Trying Times |

March 17, 2016January 2, 2018

Boredom

After a couple of good days, Kate has fallen back into her slump. She has been spending almost all of her time on her iPad. I don’t think I have seen her on her computer for several days. When we have gone to Panera the past few times, she has not taken her computer, something that she has routinely done up until now. I may ask her about this. I suspect that she must have found that she is not able to work with it as well as she has done in the past. If she loses the ability to work on her photos, that is another low blow. I want to put together a photo album of our marriage and have asked her if she could help with that. She indicated that she would. I may suggest that we do a little of that this morning or afternoon. I am also going to call a couple in my Sunday school class and see if we can visit with them this afternoon. He is on dialysis and doesn’t get to visit us much. He has been with us only a couple of times in the past year.

’Kate’s mood affects me. When she is up, I am up. When she is down, I am down. I am going to have to work harder to occupy her in meaningful things. I have a list of things I am going to attempt. These include involvement with the Shepherd’s Center, a seniors educational program that meets at a Methodist not too far from us. I am also going to see if there are some volunteer activities that we might do together.

March 7, 2016January 2, 2018

Another Strange Incident

I got home from Rotary about 30 minutes ago. Kate was seated in her chair in her office working a jigsaw puzzle on her iPad. I can’t remember all the dialog, but this is what happened. She was relieved to see me and asked if she could come out now. I was puzzled. She indicated that she thought I had told her to stay in the back of the house. I apologized and told her I never intended for her to remain in the back of the house. She was relieved but also a little peeved with me and told me she almost went to her bathroom to sit in the tub just to get out of the room.

I turned on the stereo in the family room. In a minute she came in with her iPad and her sweater and looked ready to go. It turned out that she thought we were going to lunch. I learned this while we were in the car. She had wanted to go to Chalupes. When she realized we were not going to lunch, she said Panera was OK.

A moment later she said something about “their” coming to see us and that she was going to say something about what they had said about her mother. I asked if she were talking about a couple in our church. She said she was. Once again she said something about what they had said about her mother. I told her I was unaware of anything they had said. She was annoyed. It appeared that she felt I knew but couldn’t remember. When I asked what they had said, she said, “”Let’s just not talk about it.” That is pretty much her standard response to almost anything I ask.

3:34 pm

We are back home now. I wanted to add that this is one of those afternoons when she is feeling quite bored. She just looks depressed. Unfortunately, I didn’t take the iPad’s charger, and her battery ran down; so we came home about 30 minutes ago. I offered to show her my slide show of our trip to Africa. I thought it might interest her. She agreed, but her body language indicated she didn’t have that much interest. Finally, she came into the family room where I was setting up the show. After she sat down, she indicated that she was sleepy. I asked if she would like to rest before seeing the show. She said yes and is now lying down in our bedroom.

Tonight is a reception in connection with an upcoming symphony concert. We usually attend but have missed the last 2 or 3. I had thought we might go tonight. When I mentioned it to her this morning, she indicated she didn’t want to go. It was actually a little stronger than that. She was really indicating that she was not going.

February 16, 2016January 3, 2018

“I’m So Frustrated With Myself.”

Earlier I neglected to report that as we were pulling out of the garage to go to lunch, Kate said, “I’m so frustrated with myself.” This was after several things she had done as she was getting ready to leave. I said, “I know you are frustrated.” Then I asked her if she would like to talk about it. She said no as she always does. She just doesn’t like to talk about her Alzheimer’s.

A few minutes ago as she was coming into the bedroom for the night, she said she wanted to thank me. She said she was falling apart and appreciated my taking care of her. I said, “I know you’re frustrated. I want to help you.” She said, “That means a lot, that you want to do it, and I know you do.” When she says something like this, it makes me want to do all the more to help her. On the other hand, I can find it frustrating myself when she won’t let me help. For example, I wanted to give her a Benadryl this morning. She asked if it would make her sleepy. I told her it would. She didn’t want to take it. This afternoon she has been having more trouble with her nose. I told her I was going to give her a Benadryl before she went to bed and that I wish that I had gotten her to take one earlier. She agreed, but earlier she didn’t want to take it. It is hard to know what to do, when to push and when to back away.

February 9, 2016January 4, 2018

Problem Sleeping

I woke up at 3:16 this morning and was unable to get back to sleep. I finally got up about 4:45. My mind has been absorbed with Kate’s deteriorating condition. I am working harder to keep her entertained. I find it both challenging and discouraging. For the first time since I have been keeping this journal I find myself recognizing that she is entering that stage of Alzheimer’s that people most commonly associate with the disease. She is still able to hide her illness from most people, but she is becoming more detached from life than in the past. She hasn’t gone to church in a couple of months. I passed up the past two symphony concerts because I knew she would not be interested. I have declined a couple of other engagements because I knew it was not her thing.

More importantly for me, her whole mood has been changing over the past 2 months. I don’t see any spark of joy at anything. She can get up for certain social situations. She did that in Miami. She displayed some of that on the cruise but not much. She just doesn’t seem to be happy. I keep looking for the right word to describe her. She is listless, forlorn, bored.

At the same time, she is also more irritable with me. She snaps at me when I haven’t done anything to justify her reaction. She sees this herself I am sure. I say that because she often follows such reactions by telling me she loves me or grabbing my hand and holding it fondly.

I also see more moments in which she has imagined things that haven’t happened. Late yesterday afternoon I walked into our bedroom, and she said, “I am so angry.” I asked her why. She said because someone had said something (I don’t remember what that something was, but she was specific.) about her mother. When I questioned her further, I learned that she thought I had told her about someone who had said this about her mother. I assured her that I hadn’t said anything like that. She was puzzled and finally said, “Maybe I imagined that.” She has had several of these situations in the past week.

January 27, 2016January 5, 2018

Erratic Behavior

About 35-40 minutes ago, Kate said she was hungry. I told here her we would be going to dinner around 5:30 but we could go get a slice of pizza or something else if she would like. She indicated that she would. A few minutes later she got out of bed to get ready. Instead of putting on her clothes, she got into the shower. When she came out, she said, “OK, now it’s all yours.” It was as though she thought we were getting ready for dinner not just to get something to address the immediate sense of hunger. She got her clothes and sat on the bed. Then she said she was feeling hungry. She seemed as though I had been rushing her. I hadn’t said or done anything that should have given her that impression. I told her that I didn’t mean to rush her. She held up her hand and stopped me. This is a common pattern when she doesn’t want me to say anything. Before getting dressed, she said, “I just need to rest a minute. OK?” I told her that would be fine. I am going to let her rest as long as she wants. If she takes too long, I will have her dress for dinner rather than just putting on what she had been wearing earlier. Tonight is formal dining; so it will require a little more preparation for both of us.

December 24, 2015January 9, 2018

Not as Good as Yesterday

This morning while we were eating breakfast at the hotel in Fort Worth, I received a call from my former sociology mentor at TCU, Arthur Cotti, telling me that Kate had left her sunglasses in his apartment when we visited him yesterday afternoon. I told him we would drop by on the way out of town. We had just bought the sunglasses at Walgreens just before lunch as we were headed to meet the Greeleys.

Kate had wanted to drive by the house where she had lived when she was a young child; so we did that. We saw the owner getting a few things out of her car and told her that had been Kate’s home from 1941 to 1949. She told us she and her husband had bought it in 1991. I had my camera out and had planned to take a picture, but she talked so long and her husband came outside. I felt we needed to move on to my mentor’s place. After I pulled away, Kate said, “You didn’t take a picture for me.” She was obviously upset. I told her that we had taken a picture on the last trip to Texas. That didn’t set well. The irony is that she had never said anything about taking a picture; so I thought it was only something I had thought about. I would definitely have done it if she had said something.

When we got to Arthur’s place, I noticed that she had her iPad in her arms and suggested that she leave it in the car. She was annoyed and gave me a dirty look and got out of the car with the iPad. Arthur was sitting in the lobby waiting for us. He gave her the sunglasses. Then we had someone take a couple of pictures of us with him. We then left for Lubbock. Early in the trip (but too late to turn around), Kate asked, “Where is my iPad?” I told her it was probably back at Arthur’s. She kept looking and suggested it might be in the trunk. I told her we hadn’t opened the trunk when we left Arthur.

At a stop, I called back and left messages for Arthur and David, the man who had taken our pictures. Later, David called to say that he had found the iPad and had given them to Arthur. We will pick them up next Wednesday when we are there.

During almost the entire trip Kate was still unhappy with me about not getting a picture of her old house. I told her I was sorry and would make sure we did so next week.. That didn’t seem to carry much weight. She hardly spoke a word until after lunch. She has been depressed over leaving her iPad as well as being angry at me. As we were entering a McDonald’s to get something to drink early, she said that I wanted to control everything she wants to do (referring to my not taking a picture of her 34th street house). She has rested about an hour and a half. I am sure she will come around when we meet Kevin and his family at later this afternoon.

December 2, 2015January 17, 2018

A Low Moment

Kate and I are in our bedroom right now. She had been working on her computer this afternoon and suffered some frustration as she tried to do some things. I know that one of them was trying to find her mother’s recipe for cheese grits. It appeared that she was blaming herself because she could not find it on the computer. I did a search and could not bring it up. To me that is an indication that it is not on the computer. It’s not Kate’s fault.

After this she ran into something else but didn’t want to talk about it. I asked if I could help in some way. She said no. She looked as though she were miserable which makes me want to do something to help. I offered several options. She wasn’t interested in anything. I suggested that we go back to the bedroom when she said she was sleepy. I told her we could turn on some episodes of Dick van Dyke. She agreed unenthusiastically to accept that offer. When I turned on the TV, CNN was reporting on a new shooting in San Bernardino, CA, in which 14 people were killed and another 14 injured. She wanted to leave the TV on the news which I did. It continues now, and Kate is under the covers resting with her eyes closed though not asleep (I assume).

October 31, 2015January 17, 2018

Signs of Frustration. Mine not Hers.

First a little background. As long as 10 years ago, a neighbor down the street sent a message to everyone on our street asking us not to put our yard trash on the street until near the time of our weekly pick up on Thursday. Kate was initially offended by it but has tried to abide by the neighbor’s plea. In the past couple of years she has been especially rigid about it, not wanting to put the trash out until Thursday morning. I have never cared for this because it meant that we (either Kate or I) had to be the ones to get it out because the woman who cuts the grass and cleans up the flower beds wouldn’t be here early enough on Thursday and often comes on Tuesday or Wednesday, sometimes Friday. She came on Thursday morning this time after the trash men had already picked up. The leaves are beginning to fall, and the trash piled on the street was at least 12 feet long.

This is not a good week for this to occur because today is Halloween. We have a lot of trick-or-treaters. Kate wanted all the trash moved. I originally suggested that we leave it, but she was insistent. It is also something she didn’t forget. I never volunteered to move it, but she got the impression that I had said I would. After lunch today, she said she would meet me outside which I took to mean that we would work together to move the trash to the back of the house. When we got out there, she began raking up some trash that was in the yard. I started to load up the trash in an old garbage cart that I could roll to the back of the house. It turned out that she wanted me to put it in the flower bed on the side of the house. This is one of the areas that I have had our yard person cleaning up. To be more specific some of this trash has come out of the flower beds, and I didn’t like the idea of putting it back just after she had removed it two days ago. She said she would step aside, and I could put it wherever I wanted which I did.

She started picking leaves off the shrubs she does almost daily. As I was taking one load of trash to the back of the house I noticed that she had left some trash from the front flower bed on the sidewalk, a place she usually put trash. I suggested she could clean that up while I was moving the trash from the street. She seemed quite willing to do it. I saw her with a broom, and she was sweeping the front porch. It had looked pretty clean to me, but I thought she just wanted to start there and then move along the walkway to the driveway. Later I walked by and saw the trash was still on the walkway. It turns out that she had finished her work and gone in to take shower. I ended up cleaning up that trash too. At the time I felt like saying something to her but decided against it. I know that she didn’t realize what she had done (or not done). I simply didnt think there was anything to gain by saying something other than the personal satisfaction of telling her.

I relay this story to make sure that the reader knows that I do experience some frustration even when I accept what she has done or not done. It is also another example of how this disease can change normal interaction. There are many things like this that occur, but I try not to say anything at all.

Something else that bothered me. I changed clothes before going out to clean up the trash. She is not sensitive to this at all. She was dressed very nicely when we went to lunch. I commented on how nice she looked. She wore a beautiful garnet turtleneck sweater and a nice pair of black slacks. When she went to clean up, she wore those same clothes. At one point I saw her sitting on the edge of a flower bed where she was pulling weeds or something like that. She has so few clothes that are not soiled in any way that I hate to see her messing up the ones that are in good shape.