After that near miss on Tuesday (see the "Dress Rehersal" post), we're both a little on edge about the state of Hunk's health. But it turned out to be a simple case of dehydration, so really there's not much at risk, immediately... Nonetheless,
Bitchy burst into my room at 5:30 to say Hunk was looking "funny" and she was fairly agitated. I said ok, let's go see, and I followed her into the living room where "they" had been watching a tv retrospective on swing music. (That's their era, and while he might be enjoying the music privately, she is the one who sings along and makes comments... his eyes rarely even gaze toward the screen.) She re-entered the room saying "Dear, how are you feeling?" in an anxious voice, barely giving him a nanosecond to respond before asking again.
His eyes were open, and his face looked drawn and tired, as it always does now. I asked him, "Dad, how's it going? You doing ok?"
He said in his slow, quiet way (a product of his Alzheimer's and Parkinson's diseases), "Yeah, I'm ok, I just want to go to bed."
"No!" Bitchy insists. "It's too early for that."
"Dad, don't you want some dinner first?" I suggested. He nods and says yes, that would be ok. So I turn to Bitchy and suggest that she focus on finishing making his dinner. (She had been fixing herself another vodka soda.)
My parents are members of "The Greatest Generation" who developed their routines in days of war and roses. All during my formative years they hosted raucus parties with loads of friends who smoke and drank and made lewd jokes and laughed very loudly. I've seen photos of myself dressed up as a serving maid, no more than 10 years old, circulating among the crowd, probably delivering food or emptying ashtrays. I can still hear the sounds I fell asleep to, shrill and boisterous, or quiet, slurred speech later on .
Once us kids were gone on our own, and Hunk was nearing retirement, they turned their interest to sailing, hosting raucus parties on the water with a small group of sea buddies. Their one unbreakable rule was that, at five o'clock wherever they were, the anchor went down and the cocktail flag went up. They might have been drinking martinis at that time...
They did give up smoking cigarettes, long after I'd been hooked. So nowadays they do not indulge in that stinking habit. (And I gave it up after about 12 years.) But drinking is sacrosanct. I've been to many, many doctors visits with them in these last two years, and invariably Bitchy will state with pride that she intends to keep her cocktail hour intact until the day she dies.
Of course, it's no longer just an hour. Now she puts the big bottle of cheap vodka on the counter precisely at 4:00 and pours them both their first shots, with club soda and ice. And she continues to "freshen up" their drinks until about 6:00 when she starts to cook or sometimes serve their dinner. At which point the jug wine comes out of the cupboard and accompanies the microwave heated meal. Then, up until about 8 months ago, when they both started running out of steam before Wheel of Fortune, they had snifters of cheep Canadian brandy as a "nightcap."
Now I've been noticing that Hunk never asks for any of this stuff, it's always Bitchy's serve. And even though the doctors and the nurses all confirm that alcohol is dehydrating, and even though she's been cautioned that both she and Hunk are not getting enough fluid, and even though she starts behaving in a depressed way after about an hour and a half, making lackluster efforts at preparing their meals, and making comments that are maudlin or slurred speech, she does not tolerate any suggestion that they reduce their intake!
So tonight, when she came in all upset about Hunk's "state" and I saw it was fairly good, I suggested that maybe the problem was really a little too much vodka. "Ridiculous!" she hollered. "He's hardly had any!!"
My response was "No, no, not him.... you! maybe you've had too much, and you can't see that he is actually in pretty good shape, considering. His voice is loud, his sentences are coherent, he's doing fine."
"The hell," she shouted back. "How dare you say that to me! You just get the hell out, talking to me that way," (or words to that effect) etc, etc, etc....
...
So I retreated to my room, as Hunk called her to his chair to soothe her feathers. About 15 minutes later I tiptoed out to get their evening meds ready. With a cheery voice (don't think it sounded artificial...) I said "Ok, here are your nighttime meds! Dad, here's the one that's been cut in half... Mom, here are yours." I put the cups of pills down next to the glass of water, and went around the island into the kitchen to start cleaning.
"How about some of this nice Boston Cream Pie for dessert?" I asked. Mom in her grouchy/depressed voice said "alright." So I cut some and brought it over with their tea. I was cleaning as I heard her directing his every move, "Don't take such a big bite, have some tea, take your pills, no, put them all in your mouth." I look over and she has her hand on his, forcing the little cup up higher into his face, trying to tip in the pills. It's not working, but she keeps pushing.
I go over and say "Here Dad, can I pour these pills in your hand, and you can pop them all in your mouth, like usual?" He gives it up, I pour them, he pops them, and drinks a little sip of water. Been having trouble swallowing the larger pills recently, so she said to just stop giving them. Luckily they were vitamins, not prescription meds. I say to keep drinking the water, ok? and go back to cleaning.
"Hey, did you know there were potatoes in this pan on the stove?" Bitchy said oh, just put them in a box in the fridge. I said ok, I could fry them up in the morning with some onion for breakfast. Then I see the toaster oven is on and comment. "Hey, what's in here?" Bitchy said it must belong to me. "No.... I don't have anything cooking in here," and I look -- it's the pork chops I thought she was heating for their dinner. "What did you guys eat? This is your meat." She gets up and looks, "No that's potato," she insists. "No, it's meat," I tell her, "taste it."
We go back and forth a bit with her insisting it's potatoes and me knowing it was meat, until I finally suggest that maybe she is starting to lose it.
"Yes," she agrees, but with a lot of rancor. "So don't push me!" "Ok, fine," I back off....
Then dad starts coughing and clearing his throat a lot and she starts badgering him to tell her what's the problem now. I go over to suggest he take another sip of water, assuming that he's still having trouble swallowing the pills. She sees him gesture around his mouth and assumes he is complaining about something in his teeth. So now we start disagreeing about that, but with her insisting that my "job" here is to help dad, and my insisting that was exactly what I was trying to do, and her saying I wasn't very good at it -- and of course, dad confirms that yes, it was the pill caught in his throat, but not until after Bitchy really loses it and tells me to shut the hell up and get out. Or words to that effect.
Dad says he wants to talk to me for a minute and she voluntarily leaves the room. He tries to convince me that a good sailor will ride the rough seas and not fight it, and will come out the winner. Or words to that effect. Primarily, though, he wants there to be no yelling and if that means I should agree when I have a different opinion, then that's what I should do.
I ask, what about this physical situation, where she thinks it's something in your teeth and I think it's a pill stuck in your throat... one of us will be right and one will be wrong. What do I do in that situation? He says I should just leave.
Leave the state? Leave their home? Is that what he wants? No. Just stop letting it get to the yelling stage... Or words to that effect.
sigh.
Somehow we get through the rest of the evening with me trying to help him with the usual tasks of getting his teeth cleaned with his Waterpik, power toothbrush, and rinsing his bridgework. Then getting him in his pajamas, after she got him changed into a new Depends, with the booster pad that I recently purchased, to try and belay the overnight leakage that is starting to become a routine.
sigh.
Then I came in here to sit and think about how I can leave (find them another care-giver and leave) without feeling awfully guilty.
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