Day 40: LET'S GET PHYSICAL!

So, after having the torture device pictured above for a couple of months, my brother and sister-in-law discovered that it was not being used in their home and, as a sign of support, they donated it to me.

I've been good lately: had some honey garlic chicken for brunch, snacked on some grapes later and then had one of the IHOP's "Simple and Fit" omelets with a small bowl of fruit.  That put me at less than 1,000 calories for the day, and I try not to go under 1,200 (since that is supposed to put you into starvation mode).  She didn't realize it at first, but her order came with pancakes that she had no intention of eating.  So, when the waitress asked which pancakes she wanted and mentioned that they currently had the New York Cheesecake Pancakes - I HAD to have them.  If you haven't tasted these things, smothered in Strawberry Syrup...you have not yet tasted heaven.

After helping my mom out to our car and throwing her walker into the back, I told her "Be right back" and closed the door - then proceeded to jog laps around the car while she sat inside cracking up laughing.  It's sad to say that I was out of breath after two laps, but so was she from laughing, so s'all gud.

To be honest, even with the pancakes and the syrup, I came in at 858 calories under my suggested goal for the day - and I haven't indulged in anything sweet for a while - so I have no regrets.  However, I do feel bad that I haven't been getting in as much exercise as I want to so - when we got home, I remembered that this machine was in the back of my mom's van and I ran out to get it.

I set it up in the living room and tried it out.  Now, if you haven't seen this particular contraption before, you put your knees into the two black knee pads at the bottom and then swing your hips back and forth around the perimeter of the machine.  DEAR LORD, I was squealing like I was on a flipping roller coaster!  First of all, I can't just use my arms to get started - I literally have to swing my ass to get going like a freaking wrecking ball!  My mom started laughing at me all over again, insisting that I turn on the light so that she could see better.

Then, this contraption has another workout option.  If you look between the knee pads, there is a little, silver colored bar that holds them in place but, if you remove this bar, then your knees go in OPPOSITE DIRECTIONS, leaving you sprawled out over the damn machine like some kinky Gynocologist trip gone all wrong!  My mother was literally laughing at me so hard that she was in tears.  Furthermore, she thought that it was so funny that she's made me promise to make a "Workout Video" for my beloved Chubby Chasers.  So, if everything goes right, expect your first Chuchi Fitness video to be uploaded sometime tomorrow night!

 



Now, for those of you following up on my parents, my mom is still in a constant state of pain - even more so now that she's trying to put off using her last two pain pills.  On the other hand, she is beginning to maneuver a lot better with the walker and seems to need less help getting back and forth in short distances, though she still relies on me for the simple tasks that just take her to long to accomplish (ie: getting a glass of water, feeding our cats, etc).

I am not crazy about my father's rehabilitation facility.  Although everyone there is "nice" - that doesn't seem to be enough to get the job done.  First of all, my father's a big man.  The aide attempts to wrap a normal sized blood pressure cuff around his arm, despite my father and I both telling her that it will just pop off.  But, as if we don't know what the hell we are talking about, she puts the small cuff on and attempts to *hold* it closed.  Of course, the suckers pops right off, so she disappears to look for another cuff.
Then, she brings in a chair that is supposed to weigh him, but he has no walker or wheelchair in order to get out from his bed and over the scale.  She searches high and low (in a REHAB FACILITY) and finally steals a chair from another patient's room.  The chair - which is too small for my father - does not even have the foot rests on it.  So, my father has to rest his bad leg atop his good ankle and skim his feet on one heel as she wheels him down this long hallway to another scale.  Once there, she has to steal ANOTHER patient's walker in order for my father to get out of the wheelchair and onto the scale.

About an hour after my father arrived, I asked the nurse if they had recieved the order from the hospital, and she told me she had four patients to admit and that she hadn't gotten to it yet. With an hour before he was due for his dosage (and he was already in incredible pain from the move), I was told that the hospital did not transfer the order for my father's pain medication.  After spending a half hour freaking out, complaining to the hospital and leaving a message on his doctor's personal cell phone, his doctor calls me back to advise that the rehab facility already HAD the order - the nurse just didn't look through the chart properly. 

I had just left the facility five minutes ago, so I called back and asked to speak to him, only to be told that I couldn't because no calls were allowed after 8 pm.  I explained the situation and told the operator that it was urgent that I speak to my father in regards to his medication, and the operator told me I would be transferred.   Instead of my father answering, I get a woman, and again explain that I want to reach room 312, so she says she would transfer me.  Instead, I end up with the same unpleasant operator with the thick accent!  I explained that I was the same girl who JUST left and that it was urgent that I speak with my father in regards to his medications.  The operator tells me again that I can not speak to my father, and that is why I was transferred to the pharmacy.  I said "I don't want to speak to the pharmacy, I want to speak to my father!  And, regardless what the facility's 'rules' are, I am telling you that this is urgent about his medication!"  He says "Let me transfer you to the pharmacy." And the next thing I know, I'm back on hold.  I'm a little disappointed that he was unable to hear the string of expletives that came out of my mouth as I hung up on him, just as I'm disappointed that you can not slam a cell phone to hang it up like you can and old fashioned telephone.  There's just something so much more satisfying about slamming a reciever after a bad call...

I bring my mom in today and, while I park the car, my mom asks the front desk if there might be a wheelchair I can use just to get her to my father's room.  Again, I grit my teeth as I repeat - THIS IS A REHABILITATION FACILITY!  They should have wheelchairs in every freaking corner!  And, they are not even AT full capacity - at least half the rooms appear to be empty!  But the receptionist immediately informs my mother that there are no wheelchairs available.  So my mom - balancing on her bad foot with her walker - kindly asks if there is any one else the receptionist might be able to ask for one.  (I had already warned my mother that it was a long walk).  I come in just in time to hear the receptionist say "That's what I told her."  She hangs up the phone and informs my mom that there are no wheelchairs available in the entire facility - which is obviously a load of crap.  I tell my mom that the elevator is nearby, and that I will make another attempt to get her a wheelchair when we get to my father's floor.

On the third floor, I ask the nurse's desk if there are any wheelchairs available that I could borrow just long enough to wheel my mom down the hall, and without batting an eye, they say "Oh, you're the one the receptionist called about.  No, we don't have any."

By now, having heard about the trouble I experienced yesterday and seeing the kind of "help" we are receiving today - my mom is getting pissed and audibly griping about needing to transfer my father to another location.  I feel terrible - my mom is in pain and there is absolutely nothing in my power I can do to help but walk by her side as she shuffles down the hallway.  "Can I just borrow one of your office chairs real quickly?  I'll bring it right back."  I ask, noting the numerous unused chairs behind the desk.  One of the ladies laughs at me "We can't do that, it's a safety hazard."  Although we normally respect people who have to follow rules and regulations, my mom and I have about had it.  "It'll be a safety hazard when I fall on my ass in the middle of the hallway because nobody could help us."  My mom mumbled as she hobbled another couple of steps.

"Do you need a wheelchair?"  Some lady asks as she comes up behind us.  "Yes, please!" My mom nearly shout in unison.  "Give me on second."  The lady says as she begins rushing ahead of us.  I follow along, eager to get the chair and run it back to her.  At first, we thought she was one of the nurses - but a moment later, I saw her visitor tag and realized she was just visiting the woman next door to my dad.  Just like the day before - there were no foot rests on the wheel chair, so my mom had to literally hold her legs up while I rushed her down the hallway and into my dad's room.  I quickly got her settled into the only chair and rushed the chair back to the room next door.  Now, I've already mentioned that these are private rooms - so why did this one woman need the two wheelchairs that were in her room.  In fact, looking quickly around at the other nearby rooms - each of them had a vacant wheelchair just sitting by the door, waiting to be used.  Had the nurses and aides been even REMOTELY helpful, any one of those chairs could have been borrowed log enough to get my mom to my father's room.  I literally had that wheelchair for less than five minutes before it was returned.

A little later, although he was given the normal "care kit" - complete with mouthwash, toothbrush, toothpaste, etc - he did not recieve any soap or shampoo.  Becuase of his sutures, he's not allowed to take a full out shower yet, but my mom and I wanted to try to clean his hair in the bed so that he would feel a little better.  So, I asked the aide for some shampoo.  She looked for a good fifteen minutes before reporting that only the morning shift was allowed to have shampoo - the night shift didn't have access to it - so we'd have to wait till the next day.  Seriously?  Who comes up with this shit?

My father also has this device for his knee - it's a small cooler that connects to this pump and it circulates ice cold water around his knee to help reduce pain and swelling.  During my mom's visit, his pain was becoming unbearable - he was constantly wincing and trying to move to a more comfortable position.  Talk with him became impossible because he couldn't focus and - ultimately - my father began to tremble.  This has happened a few times since Monday - when my father's pain becomes intolerable, he begans to shiver...as if he's going into shock.  She had just given him a pain pill but, since those tend to take a little bit of time to kick in, he really needed this ice machine to help dull the pain. 

Now, this may all sound like my mom and I are being a big pain in the butt, but first of all - this is someone I love!  Of course I want them to be taken care of properly!  And secondly, my parents have been in the hospital a lot over the years and any nurse that's learned to work with him has ultimately LOVED me because I end up making their job a lot easier.  I've given my mom sponge baths, I've helped my father change his clothes, I've taken care of getting their ice and water or emptying the catheter bags (I don't know what that is called).  In other words, if they will allow me to help, I generally make their jobs a helluva lot easier.  I don't want to work them to death - just tell me what to do and I'll do it myself.  But, this place seems to have an allergy to allowing family and friends to care for their loved ones.  For example, I asked them for ice for my father's machine, and I was told that *that* kind of ice could only be retrieved from the second floor.  So, I offered to go to the second floor and I was told that only Nurses could get it from the second floor. 

A good 45 minutes later, my father has still not recieved ice for the machine, and his face is beginning to turn purple in agony.  So, I go down to the second floor and ask for some ice, and the woman at the nurse's desk tells me that someone just came for the ice and is already on their way to my father's room right now.  I return to my father's room and - sure enough - there is no one there with ice.  My mom and I pour whatever ice we can find into the cooler - the ice chips in his little pitcher, the ice chips in a styrofoam cup he has, the ice from the little thermos that my mom carries around - whatever we can do to help.  It's much, but it's cooling and seems to help a little bit.  By now, the pain pill is finally starting to kick in and my father's becoming visible drowsy, so we prepare to leave.  Fortunately, we'd made friends with a woman across the hall, and she kindly agrees to let me to borrow her mother's wheelchair to take my mom down to the lobby.  So, I remind that nurse that my father has not gotten any ice yet, I get mom downstairs, go back to return to the wheelchair to our new friend, and then run into my Dad's room to pick up our belongings and kiss him goodbye.  Finally - an hour and ten minutes after I first requested it - my father was receiving ice for his machine.

My mom and I asked him if he was happy there or if he wanted to move to another facility, and he didn't seem to have any interest in moving (too tired and sore to want to bother with it), but I am seriously considering calling and complaining to someone in charge.

On a funnier note, when I spoke my dad on the phone earlier, he told me that my cousin was there with another, unrelated aunt.  It didn't make much sense to me as to why those two people would be visiting together, but I shrugged it off.  When my mom and I arrived to visit and asked him if we missed them, he admitted - they were never there.  They've switched his pain meds since he no longer has an IV and, apparently, the new meds are causing him to hallucinate.  Sadly, he had some disturbing dreams last night but interestingly, he has woken up a few times talking but confused.  He'll say "Who's there?"   And wait for an answer, and then ask "Hello?  Who am I talking to?"  Only to realize that he's totally alone and talking to himself.  I think it bothered him a little bit, but mom and I teased him, talking to the other, non-existent people in the room - until he was able to laugh about it.