General Update #255 - Thursday, December 24, 2020

Dusty arrived to farmhouse ~9:30 a.m. after picking up Christmas Eve dinner supplies and remaining Christmas morning meal components from Moscow. Found Joyce awake and sitting in her recliner without oxygen line in place. Dusty asked Joyce if she had eaten anything and she said she did not. Evidence that Joyce had taken herself to the bathroom and had a bowel movement. Joyce declined shower, Dusty informed her it would happen later today as she had refused so strongly yesterday.

Joyce reported that she "had been cleaning and putting things away" around the house to prepare for Christmas. Joyce reported that she had slept in her bedroom last night, moving herself there after Carol departed for the night. Joyce given newspaper to read while Dusty prepared breakfast.

9:55 a.m. - BP 141/75, pulse 76. BGL @ 204. Dusty asked if Joyce she had eaten anything again, citing it is important to know for her health log because they have to explain the high blood sugar level spike if she had not eaten anything. Joyce confessed to eating half of the remaining donut in the box before she threw it away. Dusty explained the importance of tracking and telling the family caregivers about food she eats when she is not around, especially now that she is not on the Metformin. 

10 a.m. - Breakfast (1/2 banana, 2 Eggo waffles with butter and syrup, V8 juice). Morning medication. Breakfast finished by 10:35 a.m. Napping began.

12:10 p.m. - Joyce woke herself from napping and requested a nutritional shake "to help get her going." 

12:13 p.m. - Bathroom trip. Urinary incontinence. Remainder of urine passed. Replaced diaper pad insert. Shower declined, citing fatigue. Joyce passed a bowel movement and made a mess of herself attempting to self-clean after waiving Dusty off. Dusty informed her that they will need to put her into the shower. Joyce became despondent and stated to Dusty that she was "just going to sit" on the toilet. Joyce required assistance in cleaning. Joyce unable to walk under her own power and moved onto walker with assistance from Dusty who wheeled her back out to kitchen by 1:04 p.m. Bathroom sink, floor, and toilet seat riser sanitized by Dusty.

Joyce became panicked about purchasing the bacon for Christmas. Dusty confirmed with Joyce that Carol had purchased it and it was in the farmhouse's refrigerator already.

Carol arrived to farmhouse to assist with cleaning of farmhouse and Christmas preparations. Joyce remained seated upon walker until her leg quit hurting her and she could rise and hobble onto her recliner with assistance from Dusty. Joyce declined lunch. Lunch negotiations began. 

~1:30 p.m. - Lunch (1/2 peanut butter and honey sandwich, 1/2 banana). 2 Tylenol.

Carol departed farmhouse ~3:05 p.m. 

Joyce declined bathroom trip, began napping.

4:03 p.m. - Bathroom trip. Urinary incontinence. Joyce released her bladder early while moving to sit onto toilet riser. Joyce became hostile when Dusty reminded her that they were going to shower during this trip into the bathroom. Joyce reported having issues with constipation. Joyce requested to be left to sit on the toilet while Dusty sanitized her shoes. 

Jess arrived to farmhouse ~4:25 p.m.

Joyce had difficulty passing bowel movement, requested additional time to sit on toilet. Joyce had bleeding from her rectum, possibly from bowel movement. Dusty will monitor. Joyce unable to move under her own power, was seated onto walker and moved to kitchen by Dusty ~5:28 p.m. 

Joyce transitioned to her recliner by 5:48 p.m. 

Joyce expressed concerns that Dusty had thrown away her sourdough yeast when it was (re)discovered by Joyce that Dusty had cleaned out the refrigerator earlier in the summer of spoiled food before Joyce transitioned back to living at the farmhouse.

7:32 p.m. - Bathroom trip. Urine and small bowel movement passed. Joyce released her bladder early. Toilet seat riser sanitized. Jess examined Joyce's wound and determined that Joyce has a hemorrhoid and had cut herself with her fingernail to the left of her anal sphincter. Joyce's sphincter is swollen. Dusty will bring out hemorrhoid cream to treat it tomorrow when he returns to farmhouse. 

Joyce slept in her recliner while Jess and Dusty continued prep for Christmas morning.

Dusty and Jess departing farmhouse ~12:28 a.m., returning tomorrow ~8 a.m.

Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

General Update #92

07/24/2020 Dusty missed calling Joyce due to personal schedule conflicts. 07/25/2020 Dusty called in to check with Joyce at 1 p.m. following a training session he attended for Scouts BSA. Lunch today was spaghetti "with a delicious meat sauce," a side of veggies and dessert was vanilla pudding. Joyce confessed that she might not have remembered it had the tray not still been sitting beside her with the remnants of the meal. She had today off from physical therapy but did have speech/mental therapy. She said that some of the questions that the speech therapists ask her are "laughable" because they ask her if she has lived in rural areas and then ask her about what she thinks living in the rural areas are like after already verifying she lives in the country. Dusty suggested that the therapists are trying to use something basic, like knowledge of Joyce living in the country, to then ask questions about living in the country to see how Joyce recalls information or rela...
Read more

General Update #95

07/27/2020 Dusty called Joyce to check in and wish her a good night while he was preparing dinner for Jess. Joyce was alert and quite talkative. Dusty reviewed the plan for the telehealth appointment scheduled for tomorrow and Joyce stated that no one had told her that was occurring. Dusty suggested to Joyce that they were going to visit with her tomorrow morning ahead of the appointment based on what Rachael had told him and Joyce concurred. Dusty questioned Joyce about her decline of participating in the urinary incontinence therapy as well as her reported lack of performance with physical therapy. Joyce stated that she had been looking forward to the urinary incontinence therapy work but according to her they only spoke to her once about it and then never again approached her about it.  Joyce felt like they don't do enough PT with her even though she wants to do more PT. She cited today that they only had her walk back and forth using parallel bars for a few minutes before givin...
Read more

General Update #85

Dusty and Jess called Joyce in the evening on July 4 to wish her a happy Independence Day.  Joyce reported that her pain levels were fairly low, even after doing upper body physical therapy work earlier in the day. She was a little disappointed with her meals served. She had been hoping that they would serve hot dogs and potato salad for lunch or dinner but none were to be had. Joyce could not recall what she ate for any of her three meals she was served. At the time of the phone call Joyce had not seen any fireworks out her north facing window but she could hear several concussive blasts of fireworks being set off near Dusty and Jess' apartment.  Joyce said that she did not see or hear the Let Freedom Ring Tour (a B-25 Mitchell, a F-7F Tigercat, a P-47 Thunderbolt, a P40N Warhawk, and a P51D Mustang), which was sponsored by Hangar180 , fly overhead around 5:45 p.m. but she might've missed it most likely owing to having been napping at the time. She stated that she was excited...
Read more