It has been a very long time since there was so much fainting in one day.   Anyone who is not okay with explicit talk about BM’s should probably pass on this post.  I was grateful for a three or four hour nap in the middle of the day and more grateful when the ordeal was over this evening and bedtime arrived.

I am a seasoned veteran in what I call waste management.  It is just part of helping someone who no longer can handle those duties on her own.  I am used to the fainting spells.  They no longer scare me.  It is when the two intertwine for all the hours she is awake that it calls into question my physical capacity to do this task.

I am not grossed out by it.  I am not pushed to a high level of frustration by it.  I am just tired and sore, grateful for a break from it now that she is in bed.  Yesterday, I mentioned that Mary Ann’s blood pressure was a very low normal when the Hospice Nurse took it.  I observed that resting blood pressure that low did not bode well for what might be so when she stands up for a while.

I meant to take her BP this morning, but did not remember to do so.  As a result, I am not sure yet about whether or not to start the Midodrine, which raises her BP and reduces the fainting but keeps her BP dangerously high.

Mary Ann got up fairly late today.  It was apparent from the morning trip to the bathroom that the fainting was a problem.  We managed to get her breakfast done.  Then the bathroom trips began.  She felt that she needed to go, but there was little production.  Each time she got on the stool, she fainted.  Each time she stood up from it she fainted.  My role, as I have mentioned before, is to hold her upper body back so that she does not fall forward off the stool.

She was fainting so much that she couldn’t even sit up in her chair when I got her back out into the living room.  I just took her into the bedroom and got her into bed.  She slept for three or four hours.

After she got up, I fed her lunch and the bathroom trips began in earnest.  There was more production during the afternoon.  Once down there would be a some activity.  Then I would pull her up, hold her up and do clean up, almost always including (sorry) getting out some that would not come on its own.  Then as that was going on, she would faint again.  Trying to get her into the sitting position when she is only partially conscious and holding herself stiff, takes all the strength I can muster.  The torso has some pretty powerful muscles.

Each time we went in, there would two or three repeats of that same pattern with occasionally a few minutes of just sitting there holding herself up. During those times, I stayed close to her so that I could get there immediately when she popped up.

Most of the next couple of hours contained those trips, each about the same in terms of my role.  When Mary Ann was not in the bathroom, she was in pop up mode.  She has absolutely no awareness of the risks of getting up no matter how often she faints or how much I remind her not to get up without my helping.  At one point, I had to click the seat belt on her transfer chair to slow her popping up so that I could finish folding the clothes from the dryer.

What I have described above is a very normal activity for Caregivers of those with Lewy Body Dementia.  I can hardly complain.  Others have a far more difficult time than do I.  I write in such detail first of all for selfish reasons.  It helps me to put into words and sort of “get off my chest” just how difficult a day can be.  I hope that the detail also provides a point of contact for those who are experiencing the very same thing but have no one to talk with about it.

I also hope that those of you who have friends or family or acquaintances who are caring for someone, will realize what they are going through and cut them a little slack.  If they are whining, they are doing so for good reason.  You don’t have to try to fix their situation, just listen patiently without immediately changing the subject to something that is going on in your life or tell them about all the other people who have it worse than they do.

Tonight, I am wondering if there is a direct correlation between the low blood pressure fainting issue and Mary Ann’s ability to keep on track mentally.  Shortly before going to bed, she stood up and called me over.  I asked what she was doing.  She seemed distressed and said she was leaning against a wall.  Her eyes were open, not slammed shut as happens sometimes.  She was in the middle of the living room, in front of the television.  When I said there was no wall, she responded, “Did they take it down?” (Probably a memory of the removal of walls in during the sun room construction.)

Moments later in the bedroom, she asked what day it was.  I answered, “Saturday.”  Then she asked me if I was preaching tomorrow.  I asked her when the last time I preached was.  She said, “Last Sunday.”  I asked her if she remembered that I had retired almost two years ago and had not preached since.  She just looked puzzled.

While she does get confused and have delusions and hallucinations and dreams that she cannot tell from reality, those interactions tonight, seemed a little extra odd.  That raised in my mind the question of the impact of so many times today that her blood pressure was too low to keep an adequate supply of blood flowing to her brain.  I am wondering what sort of cumulative effect that has.  If that is the case, it complicates the current decision not to give Mary Ann the Midodrine that raises her BP to harmful level.  There is nothing easy about dealing with this combination of diseases and debilities.

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