Going The Extra Mile

Going The Extra Mile

Mum had had a couple of days when she had hardly slept: during the first night, I went in at 2.30 a.m., and she was still awake, after which she was up and doing all day; the following night, Mum was still awake at 1.30 a.m., which was when I gave in and went to bed myself. Mum had been awake for over 36 hours, so it came as no surprise when she slept right through the next morning call, and was still fast asleep when the ladies came back for the lunch call at 12.30. 

Mum surfaced at 3.30; the ladies got her up and took her to the bathroom to wash her hands, and settled her back in the chair. I got the dinner on, and in the meantime, we washed her face, and she was able to brush her teeth as usual. 

It was a very difficult time, as Mum then became very hyper. She decided she could walk, and was determined to "get up and go." Of course, she can't walk, but we were so worried that in her firm belief she could go places by herself, she'd succeed in launching herself off the chair, and end up on the floor, so one of us stayed with her all the time. 

She made a couple of dozen attempts to stand up; each time she tried, she would realise she couldn't really manage to walk after all, so she would sit down; it seemed she couldn't remember that her actions from just a minute or two ago, had not been successful. The she started demanding the table be brought closer to her, so that she could press down on it, to help her to stand. All explanations that the table was not built for that purpose, and was just a lightweight one on wheels that we use for her dinner, fell on deaf ears. She became quite abusive, and insistent that that was all she needed. It was shades of "the stupid stool" all over again, from the time when she used a very low, three-legged stool to help her to walk, instead of a purpose-built walker - with he the disastrous result of her falling over the stool, and breaking her ankle. We didn't want anything like that to happen again, so we tried distraction, we tried the t.v., we tried to engage her in a magazine (she's going through a phase of tearing out all the pages!) but nothing seemed to work. 

I just got on with preparing and serving Mum's dinner and, at last, that seemed to work. She ate well, took her pills and had a nice cup of tea, and when the ladies returned at 7.30, she went with them to the bathroom. 

We carried on with supper - a slice of coconut cake and more tea, all of which went down as well, but Mum was still very agitated. Instead of turning them over one at a time like she usually does, Mum was sort of scrabbling at the pages of the magazine, with very "spiky" fingers - held out stiffly, and not being very effective in ripping pages out!

The ladies returned at 9.45, and succeeded in getting Mum back to bed, but throughout all this time, Mum was shouting for her mother, and for her brother, Johnny-Boy, to help her. One of the ladies, Sydney, who knows Mum so well, talked to her, and soothed her. Once Mum was lying down, Sydney knelt beside her, and in a very soft voice kept reassuring her, that they would find her Mum in the morning; but for now, it was time to rest, and her Mum needed to sleep as well. 

Because Sydney was so gentle, and spoke so softly, Mum had to stop shouting so that she could hear what Sydney was saying! and gradually Mum began to agree to all Sydney's suggestions, and accepted she'd wait until the morning. 

After all Sydney's gentle, patient, persuasion, in the end Mum did get off to sleep. Sydney did not rush Mum, and we knew she would take all the time it needed, to make sure Mum was calm and happy. It is such a comfort to know that, when Mum is having one of her episodes, we aren't alone - and that is really "going the extra mile!"