My cousin's 40th wedding anniversary party was great fun, as always it is so nice to see family members, especially those you haven't seen in a long time. Dave and Glen looked fabulous, it's hard to believe that they've been married for 40 years. One of the highlights of the night was a projected slide show of old photos which played in the background during the meal. I think they managed to get pretty much every family member who was there (I was 10 and a bridesmaid and cannot believe how much my daughter looks like me!). A late night but a very good one.
The following morning started early for me because I had visions of Ma deciding she needed to walk the dog and wandering off. So at 6:30 I went to her room and sure enough she was in the process of 'dressing' and getting ready to go out. I left her with a cuppa and told her I'd be back at nine. I took the dog for a scamper around the grounds which she absolutely loved even though she didn't spot the rabbits! At that time of the morning the horrendous rain hadn't arrived so it was a very beautiful pootle. Back at the room I was now very much up and awake so I had some serious Kindle time until 9 then went and got Ma, arranging to meet a delicate Cornishman in the restaurant.
After a truly stonking hotel breakfast we packed and paid and then drove over to Dave and Glen's for a post party lunch party. Clearly there was less drinking for the drivers though! Lovely food and lovely company then home.
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
I think all the excitement of the weekend has sent Ma into a small decline. She is rambling such a lot and is almost incoherent at times. There's a lot of talking to herself and talking back to the television too. As I understand it, vascular dementia has a different progression to Alzheimers. In Alzheimers the decline is fairly steady and continual, in VD it is more like a set of uneven steps. There can be relatively long periods where things are stable and then an event or situation will bring on a noticable reduction in abilities. Over the last few days we've had quite a lot of new behaviours or existing behaviours becoming more marked.
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
We nipped into the garden centre for bird seed after we'd been to Tesco having picked up a hot chicken and some salad for lunch. Silly me. Ma had chips.
The stable then quick decline pattern is certainly one we've become accustomed to with FIL. Often they seem to be set off by change of some sort - either visitors to them or visits by them, or some other form of stress/excitement. Not fun. (((Bee)))
ReplyDeleteThanks Fran. Validation from others in the same situation is really helpful. It's also comforting xx
ReplyDelete