Monday, October 23, 2017

Dad’s Health:

We were very fortunate on our trip in the spring that we had only a couple of issues that were relatively easily resolved. We were also fortunate that Jeanne is so good with dad!

Since being back in Colorado, dad’s had several doctors’ appointments, lab tests including blood work, xrays and urine samples with changing results. 

First, dad’s oxygen needs have increased. It seems that he never really reacclimated to the high altitude when we returned. He’s on 3.5 liters at home and with any activity, he really needs more. On his portable unit, anything less than a level 3 isn’t enough. We’ve had disagreements on this because he worries about his battery life, so I have to ensure we carry the extra charger and that the unit is plugged into the car charger when driving around town so he doesn’t lower the  O2 rate he needs.

The X-rays in the last few months have revealed that he’s had fluid buildup in and around his lungs. Increasing diuretics have helped that but made dad’s daily life more uncomfortable. He’s been a trooper though. 

The biggest concern in my mind is his kidneys. He’s been at Stage 4 kidney disease for some time. However, he’s inching closer to stage 5.  A little over a year ago, he was considering dialysis, if necessary. As of our last conversation on the subject, he won’t go through dialysis.  At 90, some doctors have said it would be too hard on his body. He has a lung doctor appointment tomorrow and a kidney doctor appointment in about two weeks.  Both docs will require X-rays and the kidney doc will have blood work results which will determine his kidney failure “number”.

His blood pressure is good, his appetite is great but he tires easily, which is to be expected at his age. His sleep is easily disturbed with his need to pee often.  He sleeps for a couple hours, wakes up to pee and then turn on the TV in his room and it may stay on for hours. I don’t mind though, as long as it provides him peace and helps him rest. 

Dad has other issues that I won’t put on a public post, but we deal with them daily and get through each day. Someday, I may laugh about some of my experiences, but not today.

(Dentist office, pedicure, leg lotion, shorts and slacks, etc.)

Wednesday, October 18, 2017

It’s been nearly five months since Dad and I returned from our trip and since I last posted on this blog. I will attempt to update to current activity and maybe even continue as this journey of being a caregiver for my 90 year old dad has had some interesting times and events. 

Although Dad turned 90 in March, we (kids) planned a birthday party in mid June.  The party was at Mark and Francine’s home in Lakewood Saturday, June 10th. We invited nearly 100 people and nearly 100 family and friends attended!  Dad was in his glory and was so kind and gracious to everyone who was there and he was treated like royalty by all who attended. He couldn’t have been happier...I actually think he was in a bit of shock.  Those that love him most, who could attend, were there.  From children of his and mom’s kids and grandkids to dad’s siblings, their kids and those kids’ grandkids to friends mom and dad had for over 60 years to more recent acquaintances to favorite restaurant employees to former work alliances. They were all there to celebrate dad. What a glorious day it was for him!

We then had a Schuster family reunion in August planned by cousin Jeff, Uncle Ray’s son. He did a great job and again there was a wonderful turnout with over 100 family from the west coast to the east in attendance. Dad and his sister Arline were the elder members and seemed quite pleased. It was great for me to see cousins I hadn’t seen in at least 40 years. I played golf in the morning before the picnic with a group of cousins and their kin. I was on a foursome with cousin Sheila’s husband Mike and Sheila’s brother, cousin Mike’s son and daughter in law. Even though the golf score wasn’t great, it was a great time!

Otherwise, the summer was filled with dad’s doctors’ appointments, tending to the garden we had to have (more on this) and finding an ever changing routine to live within. 

Gardening - When we returned from our trip, Dad decided he needed to plant a garden on his back patio which is the roof of his garage. Although he had a couple of self contained planters, we needed more! We went to Home Depot in late May and bought these along with some tomato, onion, bell pepper, banana pepper, jalapeño pepper and multiple kinds of squash plants. While outside in the garden center at Home Depot, Dad fell from a sitting position in his walker.  Fortunately he was okay and with help from a couple employees, we got him up.  The next day, my brother David thankfully came over and helped me plant these plants.  One of the days following, Dad fell again from a cheapo plastic chair I’d bought for the back patio.  Again, thankfully David was available to come over and help get dad upright. Then again a few days later, Dad tripped over his o2 hose and fell forward hitting his head on the coffee table, scraping skin off both forearms and bruising his hip and shoulder.  Ugh. When One is 90, it takes forever for a skin adhesion to heal. So most of the summer, we were dealing with those wounds. But the garden was productive and we enjoyed and shared tomatoes, peppers and squash into September! We were all so very fortunate that he wasn’t hurt more seriously in any of these three falls!

Wednesday 5/24

Today was another day of "firsts", but more for me than for dad. 

We left Kayente at either 8:45 am or 9:45 am, depending on whose time we were on at that moment. We got a cup of coffee at McDonald's, filled up the gas tank paying the Navajo Nation imposed taxes and stayed on highway 160 driving through magnificent countryside for nearly 100 miles before turning North to Cortez, CO where we did a drive-by of the airport dad was so familiar with 50-60 years ago.  Just before the turn though, we reached the Four Corners Monument where we had to stop to see the exact spot where Colorado, Utah, New Mexico and Arizona come together at one point. I've heard of this spot all my life, but never been.  Nor did I realize the controversy over the last 100 years about exactly where the spot should be and how this spot has moved a half dozen times as someone realizes the longitude and latitude require a change. The most recent change was in 2010. The monument is on the northern edge of the massive, expansive Navajo reservation before entering into Ute country. 

In Cortez, we headed east again for Durango. I haven't been to Durango since my brother Steve was in college at Fort Lewis, where he met his wife Connie. Dad hasn't been there for about 45 years. However, when he traveled for Frontier Airlines, he spent quite a bit of time in Durango.  But it holds a very special place in his heart as it's where he and mom spent their honeymoon. The hotel they stayed at is still there, The Strater Hotel. 

In Durango, we got on Highway 550 and pretty much started driving straight uphill for what seemed like forever!  I'd never been on this two lane road. It has no guardrails and it's very curvy with one switchback after another and average speed is 20-30mph. As we approached the summit of Coal Bank Pass at an elevation of 10,640 feet, I felt this drive was not only a test of my driving abilities, but a scary test of dad's oxygen saturation. His portable O2 machine was set on the highest level and he had the pulse oximiter on his finger for the duration. I was so relieved when we reached the summit!  That was short-lived though as a few miles down, and down the road, we were going up again; this time to Molas Summit at 10,910 feet.  Once again, I felt relief, albeit a little light headed from my imagined (real) oxygen deprivation. I asked dad if that was all of the passes and he looked at the map and said, "No, there's one more."  I about died.  This one was even higher than the previous two, but the most beautiful of all as much of the drive was cut out of the rock mountain, leaving a rainbow of colorful Rocky Mountains jetting into the sky.  Of course, we were 'in the sky', at the tree line, going over Red Mountain Pass at 11,018 feet!  If you read my blog a couple days ago, you'll remember that we were at the Salton Sea...below sea level. What a contrast and what a drive. I saw a sign just outside of Silverton that said 55 MPH and I told dad that I was never so happy to go 55 as I was in that moment!  Dad said this was called the Million Dollar Highway as when it was built back in the 1940s or 1950s, it cost a million dollars a mile. I'll tell you that it takes cajones to work on this road!

Silverton is a cute mountain town, but another 25 or so miles on 550 is the town of Ouray.  It looked like the perfect place to live...today.  Very quaint, still, clean and colorful, Ouray is gorgeous with the aspen trees just beginning their bloom.  Of course in the dead of winter, I'd want no part of it!

We drove on to Montrose and are here for our last night on this amazing journey. We were both so tired when we arrived, we bought dinner from a Thai food truck that came highly recommended by the hotel staff and another hotel patron and ate from the styrofoam containers in the room. It's 8:30 and dad's been asleep for 30 minutes already. I'm not far behind him. 

In the event I don't write anything tomorrow night, a big THANK YOU to those of you who have followed our journey through this blog. This trip with my dad has been one of the greatest joys of my life! I'm so happy I've recorded this trip in this manner and had the discipline to keep up with it every night. 

Good Night.

 

    

Tuesday 5/23

We happily left Blythe, CA about 9:00 am with temperatures in the high 90's that early. I filled up my tank at the station across the street where I saved 4 cents from the station on the hotel side of the street.  I thought I was being very smart!  NOT. If we had gone less than two miles on the freeway, I would have saved about 50 cents per gallon because we were then in Arizona. With 18.5 cents federal taxes, California adds another 30 cents state taxes. Ugh. Oh well, gas prices won't ruin any of my days!

We probably drove only 30 miles, if that, on interstates today. We were on state highways all day and it was beautiful, peaceful and quite interesting!  This is the way to see America in its truest fashion!  We drove along Route 66 into a town that celebrates Route 66 every day in every way, with the restaurants, old cars, trinket and souvenir stores and their own Route 66 Loop, Williams, AZ.  We pumped more gas and stopped at Dairy Queen for a shake for our continuing drive.

It was my true pleasure to experience another "first" for dad...to experience the Grand Canyon!  We made several stops at overlooks where we got out to view the absolute, magnificent beauty. For those who have been to the Grand Canyon, you know that pictures don't do it justice, but I took quite a few.  Unfortunately, this blog application only allows a minimum number of photos per post. We saw elk and deer along the road and even after leaving the National Forest, the scenery remained gorgeous for 100 miles!  

We were going to try to find a place to stay around the area befor the Page, AZ turnoff to Lake Havasu, but every hotel/motel was booked for the night.  We didn't want to take too many chances and go into Page (60-65) miles so we turned east on highway 160 to look for a place to lay our heads for the night. It still took us about 75-80 miles to find where we're at for the night, in Kayenta, AZ, at the Kayenta Monument Valley Inn. We are in Navajo country on the largest Indian reservation in the country (maybe the world).  I've learned a couple of things in the few short hours I've been here: 1) I don't have a Navajo card (likely because I'm not a Navajo Indian), so this room was $200 instead of $160 per night. 2) Dinner at the restaurant here, an maybe other restaurants, would have been cheaper if I did have the Navajo card.  3) They don't sell or serve alcoholic beverages on the reservation, but will be happy to sell you a non-alcoholic beer or glass of wine. 4) Although Arizona does not recognize daylight savings time, the Navajo's do.  So it's an hour later where we're at now than it is in Phoenix, Prescott, Scottsdale and down the 160 highway a bit for as long as we're on this reservation. When I asked the Navajo Indian front desk lady about the time while staring at the clock with, I'm sure, a very dumb, confused look on my face, she told me that I should know that when on the reservation, daylight savings time is observed.  Silly me...

It was a long day in the car even though the mileage doesn't reflect it. About halfway through dinner, dad was done...he was completely spent.  So I got him to the room and he was fast asleep within 20 minutes. It would have been sooner if he could have changed his clothes faster! He's been such a great traveling buddy! Today is really the only day we pushed the envelope a bit too far and that's only because there were no rooms at the many Inns we tried to stay.  I'm so happy we didn't have to drive into Cortez or Durango tonight!

 

    

Photos from Monday 5/22

Salton Sea, sad Bombay Beach and sand dunes from Monday's travels as described in previous post. 

     

Monday 5/22

On the road again. 

We left Jeanne and her puppies with tears in all of our eyes this morning about 10:45 am. Sadness, but there has been so very much joy over the last six weeks!  Again, many thanks to Bruce and Jane and to Jeanne for their gracious hospitality. 

So we are in Blythe, CA for the night.  To say we took the long way getting here is an understatement!  We drove through Hemet, San Jacinto and along the 10 freeway for awhile, before dad asked for another Inn-N-Out burger. This time though, we only ordered singles and shared the fries and still couldn't finish our food. But very good burgers and fries!  We then found our way along highway 111 through La Quinta and Palm Desert and surrounding communities in order to find the road that took us to the Salton Sea. The road hugs the eastern seashore of this huge body of water that sits approximately 250 feet below sea level. Although there are many areas for recreation, RV's, camping, picnicking, kayaking and other water sports, we saw only one lonely car with one person and a pup tent. It's a dying area and not kept up at all. The Salton Sea looked beautiful as the blue sky was reflected in the water and at times it was difficult to define the line between the sky and the water along the horizon.  This body of water went on for miles and miles. I pulled off the road at a turn off for Bombay Beach. OMG...it's difficult to fathom that people live in these dilapidated, old, weather torn buildings some probably call home. But they do as we saw some folks around. Made me sad. 

We drove through many small towns in very Southern California closing in on Mexico before making a turn and driving through Brawley. Along the way, I saw what appeared to be sand dunes ahead. Yes, there are sand dunes!  The Imperial (County) Sand Dune state park!  These dunes are quite amazing and would be a blast to ride.  However, all day we were in temperatures between 105 and 110 degrees. Man, it was hot when we  even opened the window, let alone getting out of the car! I would NOT live there. Leaving the Brawley area and driving to Blythe, the two lane road was in excellent condition and there were a lot of desert trees and shrubs along the road with red, Rocky Mountain peaks surrounding us...actually a very easy, interesting and pretty drive.

Well, my photos won't post, so I'll do it tomorrow. 

Sunday 5/21

As our final full day with Jeanne, Snicker and Bailey unfolded, dad began his on the patio with the warm sun on his skin for an hour or so before it got too hot.  It did get hot today, in the mid-90's.  However, on the patio, there seems to always be a slight breeze to temper the heat.  Dad wanted to go back to French Valley Airport Cafe for a late breakfast and he ordered something I've never heard of - Messerschmitt. He did enjoy it even though there was too much food for him to finish. If it sounds German, he'll probably enjoy it!

We watched golf; we began the process of collecting our things to pack to continue on our trip; dad had more patio time this afternoon; we barbecued pork chops for dinner and I took the pups for a final walk together. Jeanne has been so wonderful to dad and I as she opened her home and her heart for the last four weeks.  There isn't enough gratitude available for her love and hospitality. We may need to leave a pair of dad's socks for Snicker though!  It's really become a nightly ritual with her stealing dad's socks...or whatever he has available. 

Our adventure continues tomorrow!