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Adventures With Grandpa (tm)
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Monday, March 7, 2005
Edition #005
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C O N T E N T S
005.1: Current Condition in Brief
A quick summary of Grandpa's current condition
005.2: Grandpa Escapes!
Grandpa sneaks out for shrimp lunch
005.3: One Week or Two
Therapists evaluate Grandpa's condition
005.4: Grandpa Cheats Father Time
Grandpa celebrates 90th birthday... early
005.5: Question of the Week
"What does Grandpa do with his time?"
005.6: Colophon
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005.1: Current Condition in Brief
A quick summary of Grandpa's current condition
Grandpa's doing excellent. His physical therapy continues, with him walking about 100 feet every day. He rarely complains of leg or hip pain.
Mentally he's restless, ready to come home (a sign of health), and frustrated that he must remain at Oakwood. While the care facility is doing a great job, I'd like him to come home as soon as possible: staying there he tends to be self-absorbed and confused. He's got nothing to do but ponder his state and gets weird ideas in his head. He convinces himself of things that aren't true. At least at my house I can weed out those thoughts and help him focus on positive things.
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005.2: Grandpa Escapes!
Grandpa sneaks out for shrimp lunch
On Tuesday (March 1), Marc picked up Grandpa to take him to visit a local doctor. This was one of the requirements to get him admitted into Oakwood (they insisted he have a local doctor). It was merely a routine checkup so that the doctor has seen him and accepted him as a patient.
The first adventure was getting Grandpa into Marc's van. The van makes bringing the wheelchair a snap, but its higher entrance height makes it a little difficult for Grandpa to get into. Knowing the pain Grandpa was in in the past when he had to get in and out of vehicles, I was a little worried this might cause difficulty, but it turned out to be relatively easy. His upper arm strength is considerable and he was able to pull himself up into the high seat just fine.
In fact, after the doctor's appointment, Grandpa was game to going out to lunch, so I took him to Shari's restaurant in McMinnville where he ordered the fried shrimp lunch... and added the cup of soup for ninety-nine cents more! After seeing him eat so little at the hospital, this was astounding. Even better than ordering the food, Grandpa actually ate most of it! (He did give me two of his shrimp but he ate all the rest, I swear.) Then he asked for ice cream! They didn't have chocolate (his favorite), so he settled for vanilla with chocolate sauce.
After the lunch, Grandpa wasn't ready to return to Oakwood and asked to drive around town for a while. So I did the loop around McMinnville through Lafayette and back.
I wondered if Grandpa would remember this escape and the next time I saw him, I was glad that he did. He said, "What were those crunchy things I ate the other day?"
I said, "You mean those shrimp?"
"Ah yeah! Get me some of those!"
"I'll see what I can do," I murmured, picturing myself smuggling shrimp in my pockets.
"And a chocolate milkshake. I need one of those, too."
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005.3: One Week or Two
Therapists evaluate Grandpa's condition
On Thursday, my mom, Uncle Phil, and I met with a team from Oakwood consisting of a nurse, social worker, and therapist to discuss Grandpa's evaluation. The good news was that Grandpa is doing very well, right on schedule, and should be ready to return home in a couple weeks. Grandpa's diabetes and renal failure are considered minor issues and won't even require medication, though we should monitor him.
The bad news, if it is that, is that they are concerned about Grandpa not remembering hip-warning instructions. For instance, he's not allowed to bend over 90 degrees; doing so could dislocate his hip. Unfortunately, I seriously doubt Grandpa will be able to remember those instructions. We'll just have to watch him carefully to make sure he doesn't try things on his own.
Since he hasn't had a good right leg/hip for a long time now, it's likely he won't try some of those things anyway, simply because he's not used to doing them. For instance, I saw him in his wheelchair the other day, trying to lean over and pick up something off the floor. Fortunately he wasn't bending over, but it was interesting that he hadn't thought of doing that. Presumably if he's feeling fit he might, though, so the better he feels, the more we have to watch him.
We asked the medical team about the future and they indicated that before Grandpa is discharged they would arrange for me to come in and watch/assist in a rehab session so I could learn how to help Grandpa. They would teach me some exercises I could help him with after he returns home as well. And when Grandpa does return home (to my house), they'll have a session or two of in-home training and evaluation, seeing how he handles my home and how my facilities are situated.
The one drawback to this session was that Grandpa (who was there during the meeting) appeared convinced that he'd be returning home to his house on the coast, and that confused the medical team, who understood he was returning to my place. See him go back to his coast longings was frustrating; most of the progress I'd made getting Grandpa into a comfortable routine at my place has been lost. Just yesterday he asked me what city my house was in. And when visiting my house on Sunday, he looked at the bathroom (the one he used every day when he was here) and asked me if his wheelchair would fit through the doorway.
My theory is that if he lives here and gets into a comfortable routine, he relaxes and doesn't pine so much for his coastal retreat. When he's uncomfortable, the beach house becomes his hope and escape, and since he can't return there, that's not healthy.
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005.4: Grandpa Cheats Father Time
Grandpa celebrates 90th birthday... early
This weekend was a special one for Grandpa as two of his grandchildren and one great-grandchild came visiting from far away. Philip flew in from New York City and Tami and fourteen-month-old Rowen came in from Houston. Philip and Tami visited with Grandpa bit on Saturday, but the real affair was a huge early-birthday bash for Grandpa at my house on Sunday.
I had Grandpa at my house at noon and continued the party preparations, with guests arriving minutes later. Soon it was happy chaos, with me running around trying to get everything ready and guests scurrying everywhere and little Rowan providing the entertainment.
This was my first party and I discovered I made a few miscalculations. When the party had first been proposed I'd been thinking of a lavish affair with lots of guests, but later things had been revised for a more modest event with a dozen people. Unfortunately, that never entered my food calculations. I had all kinds of finger foods:
- two kinds of potato chips;
- a gallon of fresh homemade guacamole and
some salsa;
- French bread and two kinds of crackers to
go with three kinds of cheese;
- two huge vegetable trays of carrots, celery,
red and green peppers, mushrooms, and cherry
tomatoes, with spinach dip and ranch dressing
for dipping;
- a shrimp wheel;
- I hard-boiled thirty-two eggs (yes, 32) and
made 60 deviled egg halves;
- my mom and her friend Rita each made huge bowls
of fruit salad;
- and a monster bowl of punch with raspberry
sherbert and frozen strawberries floating
in it and topped off with ginger ale for fizz.
Oh yeah, did I mention the TWO three-foot sub sandwiches ordered from the local grocery deli? I think we maybe polished off half of one of the subs (the other wasn't even unwrapped), and we ate about ten percent of everything else. I swear I had enough food for forty people, easy.
We also had a huge chocolate birthday cake for Grandpa, which Uncle Phil cleverly almost dropped in Grandpa's lap when Grandpa was blowing out of the "90" candles. (We wondered if a cake-in-lap would have been memorable for Grandpa!)
But despite the overabundance of food, it was an excellent party. Rowan danced and clapped for everyone, amusing all with his cuteness and cleverness at escaping from mommy. Grandpa seemed amazed by everything, obviously delighted and blessed.
At one point Rowen -- who already weighs 30 pounds -- ended up on Grandpa's lap for a moment. I immediately noticed that even though Rowen put weight on Grandpa's right leg, he never even flinched! Before the surgery Grandpa used to moan and cry out in pain when one of my cats climbed into his lap. This was proof that the surgery was well-worth it and he's already in much less pain than before.
We finished the party with a picture-taking session; I've put a nice collection of party pictures online here:
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005.5: Question of the Week
"What does Grandpa do with his time?"
When Grandpa lived with me he did a lot of napping. He called it "meditating." When not meditating, he read magazines (not books, so much) or sat by a window and watched the cars go by. He likes to read though I'm not sure how much he retains. He's a slow reader, probably because he dozes off in the middle of a Reader's Digest article and then has to start it over when he wakes up!
Sometimes he teased the cats or wandered the house, finding chips or crackers or nuts to munch. I always thought it was funny the way he'd make multiple trips to the nut jar, each time taking only a tiny handful, then returning for more a few minutes later. I'm so lazy I'd just take a bowl or the whole jar with me!
Occasionally Grandpa and I watched TV, but our tastes in television are opposite. The only sport I watch is soccer, which Grandpa claims to not like (and watching it brings forth another edition of the now tiresome tale of how he played indoor soccer in first grade in Medford, Oregon). I like crime shows like CSI and reality shows like Survivor and The Apprentice -- but Grandpa has trouble following the complicated plot lines and keeping characters straight.
Grandpa does like watching the news, which I can't stand. Of all the things for him to watch, the news strikes me as the most absurd. He can't remember any current events, so why bother? Nothing on the news effects us directly anyway. Grandpa has his own TV in his room, but rarely watches it. I think he prefers to be in the living room where he feels more a part of things.
I'm not sure what Grandpa does with his time at Oakwood. Meditation, most likely. He does have therapy sessions, and he's got some reading material. But it seems he's mostly bored. At least at home I can come up with diversions for him.
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005.6: Colophon
Publication Title: Adventures With Grandpa (tm)
Frequency: Weekly
Price: $1,000,000 per issue
Publisher: Marc Zeedar
Author: Marc Zeedar
Photographer: Marc Zeedar
Copyright: Contents (photos and text)
(C) 2005 by Marc Zeedar
All Rights Reserved
Telephone: 877-364-5922
Website: http://www.zeedar.com/grandpa/
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the call ten minutes later), you may call him toll-free at
877-364-5922.
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