My heart goes out to all of you caught in the middle of this crazy weather slamming down. Yesterday, it poured buckets here and as my friend Haley was driving me to an appointment to pay end of life expenses for Mike and make said arrangements, the rain was so hard we could hardly see ahead of us on the I-5. I had been kept fairly busy in the morning with Mike. He is throwing things now. Nothing heavy, just stuff off his bedside table. I know it is not him per se but the situation that is unbalancing him, and it wasn’t until I was at the crematorium that I learned of the 25 plus earthquakes that hit Alaska.
The gentleman was kind enough to stop the procedure of form signing so I could check on the kids, and the grandkids to see if they are all okay. Dave (my oldest stepson) and his wife Elaine had left from Oregon to board a cruise ship to Hawaii, so their three kids were alone when it hit. They are all adults, but they are still scared as everything on their walls are now on the floor both in the house and in the cabins on the lower property. Everybody else is safe but shaken. Hoping the worst is over for them. They have enough on their hearts right now.
I don’t pay much attention to news these days (it’s all horrible, so I just ignore it); weather news is little different. So I don’t know how the rest of the world is faring. Earthquakes are, to me, like tornadoes, unpredictable, unreasoning and therefore terrifying. I am glad to read that all your relatives are safe.
I wish Mike’s last days were easier for him and you. Each one seems to bring its own problems. I am thinking of you.
Mike is back in Hospice for five days to be re-evaluated. Yesterday went more than crazy, it was nuts. His blood sugar was so high, he was out of his head. It wasn’t the morphine, I had laid off the dosage a few days ago, it was his 360 blood sugar. He was mumbling most of the day and playing with the bed controls all day long. He would fall asleep with the control in his hand, and up and down and back and forth the bed would go. I was so afraid that he would fall out of this bed that I tried to get the controller out of his reach, but his grip was strong and it was a wrestling match between us, so finally I just gave up.
Before they took him in transport, he asked me to get rid of the all the people in our living room. When I asked him what people were those? He looked at me like I was crazy and said “All the homeless people who pitched their tents in our front room. You don’t see them?” I told him, I would call the sherriff straightaway and have them evicted. What else could I say?
Last night, after he arrived, I called the nurses station and they expressed their sadness over his “altered state.” When I said his high blood sugar might be the problem she said it was a conglomeration of the heart not delivering enough blood, the waste of the kidneys building up inside of him along with all the stress his body is undergoing at this time to build this nest of confusion. They told me to just stay away, visit with my old friend Molly (she and I are buds from way back) she is getting together with me tomorrow. She flew into Portland today and we have a full day planned- haven’t seen her in over thirty years! So they have Mike now, and he has already called me four times spoiling for a fight. I just let him rant and rave, knowing that this is no longer the man I fell in love with- it is someone with a foot in two worlds and a battle he will overcome when God finally calls him home.
I was out of town this weekend, but I managed to see the news about the Alaskan earthquake. Glad that your family is okay.