Thursday, September 16, 2010

If ya don't eat ya don't shyte, if ya don't shyte ya die!

My Dad, who lives with us, is very ill.
Apart from the fact he's just turned 87 and has many long-term health issues including Bronchiectasis, emphysema, Pulmonary Fibrosis and a hair cut he can't do a damn thing with, he's recently developed a delightful chest infection that is very clingy and needy.
Yes, it's good old Pseudomonas come to visit again, clinging on for dear life and needing another course of anti-biotics.
This visitor pops in at least twice during Winter, sometimes more frequently depending on how social Dad has been and dared to set his big toe beyond the front step of the house in the wheelchair.
Dad has also, of late, tried to stop eating to the extent he's now on mashed/vitamised food I end up spooning down his gullet.
Thick, rich creamy risottos with chicken, bacon, mushroom and leeks, chicken casseroles made with coconut milk,  steak stews with bacon, mushrooms, vegies and whipped spuds with cream cheese. And when he doesn't eat brekkie weetbix thickens home-made soups brimming with vegies and fresh, fattening goodies but vitamised to get past his lips.
Oh, yes, I've turned into Delia for the debilitated, Nigella for the nursing home, Jamie for the geriatric.
Give me a piece of bread, a slice of tomato and a bent paper clip and you, too, can witness the MacGyver of the kitchen turn bollocks into a banquet!
Aspie teen, Hubby and I really like Dad's GP ; he's blunt, straight to the point and tells it as it is without any nonsense.
Several times he's told Dad to eat but today he was blunter than usual.
He told him that if he didn't eat he'd die.
Dad pondered it and replied,
"But that's going to happen sooner or later."
The GP shot back,
"In your case it'll be sooner rather than later. We could speak to a speechie about a naso-gastric tube...?"
Bless his little cotton socks, Dad has just cleaned up 3 pieces of toast.

1 comment:

River said...

Your headline reminded me of my mum. In her last week I was up there visiting her, and found her wasting away. She'd had visitors, friends and care workers all looking after her, all leaving soups and soft foods in her fridge, not noticing that she hadn't eaten the previous days offerings, but all concerned with the fact that she hadn't opened her bowels that day or any other day. They all left foods or medicines to open the bowels with instructions that she MUST take it. When I arrived I saw the problem immediately. She was unable to eat, couldn't even swallow more than a mouthful of cooled coffee, so had nothing to pass. She was dying of cancer and it had reached her esophagus (sp?)so she was literally unable to eat or drink. All those careworkers and doctors visiting and none of them figured this out when she said she couldn't eat or poo? She died a week later in the local hospital with my brother holding her.