A 3 night visit

We went and stayed at Mum and Dad's for 3 nights this week.  She's having a rough trot of things at the moment.  She's changed her antidepressants 3 times over the last couple of months, and it's been, disastrous to say the least.  She has had really bad side effects and we’re crossing our fingers that this change will be the one to stabilise her again.  She has only been on it for a week and a half, and is still having regular panic attacks and a lot of agitation. Apparently it’ll take up to 8 weeks to really have an affect.

I have noticed so many things recently that have been getting steadily and quite rapidly worse. The other night at dinner she was trying to cut her meatballs, and she was using a spoon instead of a fork to try and keep the meatball still.  She said to herself “how do I normally do this?”  She really struggles with eating now.  I get the impression when they are alone, Dad probably cuts up her food for her, but when anyone else is around, she doesn’t want to lose face, and tries to do it herself.  She does struggle to cut the food up, and takes a lot longer to eat.

Compare that to a year ago, it’s a world away.  She is also getting quite aggressive with Dad.  Very demanding of his time and attention.  Expects him to do everything for her without any manners or grace, she gets short at him when he doesn’t just know what she wants.

She had a fall while I was there, and seemed to forget that I was inside. I thought it was the kids making stupid noises (which they tend to do constantly), and went out to find her outside on the ground, crying uncontrollably.  She wouldn’t let me help her up, and only wanted Dad (who was at a neighbours house).  She was convinced she had broken her knee (even though she was walking on it).  The following morning, she wanted to go to the hospital because of the pain, convinced it was broken.  She said she was trying to yell out to the neighbour who was mowing his lawn, but couldn't hear her.  But me and the kids were both there.

I’ve noticed that she doesn’t read much anymore.  Normally when I visit there is an arrangement of current magazines to read, this time, no magazines.  She mentioned she wanted to sit down and read the paper, and when I walked past again, she was looking at the supermarket catalogue.

She got very agitated when Dad went over the neighbour’s house, and she couldn’t find the dogs bowl to feed the dog. Really angry and really aggressive when he didn’t jump to her assistance to clear the table and put the dishes in the dishwasher. They ended up arguing over it because he was having a drink and a chat after dinner.

It is quite clear that Dad does most things for her now, and the stress and strain must be getting to him. Not good!

 

I got the feeling that us being there really disturbed her routine, and that we were a pest. She got quite short with the kids quite a number of times, which isn’t usually her way with them. It was quite obvious that they annoyed her and aggravated her with their constant noise and mess.  The time is coming where we will not be staying at their house, it's just too much on her.