At a Crossroads

Man, what a crazy last couple days.

Tuesday night was great. Dee Dee got up just twice to use the restroom, but otherwise slept through the night. We all thought, "Great, looks like we're set!"

Then last night happened. Dee Dee was out and about all day long. No naps. We gave her the Trazodone to help her sleep. So she went to sleep at about 9:15. We knew she was going to sleep through the night again.

I was gone until a little after midnight, but when I got home Dee Dee was awake for the night. She'd only slept for about an hour and a half. Diane (Michele's mom) spent the night on the couch and took care of Dee Dee most of the night. Dee Dee was very concerned because she knew that if she didn't keep one bare foot on the tile floor, she would die. So that episode took over an hour and a bunch of cajoling and creative thinking to get her to her recliner. And so on and so forth. Several times she threatened Diane that if she didn't do what Dee Dee said, she'd yell and wake up the whole floor.

She was awake mostly all day again today, so I don't know where she's getting the energy. Maybe she's built up an immunity to Trazodone after one night, or she has a super-power where she gets energy from sleep aids. Those are about the only possibilities that seems logical to me at this point.

For the first time today, I got to witness agitated, insistent, paranoid Dee Dee. She has historically saved those mostly for Michele, Diane, and Ace. It was quite remarkable. She really didn't want Jennifer, our home health worker, to be in our home. She kept on dismissing her, making up all kinds of stories about why she needed to leave. I was Dee Dee's only recourse. "Brian, you don't understand. She needs to go, because we're leaving."

But Dee Dee, I need to go back to work. We're not going out to lunch. She'd shake her head in frustration and say "Brian, would I lie to you? Would I? You just have to trust me!" while she grabbed my arm tightly. This went on for about a half hour until I really did have to go back to work. The afternoon went on in a similar vein until Jennifer left.

Basically, we're back to where we were before the hospital episode. She's not sleeping through the night. Getting rid of the urinary tract infection doesn't seem to have helped her dementia. And she's getting more and more irritated with her family, to the point of physical resistance sometimes.

At this point, it looks like Dee Dee is going back to Gardenview tomorrow. Tonight will be an adventure, but we're taking it in shifts. I've got First Watch. But even if things go perfectly tonight (we're upping the sleep aid dosage by 50%, per the doctor's suggestion), I don't think it will change the outlook.

By the way, I'm not upset by Dee Dee getting upset with me. I fully expected those kinds of episodes when I signed up for this. What cracks me up is that when we went out to dinner tonight, she brought up out of the blue how unhelpful and irrational I'd been that day.

So some things she remembers just fine. ;)