I just lost a blog, it expressed perfectly what I wanted to say...it was polished...it was wise...it was so good...and it disappeared into cyberspace. Dash it all!!!!

We've had a few good days and a few bad days lately. I wrote a vent of a blog last night...I was so mad with how life is going I just couldn't think about the good things in life at all...so I wrote a blog that expressed all my ugly feelings. I can say I was lucky that it too would not post at all. No-one needs to read all that doom and gloom.

Ray has had a few changes in his behaviour lately, he is a bit more argumentative, a bit more restless, has a bit of a problem with eating, what he wants to eat, what he doesn't want to eat. He is slow to get ready to go out although of course he might really enjoy it when he gets there but may not want to go out for various reasons. This is part of it getting colder as winter approaches I guess. This is difficult for me as everything takes him so long when he doesn't want to do something. Trips to buy groceries, to the doctors etc have to take place regardless of what he wants to do so we have had some arguments about that too. Here you pay if you break a specialist's appointment and I don't have the extra money for that. It is all part of the changes having dementia brings.

Today I feel so much better about life, owing to a shock, a good talk and some co-incidences that gave me a new look at life. I have been worrying for a few weeks about how I was to get some care for Ray while I do the first weekend of my course in theology at the end of May. Whatever arrangements I made, none seemed to fit the situation. We have a cottage, like a group home, that takes people with dementia for four to seven days to give their caregiver a break, that seemed like a good idea. No they were fully booked in the time I needed. I went to both of the places he has been in respite before. One was booked out till June, the other would clear a space for him but it was for next week and the week after. Well, at such short notice how would I manage that? I said : "No, I will try to find something else" and that was where I was at last night, right down in the dumps thinking poor me, why is everything too little, too late or wrong size, wrong price, wrong colour?

This morning I went to see Mum and she was in a wheelchair! Shock, horror! My little Mum who walks round and round and round all day long, in a wheelchair! It seems she had had another fall and so they concluded it was the fault of her socks, so one of the aides put shoes on her feet and now she seemed unable to walk. Well, of course, as she hasn't had shoes on for a couple of years she probably wondered what the heck they were! Luckily I had bought her new socks with the rubberised bottoms for Mothers Day. We put those on her feet , she stood up and away she went! Whew, what a blessing!

I went from there to dementia support and sat through the lecture part of the program where the subject was "Routines". Routines are very important in the life of a person with dementia and to most of us if you come to think of it. We all have a routine whether it is how we get up of a morning, how we keep lists etc, all the different parts of our lives have their own routines. To a person with dementia a routine gives them a feeling of security, of being in control. Ray may not know it is Thurday the 14th day of May but he does do know it is shower day, shopping day, get a hot cup of chocolate day. For Ray Thursday is a social day as we see a lot of our acquaintances from church and the other organisations we belong to at the shopping centre, so Thursday is a good day.

One of the daughter/caregivers at the meeting today asked the mentor a question I would maybe have asked: "How do I MAKE mum do..." and we all know the answer to that, you can't make a person with dementia do anything they don't want to do. You often can't reason with them but there are other ways. You can offer an incentive ( for Ray a cup of hot chocolate and a couple of cookies is a good reward) find some care for them while you go out, use your regular care time to do the things you have to do, or just make it part of an excursion to somewhere else they do like to go to. He said: "You can't reason with unreasonable people" and isn't that the truth. But you can broach the subject later, maybe ten minutes later in Ray's case....lol.

We are taught that if you are dealing with a person with dementia or a brain damaged person you have to be the one to make the compromises. I used to get offended by that at first, like WHY should I be the one to ALWAYS make the concessions!! but it stands to reason that I am the one with the full count of brain cells. I am still able to change unlike Ray who is struggling to make sense of life every day, so I need to be the one to find the solution to the problem. And so I do. I endeavour, each time things change, to find a way around the problem. If Ray is to go on living at home and I am not going to go insane myself while taking care of him, I have to change my thinking.

And so I took the two weeks at Reynolds Court but decided not to put Ray into care until Wednesday as we have an appointment on Monday, Grandparents Day at preschool for our grandsons on Tueday and Lions dinner on Tuesday night. Then while I was at the shopping centre I met up with a friend who asked when I was going to see my daughter next. I said I didn't know as I was just putting Ray into respite for a fortnight and so I wouldn't be able to go up to see her on my own and she said: "What is wrong with going now?"So I went to the travel agent, airfares had come down a bit and I will go up next Wednesday for a week. It is the worst week to go as the middle weekend is the Salvation Army Red Shield Appeal. Shirley and her husband Craig are the Captains of the Corps so they will lead the teams. So I will see the grandkids, the cat and the dog and my daughter and son-in-law as they rush in and out of the house. But that doesn't matter, we are family, and I love them and just maybe I can be a help to them.

I just realised I can take up the next lot of bracelets and save the $5 postage...that will be a discount on my fares...lol. For my chatroom buddies that means I will not be doing the chat hosting for the next two weeks but I will be thinking of you all. Just be good while I am away.