Glasses piling up on the counter
Most little things are not important to care about. Our niece, Natalie, who cleans for us once said you are neat people in response to a comment from Cheryl about how quick and efficient she is at cleaning our place. She is right about that Cheryl and I are neat people generally. Clutter of newspapers and magazines will appear during the week but by weekend they are in the recycle bin. I get up and make the bed every day. While I am cooking dinner which is something I find myself doing more and more often these days, I put things in the dishwasher as I complete a task. We put the dishes in the dishwasher right after using them.
I’m not big on dusting which is why I hired Natalie to do that for me but since she has been dusting and cleaning every couple weeks, I have spent time spiffing up my office. Lately I have noticed a slight changes here and there with Cheryl’s behavior about neatness. It seems to be another sign of the degradation of mind caused by the Parkinson’s disease. Something else for the caregiver to do.
The inconsistency of PD is often confusing to me and always frustrating for Cheryl. I have mentioned this before. Paul McCartney has a new album out and on it a song titled “Seize the Day”. Absolutely one should seize the day but often with a parkie one must seize the moment. Her day might be disconnected from reality one moment and acutely aware twenty minutes later.
Mail… junk mail
As one gets older the junk mail increases. At least that is my perception. Cheryl used to be able to discriminate junk mail advertising and new credit card offers without opening the envelope. These days each envelope is opened and ruminated over. I think that’s how the Readers Digest started to get delivered. She may have asked me in a weak moment – Do you like Readers Digest? The subscription has been renewed until 2025 or so. Oh well. It was cheap.
Perpetual Christmas card list
Finally it is the end of an excruciating three weeks of getting the Christmas card list in order and sending them out. Cheryl has been looking at printing out and re-looking at the list of addresses she has from 2018, 2019 and edits from this year. This is all made so much harder by the fact that the original list of addresses is kept in an Access database which makes little sense to me. The list itself is a couple names short of 100. Both Aunt Alberta the last of my father’s core family and Aunt Ruth the last of my mother’s core family have passed away in the past twelve or thirteen months. Cheryl’s sister Janice is also gone, as is my brother Bill. Things need to be adjusted.
This exercise is more than just making sure that the address list is accurate. It is a time to think about those folks. Maybe a letter is needed for the card. Maybe a phone call is needed to get current. To me it’s about the list. To Cheryl it is more than that. The sewing machine becomes desk to finish off the last 30 or so cards that require extra thought. Lots of distractions jump in the way of sorting through these last cards.
Is this one of those “Aha” moments that a Facebook friend talks about? Aha! She is not able to focus her thoughts long enough to ask for help. When she asks for aid, it is very hard to understand when I must not push back when she wants to do it differently. I was not able to accept micromanagement in my working career either. This is frustrating. There are four more addresses to go.
We wrote a generic message to those who were left to go. We did this in the car riding to visit my son yesterday. Today when I asked her for the notes she took so I could write it up, she did not know what I was talking about. I had to be very specific in my discussion. But we got there. This is the note:
I have written this short note to everyone on my Christmas card list. My Parkinson’s disease is making typing and writing more difficult as time progresses. So, even though I would like to write a longer note, I cannot do it. I do want to find out how everyone is doing this year, so, if you are interested please send a text message to 5——–0 or email to me@Gmail.com and Paul will set up a Zoom meeting to keep in touch.
Thanks to you all and have a very Merry Christmas!
Cheryl
printed 6 to a page
I probably spend too much time trying to understand why I am angry (at myself) and frustrated (with myself) about a stupid list of addresses. I printed the labels – weeks ago. I just went in to check on the last four. She is handwriting an address for a fifth one to someone not on the list at all. Carpe Diem…
Questions
In a Facebook Parkinson’s disease caregiver’s group – a person asked in a posting if anyone else got driven crazy with questions. I am not. I wish I was. Occasionally she will wander down a rabbit hole and come out the other side anxious about loosing a piece of information, email draft, telephone number or address.
What day is this? Is Scott going with us? What do you think Jan wants on her pizza? Are we staying here or can we go home? Did that guy bring my pills yet? … I do get these sorts of questions.
There is very little straight line activity in Cheryl’s world. Her world has many distractions along the way.
I have read and re-read this several times. I am whining but there it is – a couple weeks in the life of a PD caregiver. It certainly is an odd disease. And it sucks!
This particular image has nothing whatever to do with anything I have written here but amusement parks used to have photo booths in them. Remember photo booths?
There is no value to looking backward in time. It is, however, enjoyable to reminisce about days gone by.
Adjunct_Wizard 