Navigating Through the Fog, October 12

The degree of seriousness is now evident. There can be no decisions, nor plans, nor reasoned discussions nor structured thinking in any form about circumstances or options. There are only spasmodic declarations that rarely bear any relation to reality and are quite often contradictory, sometimes within the same sentence. The fog will lift suddenly and the listener will be surprised by the temporary lucidity. But it is always quite temporary, so he must be always ready.

Example: Dad admits he has been falling. He has fallen something like five, or ten, or four, or seven times in the last six weeks. Most probably five. No way to be certain. He connects falls from a week ago with falls from three years ago in conversation, so parsing incidents is difficult. Many of the falls are completely fictional. Recent falls, however, have been not only real but covered up. They're discovered when my mother finds bloody laundry or bed linens. In any case he disagrees strongly that there is a problem because the falling "goes in streaks" and the latest streak is over! And of course, he'll never fall again because the streaks are over, too. So why discuss it?

Mom says he's fine but she's worried about him but she doesn't worry and she has to watch him closely but he's fine and besides that he's fine except when he gets confused or angry which is often but it doesn't happen very often. It frightens her but she's not worried, so it's fine.

There are two coping mechanisms. One is to declare Fine. The other is to redirect the conversation with a contrived, painfully lame quip followed by extended forced laughing, hoping the topic will evaporate. Very hard to witness.

There is a shell of a previous plan that is, quite obviously, unworkable. Their names are on a list for a local retirement home. But they're upset because the found out it serves "liquor" (wine) with dinner. And it costs too much. For my mother anything over ten dollars would be too much. The retirement home starts at $5,000 per month and goes up as more services are required. There's no way on God's green earth that either parent will come to peace with the liquor or the cost.

But neither of those issues is as serious as the other two. We visited the center today (they offered Mom a free birthday lunch and she pounced) and it's occupied by about 3:1 women to men. My father acknowledges he simply cannot accept that, and he's right. In fact, he really can't be around women at all for any extended amount of time. Especially old ones. There's a bigger problem. I watched the other residents and listened to them carefully. They're all lucid and capable of gracious, discrete, appropriate conversations. About things like reality. I heard nothing like motorcycle races at the cemetery or Saracens invading Holland. So I don't see any way the retirement home can work.

Which leaves us ... where?