guillotine. In a millisecond the deed was done. Of course we don't really know how much pain an animal (or person) suffers in such a death. I want to believe it was over quickly.