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Things Mom taught me

I have an old voice mail on my cell phone that I cannot bring myself to delete.  LISTEN



Twenty five things mom taught me...



1. My mother taught me TO APPRECIATE A JOB WELL DONE .

"If you're going to kill each other, do it outside.. I just finished cleaning."



2. My mother taught me RELIGION .

"You better pray that will come out of the carpet."



3. My mother taught me about TIME TRAVEL .

"If you don't straighten up, I'm going to knock you into the middle of next week!"



4. My mother taught me LOGIC .

" Because I said so, that's why."



5. My mother taught me MORE LOGIC .

"If you fall out of that swing and break your neck, you're not going to the store with me."



6. My mother taught me FORESIGHT ..

"Make sure you wear clean underwear, in case you're in an accident."



7. My mother taught me IRONY .

"Keep crying, and I'll give you something to cry about."



8. My mother taught me about the science of OSMOSIS .

"Shut your mouth and eat your supper."



9. My mother taught me about CONTORTIONISM .

"Will you look at that dirt on the back of your neck!"



10. My mother taught me about STAMINA .

"You'll sit there until all that spinach is gone."



11. My mother taught me about WEATHER .

"This room of yours looks as if a tornado went through it."



12. My mother taught me about HYPOCRISY .

"If I told you once, I've told you a million times. Don't exaggerate!"



13. My mother taught me the CIRCLE OF LIFE .

"I brought you into this world, and I can take you out.."



14. My mother taught me about BEHAVIOR MODIFICATION .

"Stop acting like your father!"



15. My mother taught me about ENVY .

"There are millions of less fortunate children in this world who don't have wonderful parents like you do."



16. My mother taught me about ANTICIPATION .

"Just wait until we get home."



17. My mother taught me about RECEIVING .

"You are going to get it when you get home!"



18. My mother taught me MEDICAL SCIENCE .

"If you don't stop crossing your eyes, they are going to get stuck that way."



19. My mother taught me ESP .

"Put your sweater on; don't you think I know when you are cold?"



20. My mother taught me HUMOR.

"When you cut off your toes, don't come running to me."



21. My mother taught me HOW TO BECOME AN ADULT .

"If you don't eat your vegetables, you'll never grow up."



22. My mother taught me GENETICS .

"You're just like your father."



23. My mother taught me about my ROOTS .

"Shut that door behind you.. Do you think you were born in a barn?"



24. My mother taught me WISDOM .

"When you get to be my age, you'll understand."



And my favorite:

25. My mother taught me about JUSTICE .

"One day you'll have kids, and I hope they turn out just like you !"

Memorial Service & Slide Show

Mom's Obit Page at Mt.View Memorial.
 
 
 Audio clip of the Memorial services for Mom. 

 Mom's Slide Show .

St. Leona has arrived.

December 3, 2012 7:30pm, Pacific time, as I sat on one side of the bed and Popcorn stood on the other, Snickers, Baileywick, Ladybug and Firecracker were in casual family conversation.  Mom’s labored breathing slowly came to a stop.  Her strained facial expression suddenly became very peaceful.  Popcorn looked at me and said, “I think she is gone.”  I stood up and bent over Mom kissing her on the forehead.  Snickers removed the oxygen mask from Mom’s face and hugged her and we all shed tears of joy knowing that Mom was absent from the body and present with the Lord.  Popcorn went to summons the nurse.  Nurse Cheryl came in with a stethoscope, and after listening to Mom’s chest for a moment, she nodded and said, “I’m so sorry.”

PICC Line & NPO

I checked in at Manor-Care to see Mom today (Thursday 11-30-12) at 1:20PM.  Snickers was there earlier and was out for a hearing test.  The Speech/Swallow therapist was there with Mom when I arrived and was doing paperwork.  Physical therapy was there earlier, I’m not sure what they did with Mom, and Occupational Therapy was scheduled for Mom at 3:05PM.  Mom was sleeping and I could not rouse her.  She was that way almost all day.  The Therapist has some serious concerns that we all needed to discuss with the nursing staff.  I interacted with various other staff as they came in to check on Mom and some time after 2:30PM Snickers and Tadpole showed up again.  Tadpole had some nice flowers for Mom’s room.  I began explaining to Snickers how poorly Mom was doing today compared to yesterday, she was already aware of this, and soon - several of the staff were there to discuss where we go from here.  At this point, Hospice is OUT until further notice.  WE want all the skilled nursing staff to do everything they can to help Mom have some healing and recovery if possible. They have her on a NPO (nothing by mouth) order and are setting up for an IV to be started again.  In order to get the nutrition she needs, we discussed a surgically installed feeding tube in her stomach but opted instead for the PICC Line method.  Manor-Care has a Nurse on staff that can do PICC Line installation at bedside. If the nurse has problems installing the PICC Line at bedside, they will transport Mom back to the hospital to have it done there and bring her back to Manor Care afterwards.  Mom was also running a fever of 99.7F and they put a cold wet wash cloth on her forehead and icebags in her armpits.  Snickers had a conversation with one of Mom’s old nurses at OAR who said the deal about not holding Mom’s room for more than 21 days is not cast in stone.  So, Snickers is now holding out hope that perhaps Mom may be able to return to OAR in time if she recovers enough for that.  Today was a bad day and did not give me much cause for optimism but we are doing our best to do the right thing for Mom.  I left for home around 4PM.

Move to Manor-Care

Manor-Care - Click HERE

Wednesday was spent researching “Skilled Nursing Facilities” for Mom to be released to from the hospital.  Snickers and I did some actual eyeball-to-eyeball tours with facilities representatives and came to a consensus.  “Tadpole” came over from the other side of the state and tied in with her mom Snickers as I headed back home to prepare for services prayer meeting night.  Thursday morning I did some chores, gathered some legal paperwork and met Snickers and Tadpole in the cafeteria at the hospital.  Mom was under the care of a new Dr. at the hospital and we received information that changed our plans a little.  Mom was actually doing better and we were going ahead with the move from the hospital to the selected “Skilled Nursing Care Unit” but we have decided to postpone the Hospice care.  We learned that if we called Hospice in on the case, the Skilled Nursing Care would not be as diligent with lab work.  That being the case we instructed them that we did NOT want Hospice care at this time and would re-assess Mom’s condition in a week or two and monitor her condition closely including regular lab work until we know if she is going to go downhill or have a chance for a recovery of some sort.  At a little after 1PM they transported Mom from St. Anthony Hospital to Manor-Care room 209A (by the window).  I signed all the initial paperwork for Mom as her POA.  Snickers, Tadpole and I were there in the room with Mom as the various different “NEW” care givers came in to introduce themselves and do the preliminary tests, questions and check for vitals, etc.  Mom’s new “home” is very nice.  If she improves enough to become ambulatory like she was not long ago, they will move her to a different wing of the facility that specializes with dementia patients.  She is still on oxygen, has the catheter, is on one to one care at soft diet mealtime and still has a choke hazard but for now, is off the IV.  Many of our friends and family have been praying for Mom.  Today was a display of how God hears and answers prayer.  Thank you Lord and thank you that were praying for Mom. 

Tue. update on Mom

I made it over to St. Anthony Hospital Tuesday morning by around 11:30 am.  Snickers was already there since about 10:15 am.  It had been a bad morning so far for Mom.  Her blood work showed that she was back in a dehydrated condition and they had her hooked up again to an IV with saline solution.  She was also on Oxygen.  Snickers was trying to feed her some Jello.  Mom was having a hard time swallowing and chocked on it.  The nurse was able to suction everything out OK and things settled down but the coughing caused a lot of pain for Mom with her three broken ribs.  The nurse also gave Mom a half dose of pain medication about a half hour earlier than scheduled.  Things got better after that.   

The Dr. finally showed up around 1pm and said he was keeping her in the hospital for another night and was setting up an interview for us with the Hospice administrator.  Depending on the assessment of the Hospice people, his goal was to re-hydrate Mom again to a good level, keep her comfortable with proper pain medication and release her back to OAR with help from Hospice. He said he was not on hospital duty on Wednesday and there will be a different Dr. on call tomorrow to make the decision on if Mom is well enough to be discharged with Hospice care back to OAR. 

The Hospice person didn’t get to see us until about 4pm and told us that Mom was qualified for Hospice care and working with the Dr. – their plan was to get her re-hydrated so she can go home to OAR.  They will maintain her comfort level with pain medication, prescribe a hospital bed for her room at OAR, and a good wheelchair, Oxygen as needed in the room, a Hospice worker assigned to Mom working in conjunction with the OAR staff, one on one care at mealtime while remaining on the soft food diet for now.  I left Snickers there after this meeting and got back home around 5pm.