Today we picked a place for our mother to live.  The bedroom opens to a private deck off the garden and the woman can do level three care which means the patient needs everything.  She can die there.

We were on our way up to the foster care home to put a deposit down when we got the call from rehab saying they’d moved our mother to a private room; that she’d been stealing.  She went into her roommate’s cupboard and took something.  Not only that, the social worker said she had been stripping.  I guess she had been vomiting, too.

We gave the check to the Romanian woman and told her about the stripping and vomiting but not the stealing and she asked if we had introduced any new medication.  She said those were typical symptoms of ……I can’t remember what drug she said.  But sure enough when we got to rehab the nurse checked her chart and they’d introduced Resperidol on Mon afternoon. 

She was clean out of it by the time the four of us got there.  We were gathered round her bed and she tried to put a sentence together but to no avail.  My youngest sister pulled out her cell phone to call my mother, wanting to see if she knew how to answer the phone because she hadn’t the night before.

My mother struggled to get her right arm out of the covers, and she was scrambling because she probably thought it was her “significant other.”  He’s not really but she thinks he is.  She finally got her arm free and picked up the receiver.  In this bright, cheery voice she was somehow able to call up she says, “Hello???”

My sister is standing right in front of the bed, holding her cell phone, saying,

“I just called to see if your phone worked.”

My mother seems confused but focuses on the phone and says,

“Robi…..? (I can’t think of a good name)

Which is weird because that’s the sister standing closest to the bed, not holding a cell phone.

“No, mom, it’s me.  I just wanted to see if you’d pick up.”

My mother looks confused but turns her attention back to the phone call saying something I can’t remember.

My brother laughs and says,  “bye-bye.”

She listens to the phone, waiting.  We say to hang up so she says good-bye but can’t figure out how to hang up the phone. 

What I am more concerned about is her shoulder.  She had tried to take the hospital gown off, which is why her arm was all caught up.  Her exposed shoulder was skeletal and an odd color:  almost the yellow you’d see with a bruise.

The woman we gave the check to is going to rehab on Monday morning to check her out.  See, she gets the deposit from us so we are committed but then she has the option of saying, “I don’t think it’s a good fit.”

That’s okay, we found two more places today that we felt good about, and there are plenty more to look at.  But we only have ’til the 27th.

My mother was in a foul mood.  So was the roommate.  My brother took three bills up for my mother to pay this morning, sort of a little test.  Even with coaching there was little success. 

By the time I got there the roommate was trying to pretend she was asleep and my mother was trying to order everyone around.  The husband was trying to lighten things up, bringing over their pictures of the first great grandaughter for my mother and me to see. 

I ate lunch and left, not having the stomach for any more of her.  We looked at foster homes today, trying to imagine her there.  And I had a telephone conference with an eldercare lawyer so we can set up a guardianship/conservatorship to pay for it.  Maybe she’ll just stroke out when we tell her she’s not going home, and we won’t have to take her anywhere.

Today was the day she saw her doctor.  Actually it was the doctor on call.  Hers is on vacation.  He met with us, then her, then just me.  I noticed his socks and elegant shoes and the way he flipped the hair out of his eyes with a shake of the head like I used to. 

He thinks rehab is a waste of time and that she should go straight to longterm care.  I pleaded with him to reconsider, saying she actually likes it there, that she even made friends with her roommate.  And she doesn’t make friends.  He prescribed mood enhancers and left it at that.  All we really needed from him was a signature on some form they keep at the doctor’s office.  It’s what the court needs to show incompetency.

So now I’ve screwed her out of the remainder of her medicare benefits at this place and have to round up a new place.  Of course she will refuse to go, not wanting to pay for it, not seeing the need.  She will demand to be sent home. 

Today was occupational therapy.  She practiced brushing her teeth and washing her face.  She was supposed to do it standing up but when it came time to push herself up from the wheelchair she refused, insisting she could pull herself up by gripping the edge of the sink.  Her little arms weren’t strong enough and she quickly gave up the idea.

She was always beautiful if you didn’t know her so looking in the mirror and brushing her hair must have seemed pleasantly familiar.  But I had to caution her about the toothpaste.  She was using the toothbrush on her bangs.

My fabulous floor is finished.  That’s the good news.  The bad news is that my mother had a stroke and has vascular dementia plus a whole lot of other things we never knew about.  And now pneumonia.

She was starting to make pretty good sense some of the time in the hospital but now that she’s in the rehab facility she’s completely nuts.  She won’t sign the forms so they can treat her.  She finally signed the one so they can bill medicare but we’re gonna have to move her somewhere else if she doesn’t get it together here pretty quick. 

When I asked her how it went with the physical therapist — She hasn’t walked since the stroke — she said, “Oh, I’m not going to involve her.”

I tried to explain that medicare won’t pay if she doesn’t “participate.”  There’s no reasoning with her.  She thinks my brother, who she has named as executor of her estate, is trying to get ahold of her money.  She thinks the form for rehab is the power of attorney form. 

Anyway, that’s where I’ve been.  She was in ICU for a week because they couldn’t get her heart to calm down.  She’d been on the bathroom floor for three or four days but still contends she was in bed.  She was delirious when I found her, covered in feces.  I went to call 911 and they called the ambulance while she screamed at me to hang the phone up. 

The whole time she was in ICU, where there were no windows, she was convinced it was snowing outside.  So many times I’d wish I had pencil and paper.  The stuff that came out of her mouth was just so….Well, it would make good fiction.  She’s the most narcissistic person I’ve ever known.  And mean.  And now crazy.