Joan here..."The begining of Home Care in our place"

Well a few updates...using the DABS are the run of the mill thing around here now. :(
Funny how quickly we move to routine us humans! I still have to disassociate myself mentally and I am sure that is what Rick does also to survive as we go through the process. So we grieve.

We do have home care coming in, 3 half hours a week , to do Rick's range of motion exercises as a start. This helps his joints. His feet swell up so bad during the day from sitting in his chair. He does try and lift up his legs and lays on the bed for a change but they still swell up some.

It is unreal how having another person in our place is such a infringement on our privacy. This is the initial step towards this becoming normal for us and it is so scary. Soon our time will not be ours alone and we both do not like that at all. We know that we will just have to suck it up in order for Rick to get all the care he will need. So we grieve the loss of our privacy.

I just had a birthday this past week and it was a horrible one for me this year. There is so much emotion running around inside of me as this could be my last one where Rick can talk or even eat. I was incredibly disappointed with the way Rick was so passive about it all. To me it was such a huge big deal. I am a dreamer and like to dream big. I want everyone to be invited etc. He forgot to even invite my best friends, never mind my other couple of sisters, cousins, aunts and uncles and nieces and nephews who are close to us. It has been hard to know if it was just "the man thing" or in fact an ALS thing! hmmmmmm...

Just because your man is dying doesn't mean that he will be sensitive or with it when it comes to knowing what is important to his woman. I really had to grieve the loss of probably not having another birthday with him being involved and being able to celebrate with him and everyone together. It is so hard to explain until it happens to you. It was so important to me that he remembered all the things that I have ever talked to him about that were important to me.

In my selfish own way...I figured he had lots of time to think about it all while I was busy showering him, making meals, making beds, dressing him, undressing him, hoyering him, loading and unloading him in the van and etc. And YES, I have been feeling really sorry for myself over it all!

On a different note...I did discover something interesting tonight. When driving back from the city there was a deer in the middle of the road that I actually missed! The deer do not like the sound of "the beast's" horn! So I merrily honked that horn as I drove in the black of the night. There were many a deer in the ditches but not one standing in the middle of the road!