| Dad's diagnosis. |
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| Monday, 29 December 2008 | |
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Earlier this month we found out the results of Dad's MRI. The evidence shows he has had 3 mini-strokes and has developed Vascular Dementia. I have not talked since learning this news with my youngest sister who lives with Dad to find out whether she has told him or not. She was worried about letting him know because she was concerned he would take the news badly. The doctor at the VA hospital where he goes to be checked has prescribed Zoloft for him, so hopefully it may keep him calmer and not as full of anxiety as he has always been. Dad had heart by-pass surgery in May of 2006 at age 81 (almost 82) and his cognitive skills have gone steadily downhill since then. Life is also a bit more complicated in our family with our other sister up north in PA having finished 2 rounds of chemo treatments for her brain tumor the week before Christmas. This has left her rather weary physically. I am the firstborn (age 61 and married with adult children spread all over the world and one young grandchild) and living in the southern tip of Texas. My youngest sister, (age of 43) who is single, lives with our widower Dad a five hour trip north of us. (Mom has been gone to her heavenly Home since 2002.) We have 2 married brothers who live in other states far from us. They are 59 and 58 and have more grandchildren than I do. Our sister in PA with the brain tumor is married and has two adult sons and is age 54. The rest of us who don't live with Dad and our youngest sister are concerned about how he is doing when our sister has to leave him to go to work all day. He is home alone at that time and we are all too far away to go check up on him. He takes daily walks to the post office and sometimes he might forget he already went and will go again, so he does get his exercise, but I am afraid that he lacks in daily social connections and often wonder what he eats when my sister isn't there..She does leave him plenty of notes pasted all over the place to remind of things..but is that enough? She can also question him when she gets home, but he won't be able to remember enough to tell her what she needs to know. If we try to suggest anything to her about Dad's care she gets really upset with us and thinks we are accusing her of not doing a good job and then the tensions between her and the rest of the siblings can really escalate and then Dad suffers from her elevated stress. I am scared to even mention this here since she could easily find about this website and read this story, even though they have no computer with internet access at home... How do we convince her that she needs others to tend to him in the daytime when she can't be there? There is no way she can be there 24/7 to look after him constantly. Certainly there must be a local service that can be provided even in their small town that can be paid by Medicare or the VA. The upside of this is that she has always kept a sense of humor whereas I have been the too serious oldest sister. As a retired preacher Dad has always been active in church and can still carry on an intelligent conversation about the Bible, but can't tell you what he did the day before, or even about some things he did earlier in the same day. He has no problem remembering his own kids, but can't seem to always remember all of his grandchildren and also how many great-grandchildren he has or who gave birth to whom or where they all live. That is too much recent information for him. ok...that is the basics on this family story.... To sum it all up: Our dad having been diagnosed shortly before this Christmas with vascular dementia, a 54 year old sister across the country from us whose brain tumor is no longer dormant, and other family members spread all over the country and even the whole world....(my only daughter is living in a distant country in SE Asia.) Our main best emotional connection is through a lifetime of belief in the power of our prayers. |
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