Mom's been terrible all day. Tonight she wouldn't take any of her meds. She couldn't tell me why and kept saying I was bugging her. The hospice nurse said there was really nothing I could do if she didn't want to take them, but she was hurting so much. She was sitting at the kitchen table for hours—she said she was hungry but then when I served her the soup she just sat there staring at it—rubbing her head. There was one pill the doctor prescribed today that he was hoping would help the pain in her eye, but she just would not take it. She wouldn't even let me take her temperature; she said she already had something under her tongue today. I finally called my cousin Debbie. Debbie managed to get her to take some of them, and also steered her back onto the sofa.

I feel so damn helpless. I expected her to be in pain. I didn't expect her to be irrational about taking her medications. She's had to take medicine all her life, for her heart and her arthritis. I know she is old and in pain, but it doesn't make sense.

I am not Prince Hamlet, nor was meant to be;
Am an attendant lord, one that will do
To swell a progress, start a scene or two,
Advise the prince; no doubt, an easy tool,
Deferential, glad to be of use,
Politic, cautious, and meticulous;
Full of high sentence, but a bit obtuse;
At times, indeed, almost ridiculous—
Almost, at times, the Fool.

The Fool. That's me, all right.

"Heroism consists in hanging on one minute longer..."

----------------------------------------------------------------
. . . . . noted and logged by Linda at 10:12:00 PM

Comments: Post a Comment