Archive for 2008

Isn’t it fast how time flies? Its Christmas Eve today. Imagine that. In another week the girl and boy will be going to school and kindy. Soon they will be going to college. I am getting more and more gancheong (excited) now…..

Have a number of things to do today. Gotta trim the kids nails and wash their hair for tomorrow’s Christmas party. Need to get them to finish up their homemade cards. Need to pack dad’s stuff and label his medication for brother. Tonight or first thing tomorrow we will take out the presents for the kids. That is the best part.

After a week, I think I see a pattern for dad now. Sometimes he operates at 100%. That is when he has his “awakening”. After an “awakening”, he operates at 30% because the “awakening” has drained him. He is so so tired. He can’t think anymore. He has to be guided each step of the way. He must sleep and sleep. At one point he slept for 15 hours straight. After the long sleep he now operates at 50% meaning he can go to the toilet etc unaided now but he is very quiet. He talks mostly in his sleep or to himself. He says very little to us even when we speak to him. He stills like to rest and wake for meals only but he looks a little less tired now compared to right after his “awakening”.

Well, I must be off now. Sorry I have no time to blog hop to wish you all a Merry Christmas and Happy New Year. So here is an e-card for those of you who just happen to be passing by.

Happy Holidays and hope you all have a good time with your loved ones.

After the awakening comes the fog. Dad’s fog is back. He didn’t make it to the toilet on time this morning. After breakfast, he went upstairs and went right back to sleep on the study room sofa. Only to pee again but fortunately this time all over the bathroom floor.

The little one wanted to play with kong kong. He sits beside his sleeping kong kong playing with his Thomas the Train. “Why is kong kong still sleeping?” he asks.

Because dad is upstairs with the little one, I had to run up and down to make sure everything is ok.

I had plans to finish up some subjects I had been teaching the kids. Its only two weeks more before school starts. But today, I feel a bit unsettled. In the end, I put them both in front of the tv. I also scolded the girl and said some not very nice things to the her because she can’t seem to stop asking questions.

I wanted to cook yam rice today so I asked the maid to fry the yams for me so I could cook it but she fried the yams then cooked the rice herself without putting in the chicken. Nevermind, I told her, we’ll steam the chicken but she went to fry the ginger before putting it on the chicken to steam. Normally we only fry the ginger for steaming fish, not chicken. Nevermind, it’ll taste nicer, I told her but we have to hurry. If kong kong goes back to sleep it’ll be very hard to wake him. We have to cook fast today. She’s not normally that forgetful but today of all days….

So now, the food is cooked and kong kong has gone back to sleep, upstairs. When he wakes up again, he will be disorientated again.

Dad wakes up and leaves a trail of urine all the way to the bathroom again. I guide him to remove the bottom half of his clothing and I am relieved that he will allow me to turn the shower on. Dad does not like to shower anymore. So I held on to dad’s shirt and asked dad to spray and wash up himself. Dad allowed me to help him towel dry but he managed to change himself. Thats good. At least he managed to have half a shower today.

He is like a totally different person today compared to yesterday. Today, he needs to be guided on what to do, otherwise he won’t know how to do it.

In the evening when dad woke up, I took dad to the toilet again. This time I followed him in instead of leaving him in there and I discovered that he really didn’t know what to do next. When we entered the bathroom, he stood in the middle of it and looked like he was going to pee right there. I had to tell him where the toilet was and I had to remind him to remove his clothing.

Then I had to remind him to wash his hands. He nodded his head, turned on the tap and then off again without washing. I had to remind him again that he hadn’t washed. Dad looks like he is operating on 30% at the moment.

Dad had one of his what we refer to as “Awakening” moments on Sunday so we took full advantage of it and took dad everywhere to enjoy old dad.

When dad has his awakening moments he would be very alert and want to do everything, like making up for lost time. I think dad started coming out of his fog on Saturday afternoon. He began talking more and on Saturday evening he sat through the whole “Fearless” show we had put on for him. He loves kungfu movies. After that he even commented on the show.

On Saturday morning, he followed us to the mall to do some grocery shopping. I think he was impressed with the Christmas decorations at the mall too. Dad was tired so we found places for dad to sit and rest while we took turns to run around doing our errands.

We eventually decided to buy a belt for dad because I noticed that the one he was wearing was so old and long. Dad has lost a lot of weight so much so that his clothing no longer fits him. Brother in law has given him some hand me down trousers and we had all bought him lots of shirts but I think we forgot about the belt.

On Sunday morning we took him to the park with the kids. He even sat on the swing for a while. 

After that dad and I walked to the nearby coffee shop for breakfast while hubby stayed on at the park with the kids for a while. Dad had fish slices congee. We bought Yau Char Kuay to go with the Congee because the porridge stall did not have any. Dad really enjoyed it. Then we packed some breakfast home and bought the newspapers for dad to read.

We painted the gate today, something we had wanted to do for a while. Meanwhile, dad sat on the bench and read the papers from cover to cover. He was alert and talked about everything that he read from politics to crime. He even spoke about his 4 digit numbers which he used to buy often.

I had forgotten that it was Donzhi or Tang Yuen Festival or Winter Solstice Festival. Sister had made some and Dad called her to ask her to bring some over. He was really mad because she was late and asked her not to come over anymore. Sis was stalled because she had workers at her house doing renovations.

So we brought dad there to have some tang yuen. It was the kids first time trying. Last year I made some store bought ones but they didn’t like it. Anyway, we thought its a better idea to wait till they are older before getting them to make and consume them since it is a choking risk. In short, the kids didn’t like it, so I ate their portions. 1 bowl plus 2 more bowls makes 3 bowls in all!

We skipped lunch because we were full from the breakfast and the tang yuen so we ended up having tea at a Mamak shop. Dad loves lembu susu and tosai so he enjoyed those.

In the evening after dinner, dad was still very alert, so we took him out to get some last minute Christmas gifts as well as to buy some new shoes for the maid. The kids had accidentally stepped on her shoes and tore it!

This morning the fog returned. Dad left a trail of urine all the way from his bed to the bathroom. After that he didn’t know what to do, because he couldn’t sit down. I finally managed to persuade dad to change his clothes, have breakfast and take his medication but he is sleeping now, like a baby. He will usually sleep all day after his awakening moments.

Sometimes with the awakening moments comes imsomnia where he will not be able to sleep for more than 24 hours and after that he will sleep for 24 hours. Its strange how the brain works.

On Friday, Saturday and Sunday, dad kept on talking about his diapers. Should he wear it? If he wears it he become lazy and won’t make an effort to go to the toilet to pee, he said so himself. He’s worried about not wearing it because he is too full etc but he managed to go through the entire days without it even though he was worried. He even managed to ask for the toilet at the mamak shop and go there on his own accord. And on Sunday he was delighted when he managed to poo first thing in the morning.

Someone said that alzeimers is almost a blessing in disguise, that losing all one’s memory is perhaps better than awareness but what about this half awareness, this awareness that you are beggining to lose your memory. It must be very frightening indeed. Sigh.

Despite wanting to remain positive and the numerous articles about growing old gracefully, I do not think that growing old is a graceful process, not when you have dementia and a bit of alzheimer’s.

Not when you begin to lose your dignity and confidence because you cannot handle simple daily tasks any longer. Not when bathing becomes scary to you and you no longer know how to button up your shirts and unzip your trousers. Not when you start having urinary and fecal incontinence and you have to start wearing diapers like a baby. Not when you have to allow your daughters to help you wear your diapers because you are embarrased you keep on wetting the bed.

Dad’s condition has deteriorated to this now. Sister will be away on holiday again for two weeks so dad will be coming to stay with us for a week till Christmas before going to stay with brother for another week till the New Year.

We’ve got ourselves some Christmas presents, books and toys and CDs and a wallet to replace my broken one. We wrapped them all up even though we already know what they are. Silly, but fun anyway for the kids. Even the maid has got two story books all wrapped up but what shall we get dad?

Hubby said that a digital photo frame would be a good idea. We could store pictures of the kids in there for him. I wonder if those digital photo frames comes with batteries. Will have to check it out. Its very sweet of dear hubby to have thought of this. I am touched. He is the caring “sai sum” (thoughtful) one between us two. I am the airy head one who doesn’t give much thought about things, well, not as much as him anyway.

I have discussed with big sis and I think I will get my maid to sew velcro straps onto his trousers to help make things easier for him. I feel sad because we can’t take him out to jalan-jalan and makan-makan as much as we would like to now because of the fecal incontinence.

I hope that when he is with us, he will have at least one good day when he reverts back to his old self and we have old dad back for a few hours instead of the quiet dad we now have. Dad used to be so chatty and clean but now he is quiet and he won’t bathe and change anymore and now he has incontinence. Poor poor dad.

I found a good online dictionary to help me learn Chinese yesterday and now I’m torn.

I wanted to get a handheld Electronic Dictionary because it is convenient but is it all that good? Some people say you can’t find many words. Now if I invest in one, I will surely feel frustrated if I can’t find the word that I want!

At RM1,500 it is not a cheap investment. Hubby kept on asking me whether it will be worth it. Won’t a printed dictionary be just as good? I don’t have an answer for him.

At RM1,500 I can buy a lot of things. I can even replace this cranky PC with an original Dell by adding another one or two hundred. This PC won’t start up in the morning properly. I have to press restart before Windows will start up. Geeezzz!

Aiyooo how ar? Nevermind, while I go and think about it, I want to share the online dictionary that I found.

All banana parents who only know English but are sending their child to Chinese school should find this online dictionary useful. I don’t want to repeat what I have written on my other blog, so if you don’t mind, please hop over there to read……

Online Comprehensive Chinese-English Dictionary