So I decided to go off my sedative.
Last year was one of the worst of my life. My mother was gravely ill and failing fast. She told me that she never wanted to return home, where my father and brothers were expecting her to cook and clean. She had just ripped her arm open while falling from the bed.
They said she blamed it on Dad, and I know why. Both she and I sleep on the far side of the bed, away from the door. Both she and I need to "go" frequently in the night. The longer trip is due to the fact that both she and I go to bed early and the other come in later. They get the bedside closest to the door, and we wind up having to circumnavigate the bed to get to the bathroom.
Once in the hospital, they wound up placing her in a nursing home. Auburn Life Care Center. Mom was very well cared for there, and she and their people obviously loved each other. Whenever she would be sent out for an emergency, she would be relieved when they returned her to Auburn.
After several trips back and forth, Mom said, "I wish I could just go to sleep and not wake up."
In September, she got her wish. Her condition proved terminal and she refused all life support. We all dutifully filed in to pay our last visits, and just after the last grandchild left, she died peacefully in her sleep.
Now Dad was another story altogether. Dad was never going to die. He did everything to stay fit and active. Well, fit and active is one thing when you are at the top of your game. With Early Onset Altzheimer's, he was lucid enough to know he was losing it, but unable to stop its progression.
The man at Mom's funeral was not really my Dad. I was told that whenever he returned to normal, he would remember that Mom was dead, and begin grieving all over again. When I came back to Little Pond, I predicted that Dad might not make it to Thanksgiving, and surely would not be alive at Christmas.
I was right. During Thanksgiving dinner, Dad began to talk about suicide. The boys soldiered on and kept him busy with sports and TV, but didn't supervise his outdoor activity. Dad had a heart attack and fell down injuring himself during a walk. Into the hospital he went, where they predicted all sorts of dire outcome.
That Sunday, right after the Patriot's game, Dad died while discussing the game with nurses. It was exactly three months from the date of Mom's death.
It was during this time that my neuro decided to cut the Valium. Not less valium, not fewer pills, just one month refill at a time. Getting them from the online pharmacy became a huge problem, because they are just not very reliable. I often went days without the drug, and a day without Valium is a very, very restless night. I attended both funerals and all the travel in between during this sorry situation.
It is now almost four months after Dad's death. I am still adjusting to (withdrawing from) the lack of Valium. At first I thought all the crazy dreams would stop and I would sleep peacefully, but this was not to be.
Why?
pb
Little Pond
