more on the VOD

So….

I spent the day and part of the evening yesterday at the hospital with my mother....yup...the VOD is sick again....

actually...I think it's more that the VOD is sick still

I came home from work Friday night to her complaining vehemently of a vicious headache that involved her sinuses, right ear and throat…keep in mind that she had surgery on her right eye 3 weeks ago…

As usual I suggested going to the Dr and she refused.

Yesterday being Saturday I got up with the best of intentions. I’d hoped to spend the day mucking out my pig sty….frankly I’ve come to the conclusion that the reason I have let my home get so far off track is that I’ve been depressed about my role in becoming sole caregiver of the VOD…and that coupled with the lack of action/response/assistance on the part of the bother and the blister and liberally added to by the virtual decimation of any semblance of camaraderie amongst those I thought were my friends and interim family have been more than enough to let me backslide to pigdom…but I digress…

Mom called me around 10 am to say that she was worse…I went over to see and she was swollen up like someone had punched her in the face.

She’s got an abscess again…more response to her refusal to do anything constructive about her teeth over the last 30 years…...only this time it’s different for a myriad of reasons. First of all, she’s 78 years old and in pitiful shape…Secondly, she’s diabetic, thirdly she gets no exercise, fourthly (is that a word?) she treats her diabetes like an “I’ll show you” game and insists on managing it with Scotch….(why that nurse told her that a shot of scotch at night would lower her blood sugar in the morning is beyond me)

So by 11 I’ve got her hog tied and we are off to the hospital (I’d call a couple of dentists offices and finally got to speak to a dentist who advised that she needed to go to emergency due to her age and health status)

At the hospital they put her on an IV of antibiotics and fluids to re-hydrate her…but in usual VOD form she didn’t tell us that she’d not eaten till 2pm …and by that time she had almost convulsive vomiting. (just to make things really interesting) The released her to come home around 8:45 pm but I’m thinking it may have been just to get her to shut up!

I don’t’ want to come off here as if I don’t love my mother….I do…but I am her daughter and thereby have a healthy sense of martyrdom.

I truly don’t get it…how can anyone that professes to be as conscious as she is about the way she looks walk around with rotten little stumps in her mouth when she can do something constructive about them?

Besides that…has she looked in a mirror lately? What the fuck is with the hair by Zippy the Clown do? But I digress again….

When we got home last night she refused to take the antibiotic and the anti inflamitory that the Dr had prescribed…never mind that I had to drive alla way into the city in the middle of the fuckin night to get the Rx’s filled cos both of the pharmacy’s out here close at 6 pm….She refused on the grounds that they were making her throw up.

“No mom…it’s not the pills….it’s the puss that’s making ya puke” I say as I start to finally lose my temper”.

So I head home to bed and start in for round 2 this morning.

“have you taken your antibiotic and anti inflamitory?”
“no they make me sick”
“did you read where it says on the print out that you need to have something in your stomach to take them”
“no I didn’t”
“well lets try some of that sticks n twigs bread of yours and see if ya can keep that down”

Jeeez eh?

Eventually I did lose my temper and it went something like this….”mom, you know I love you. And you know I don’t want to lose you…I get that you are going to die sometime…I just don’t want it to be this week.
“yes” she says
“so…you are a diabetic… you cannot continue to ignore that….and your teeth infections can cause all manner of systemic issues ie: heart problems, eye infections, ear infections, upset stomach, chronic cough etc etc etc.”

“well I know that the Dr’s say that”

“Dr’s are not always right mom…but they are not always wrong…in the big picture you are 78 years old and your health has been waning over the last couple of years….you say that your sister died cos she didn’t want to live any more…well I think she died cos she refused to go to the dr when she had all the signs of disease. She didn’t go to the dr till the tumor was so large she couldn’t ignore it anymore because she couldn’t get her god damn blouse buttoned up…and if your intent is to die…if that’s what you’ve made your mind up to do…the step in front of a fucking bus…don’t do this to your kids any more!”

Harsh eh?

Not the first time we’ve had this conversation…likely won’t be the last.

Now…on to the muckin out of the pigpen!

oh....on yet another aside...in keeping the VOD engaged yesterday and trying to take her mind offa her head we had quite the discussion about friendship....to which she suggests:

"your friends make their beds and they are the one's that have to lie in it....all of you have been takin in at one time or another...but some of you retained your manners while doing so....and some didn't...those that didn't will be the people that are now "lyin with fleas"

smart cookie my old doll!