DAY WITH NO TEARS

Date: 17/08/2007 04:00

Yesterday (Wednesday) Dennis and I were at Mom and Dad's from 10 am
until 6 pm. Dotty called; the kids all had their dental appts. for
school (remember those? AARGH!) so maybe she can come later in the
week. [I would rather clean than go to the dentist, if you know what I
mean!]

We finally opened up the access through the laundry room. Dennis got
the back screen door put on and bought a new screen door for the front;
it will have to be firred in, but he was a door installer years ago, so
that's doable.

We hauled off another load to the dump and another load to ARC. (Dennis
is doing so much box hauling that it's got him in the hot tub twice a
day!)

The physical therapist made a home visit. She had Mom show her how she
walks with her cane and with her walker. The walker is still a squeeze
in some of the locations, so this makes it easier for us to convince
Dad that more furniture must go. She left the directions for Dad to
help Mom do her exercises twice a day. He's already working on that
with her.

For all of the progress that we have made, I was so embarrassed for Mom
and Dad at the horribly dirty, smelly state the house was in when the
therapist was there. It is deplorable. But, clutter out first, then
deep cleaning later.


The good thing was that Dad had cleared a few things the night before.
This is not easy as he is Mom's 24 hour caregiver, and he is attached
to a lot of stuff. So, we hauled out another card table, at least two
more bookcases, and a few small stands for the 'free store' out front
of the house. We put things out to be 'gone' but some of them
mysteriously migrate back inside the house. We put them out again, and
it's to the point now where Dennis has to put the tarp over the truck
so that the 'stuff' will stay outside.

If I haven't told you already, I believe that we have receipts totaling
4,880 pounds for the dump, and just as many pickup loads to the
donation centers.

We finally cleared the dining room table of the Christmas gifts of
rubber stamps and jewelry Mom has sorted out for her 'girls'. We got
rid of a ripped old room divider.

Dennis and I spent several hours cleaning out envelopes of photos;
trying to find the 'people' shots, and dumping scads of photos Audrey
sent of her family and trips she's been on. (That's the ticket; clean
your house by sending all the junk to the Richardsons!) Anyway, we now
have a drawer dedicated to family pictures. You can be sure that there
are many quite flattering photos of all of us; but that's for you all
to check out later....

The good news is that Dad had his 'shingles' appt. and the pain is
abating. He is very resistant to taking Vicodin (I can understand that;
it's nasty stuff I used for dental pain), so thank goodness his stress
level is going down. Yes, it's stressful to sort and get rid of stuff,
but I believe he is almost relishing the 'resort' atmosphere of room to
move.

Today we did an ARC run first, then got to Dad and Mom's before 10. We
could only stay until noon as I had PT today (while Dennis did the dump
run) and we are both just about exhausted. Not sure, but this may have
been Day 10 in a row.

While we were there, I got the desk cleaned out and Dennis got the
sideboard organized. He helped Dad sort through some old papers and we
brought home a large box to shred in our crosscut shredder. Dad had Mom
sort through books. She's almost to the point where she just wants to
get rid of things, but then gets distracted.

Dennis has dinner planned for Saturday, with Sunday leftovers: macaroni
and cheese and Greek Green beans. Dad loves mac and cheese and Mom will
enjoy the 'gourmet' cheese like smoked Gouda, etc. I think I'll try to
whip up an angel food cake dessert. Diabetics can eat that kind of
cake. We are getting our recipes off the diabetic websites.

Sean and Steffan are setting out more 'stuff', as well. That will make
later stages of clean up easier.

We HAVE to figure out what to do with the carvings. I haven't
confronted Dad about that yet. I don't think he knows that I discovered
the basement is full of them. It's a firetrap. It's scary. We'll need
to do another intervention when Chris or Laird are here. BUT; first
things first. The living space is most important.

Made it through two whole days with no tears, so things are looking up.
We'll be back tomorrow. Maybe I can get Donny to take Dad to Powells to
do some book selling this weekend.

Love for now,
Daphne