[IWE] Thanks, you lot

[D. Scott Katzer]

Hi Laura,

Good to see you here.  You sound great.  Keep it up!

I'm glad you're doing Ok and hope things settle down a little for you.

laura wrote:

> He had a talk with me about dying, and he helped me see I'm no different 
> than anyone else.  We're all dying and no one gets out of this alive.  
> You take what you've been given and you live appreciatively until you're 
> done.  It's really no more complicated than that.

Yeah.  We're all fragile and transitory...  :-(

My 89 year old MIL, Ann, was in the hospital this week as a result of a 
bad urinary tract infection (UTI).  She gets them every 2-3 months at 
the nursing home she's at (and it's actually a pretty good nursing home, 
for around here anyway).  We always know when she has one because she 
starts getting more agitated and talking crazy, but the administration 
there won't check for one unless she gets a fever or her urine changes 
smell.  Of course, those are never her symptoms (and those often aren't 
symptoms), so she's been to the hospital twice in the last 6 months as a 
result of the infection getting so bad that she gets knocked out.  (The 
last time she was admitted to a hospital was when she had her girls.) 
The nursing home administration is worried about not being reimbursed 
for the cost of the test, so they let things get out of control as a 
result.  It's madness.  Of course, there's a perverse incentive for them 
to send people to the hospital - the family has to private pay to hold 
her nursing home bed while she's away...

(UTI's are very common in the elderly because they don't drink enough 
and because diapers don't get changed promptly.  Bacteria in the bladder 
don't get flushed properly and they it is a great breeding ground for 
nasty problems.)

But Ann's doing better.  She probably doesn't have too much longer, 
though.  She's a sweet little woman, but her Alzheimer's and Parkinson's 
are taking their toll.  She's lost about 10 pounds in the last month. 
Each of these infections take quite a bit out of her as well and it's so 
preventable.

J visits her every day for 2-3 hours and twice a day on the weekends, 
she keeps up with her meds and assists in feeding her and getting her to 
the bathroom, and tries to oversee the (seemingly constant) informing of 
new people at the nursing home about Ann, so there isn't too much more 
she can do.  We just hope that Ann doesn't suffer...  :-(


Enjoy your physicians and medical staff!  They sound great!  :-)

> So I had more surgery, I get more radiation, I have a boatloads of meds, 
> and I'll see where this takes me. I'm feeling better and am getting back 
> to normal functioning again, and as long as I can function, I'm good.

Take care and best wishes!  Stay strong!

Cheers,
Scott.