The Story of a Caregiver

The day started with the person assigned to be Mike’s caregiver for the day bailing on me because I hadn’t cleared the snow from our spare parking spot and the visitor spots had too much snow. To be clear, I would have moved my car to the visitor’s spot and let her park in my spot, but my spot had even more snow than the visitor’s spot. I just deal with it, which is what I wanted to say to the “Visiting Angel”.

Normally, I wouldn’t mind so much, just another excuse to work from home. But today was the day I was supposed to have surgery for the carpal tunnel in my right hand. The hand that, at this very moment, is tingling and telling me to cut it out already. I may be able to reschedule in a month or so, if they aren’t too upset that I canceled at the last minute.

To be absolutely clear, I’m not blaming Mike at all in this mess. Still, I sometimes wish I could just do things without worrying about him being alone.

Mike isn’t keeping up with his blog or his journal, so I guess it’s my job to document the journey.

Things are getting troublesome. What’s worse is I often can’t remember him from before. He’s changed that much. He still calls me Sunshine though. That’s still there.

Last week he started having trouble telling the difference between right and left. He’d get mad at me when I’d tell him to move his left arm, and he’d move his right arm. I’d say no, left, and he’d say make up your mind! I didn’t think much of it at first, but since then he’s been making up stories like he bought Nizoral and he’d been using it on his bald head. Now that I think about it, it’s not the first time he’s made something up. I don’t think he’s intentionally trying to gaslight me. I think he really believes these figments of his imagination.

Today, he dropped his Dr Pepper and his fork (twice) during dinner. And with his right hand. I asked if that’s been going on all day (I’ve been in the office) and he wouldn’t give me a straight answer. I’m used to him having trouble with his left side, but this is different.

Tonight, while scrolling Facebook, I saw a post asking for the Duran Duran lyric that says something about me. The answers people wrote brought so much back to me. Seasons, feelings. What seemed to fit today was from “Lonely in Your Nightmare”.

“When the lights of hope are fading quickly bring them to me. I’ll be your homing angel, I’ll be in your head. “

Good night, all.