A Move to Castle Yonder

Because of Rocky's illness and hospitalization, I have decided I can only keep up one blog. So if you have been following this one, please become a follower of http://mimirock-castleyonder.blogspot.com/


The Old Crone

More About Snuggies

     On one of the first days Rocky was in the hospital, Geoff or I asked whether we could bring in the Snuggie to cover Rocky since even in an 85 degree heated room he complained of being cold.


     "Of course," we were told by a female nurse, "you can bring in anything you want from home."


     I duly carried the Snuggie in to Rocky the next day, but didn't put it on him because Geoff, who was already there, said, "They won't let him have the Snuggie!"


     What? But yesterday, they said he could!?! "I don't understand why," Geoff said, "but they said he couldn't have it."


     Shortly after, a male nurse named Al came in. "Hey," I said, "how come we can't let Rocky have his Snuggie?"


      "Oh, no," Al said, "We don't allow Snuggies. They are too tight around the waist, and cause all kind of problems. We don't use any kind of diapers here."


     "Our Snuggie isn't a diaper," I said just as Al happened to notice our Snuggie still in the bag on the floor. "Oh," he gasped! "A Snuggie! I thought you were talking about those Snuggie diapers. Those aren't Snuggies, are they?" he realized, "those are Huggies!"


      Al gave permission for Rocky to be covered up by his Snuggie. And I gave Al permission to tell the story to the other nurses all day long.




The Old Crone

A Snuggie For Rocky

     Little did I know when I wrote about Snuggies last month that I soon would be using the Snuggie we received from Rocky's son, Geoff, for Christmas. I debated whether to send it to the Snuggies For Seniors campaign, and decided to keep it and send them $15.


     On March 17, Rocky went to the ER with a slight fever and exacerbation of his COPD. Two days there and he fell and cracked three ribs. It was all downhill from there.


     The meds they gave him made him delusional and a little hard to handle. Finally he reached discharge stage and because we didn't think I could do what he needed here at home, he was transferred to a skilled nursing facility. The first night there, he had such abdominal pain that they sent him to the ER and he was re-admitted to the hospital again, this time with an infected gall bladder. 


     More pain, more meds, more delusions, lots of talk about dying. We prepared for him to die, and reviewed his desires about internment and memorial service. I read the 23rd Psalm to him and he asked me to read more Psalms. I read Tabori's poetry from The Shores Of Eternity, a collection of positive poems about the wonder of dying.


      The Hospice folks came in and evaluated him and he qualifies. He stopped talking about dying and said he wants to live as long as he can as long as he can be comfortable. Finally, on April 5 his son, Geoff, and I decided an appropriate discharge was to move Rocky to the Select Specialty hospital, which is independent from Bristol Regional Hospital but leases space from them on the 5th floor. 


     On April 6, Rocky was transferred. He is no longer getting morphine. His gall bladder has been drained since he is not a candidate for surgery because of his COPD. He has received
lots of antibiotics and will receive even more since he now has developed two more infections and is in isolation. As of today, Geoff and I have to wear a gown and rubber gloves when we're in his room. Hope that doesn't last too long.


     The goal for him that we've all agreed on is for him to gain strength and the ability to take care of his bathroom needs and walk short distances in the house. Then he will be discharged to our home with Hospice following.


     Please pray for us.              The Old Crone

Snuggies For Seniors

     Did you receive a Snuggie for Christmas that you aren't sure you will ever use? We did! Here's an opportunity for you to donate it, as long as it is still like new, to a woman who is collecting Snuggies to donate to Seniors living in nursing homes.


     Click on the Snuggies For Seniors gadget posting on the left side bar of this Blog. It will take you to the website where you can get all the details. Despite all the jokes that have been made about them, seems like
Snuggies are ideal for folks who are confined to wheelchairs or who must sit for long periods of time and heat is turned down or air conditioning is turned up.


     I'm not sure what we'll do with ours. The Old Curmudgeon (I'm changing his name from The Old Coot) does use a wheelchair and he often complains of feeling cold. (He doesn't have the padding that helps keep me warm.) So we might make a donation of $15 which the website will help us do, too. Check it out!


The Old Crone


     


     

Don't Miss the Boat!

Here's why the dinosaurs became extinct!

Memorials & Funerals

     In my last post, I discussed buying a graveplot in the Indiana cemetery where all my family is buried. 


     In this post I want to emphasize how important it is to make pre-arrangements for your own funeral or memorial. I have been discussing this with a storytelling friend of mine who is a "civil celebrant" in another state. He says, "It's astonishing to me how little attention we pay to the arrangements for our own funerals. It should be a part of estate planning and someone who understands ritual and story--whether a minister or civil celebrant--should say the words and as the ancients did, celebrate the songs that have been sung." 

I believe that the "songs that have been sung" is a metaphor for the life events the deceased participated in. 


My friend said he had recently attended the wake for a jazz organist, and the jazz community who was present took turns playing the organ. Then two more musicians joined, one of them playing the alto sax and the other playing the trombone, and the wake turned into a final blues melody of "I'll be seeing you."


     My friend went on to comment, "Now that's the way I want to be sent off. Make me a pillow of music and sing me to my final sleep."


     I'll certainly will be thinking about this advice and my own progress in finding the right words to express "me" and making my pre-finals.


Mimi

One Old Foot In the Grave

     The time eventually comes when we think about dying. I've been thinking about it since I turned 50, because my mother died at the age of 54 and I thought I might, too, because I have hypertension just like she did.


     Thankfully, I didn't die.

     Then my older sister, Vi, died at age 61 of cancer. So I had anxious years leading up to 61. I didn't die then, either. Thankfully.


     Then my brother died at age 69 of cancer, and my oldest sister, Velm, died at 83 of heart failure. 


     I made it past 69 and really am not obsessed with this anymore since my uncle is now 101.


     But I do know it is going to happen someday; no one gets out of it. Then our financial advisor suggested we think about making advance "arrangements" for a funeral and disposal of the body. So it has been a topic of discussion that Rocky is now willing to participate in due to his own ill health.


     He has decided he wants his body to go to a medical school. We know East TN State University does this because two of our storytelling friends decided to go this route. It is our understanding that once the body is used, then it is cremated and the ashes are returned to the next of kin.


     I don't want to do that. For a long time, I thought I wanted to be cremated, but the longer I sat with that decision the more uncomfortable I am feeling about it. Another alternative was to buried in the cemetery nearby where our group does its storytelling. That felt ghostly to me and once the amusement wore off, I didn't feel comfortable there either.


     Then it struck me. What I really wanted was to go "home." I've already joked that now when I go home, I immediately go to the cemetery because, since I'm the youngest in my biological family, that's where my parents and siblings are.


     So I telephoned the cemetery in Indiana where my family has a large plot Unfortunately, it's all used up. There was one plot open on the edge which I did not want. However, one of my sisters and husband, are buried in another newer area, so I am buying a plot near them. 


     I've sat with this decision now for over a week and it feels very comfortable. I don't like the idea of being "stuffed" in pretty clothes and warehoused underground, but being "at home" feels pretty o.k.


The Old Crone


     

The Old Coot's 80th Birthday

Rocky likes chocolate cake--the candles he says he can do without!

He likes presents too--just like any birthday boy!

One of the things that now give him the most pleasure is listening to music which this Bose music system should handle nicely!

To Eat Them Is Not In Question

Crisp and Tasty In Their Own Way!

In the book Cancer: 101 Solutions to a Preventable Epidemic (New Society Publishers, 2007) the authors Liz Armstrong, Guy Dauncey and Anne Wordsworth consider the importance of eating specific foods and drinks for cancer protection. Here’s what they suggest:

1. Cruciferous vegetables: Broccoli, cauliflower, cabbage, Brussels sprouts, bok choy and kale. These score high for containing many anti-cancer substances, such as isothiocyanates.

2. Globe artichoke for very high levels of salvestrols.

3. Dark greens, such as spinach and romaine lettuce, for their fiber, folate and a wide range of cancer-fighting carotenoids. Other dark colored veggies, too, such as beets and red cabbage.

4. Grapes and red wine, especially for the resveratrol.

5. Legumes: beans, peas and lentils, for the saponins, protease inhibitors and more.

6. Berries, particularly blueberries, for the ellagic acid and anthocyanosides.

7. Flaxseed, especially if you grind it yourself and consume when fresh, for the essential fatty acid alpha-linolenic acid, lignans and other “good fats.”

8. Garlic, onions, scallions, leeks and chives, for many anti-cancer substances including allicin.

9. Green tea, for its anti-cancer catechins, a potent anti-oxidant.

10. Tomatoes, for the famous flavenoid lycopene.

To Eat It Or Not To Eat It...That Is The Question

So tasty, but so bad for us!

In the book Cancer: 101 Solutions to a Preventable Epidemic (New Society Publishers, 2007) by Liz Armstrong et al, the No. 4 solution is “Eat a Healthy Diet.” Listed within are the 10 Foods and Drinks to Limit or Eliminate:

1. All charred food, which create heterocyclic aromatic amines, known carcinogens. Even dark toast is suspect.

2. Well-done red meat. Medium or rare is better, little or no red meat is best.

3. Sugar, both white and brown–which is simply white sugar with molasses added. (See Care2’s Directory of Natural Sweeteners for great, healthy alternatives.)

4. Heavily salted, smoked and pickled foods, which lead to higher rates of stomach cancer.

5. Sodas/soft drinks, which pose health risks, both for what they contain–sugar and various additives–and for what they replace in the diet–beverages and foods that provide vitamins, minerals and other nutrients.

6. French fries, chips and snack foods that contain trans fats.

7. Food and drink additives such as aspartame.

8. Excess alcohol.

9. Baked goods, for the acrylamide.

10. Farmed fish, which contains higher levels of toxins such as PCBs.

A Valentine's Surprise

What a surprise! While I was on the phone

this afternoon, The Old Coot got in the car and

drove himself to Walmart where he bought

five long-stemmed red roses for me.

Now I can't nag, er remind, him about

never remembering Valentines Day.

That's o.k. The roses make up for it!

The Old Crone

A Valentine Memory

Remember these? Candy wins the day for any child, and I loved these in elementary school. Strange, they began to taste like medicine, child vitamins specifically, as I got older.

Here are a few things I found out about heart-shaped candies from Google websites.

• Necco is the candy-maker.
• They date back to before the Civil War.
• They were factory made in 1902.
• The most popular messages are "Kiss Me" and "Be Mine."
• For 2010 messages will include "Tweet Me," "Text Me," "You Rock," "Soul Mate," "Love Bug," and "Me + You." These were all chosen in an on-line survey.

The question that remains for me is who made them by hand (women, I'm sure) and what was the process and ingredients?

I plan to bake brownies for Valentine's Day here at Castle Yonder. Once I'd been married a couple years and The Old Coot hadn't recognized V.Day, I gave up expecting anything. I also gave up pouting about it, and decided I'd just give myself a present, as I had learned to do for my birthday.

During the past recent years, The Old Coot usually gives me a V.Day card. I used to give him a bag of sour ball candy.

So if you can't figure out how to compromise a V.Day present, buy a bag of Necco's and give each other a heart. Happy (early) Valentine's Day!

The Old Crone

A Whipped Cream Winter

This Winter has been like living in whipped cream. Or maybe in a big marshmallow!

It started actually in December, and the first 12 days of January were frigid, never going above 32 degrees. Two weeks ago we got a snowstorm leaving about 4 inches on the ground. Then last weekend, the East Coast got over 20 inches but it went slightly east and north of us so we got only rain.

However, that changed yesterday. Snow fell all night, then all day. Big dry fluffy flakes that piled up like Ivory flakes in a soapbox. Remember Ivory Flakes? I'll have to check the grocery aisle the next time I go to see if they still sell them.

So, needless to say, The Old Coot and I have been snowbound all winter. His gall bladder has relaxed, but now he is having serious back pain. We had MRI's last week for arthritis and scoliosis. We both have the same thing altho I've had the scoliosis for 70 years.

Once the MRI's are read, we will see an Orthopedist.

The Old Crone

An Elder Man Loved Is Like Winter Surrounded By Flowers