Charles just doesn't "find" his walker. He pulls it to him from across furniture, etc. I always say "find your walker" because he also picks it up and I call that the flying walker.
Last night I came home and there was a hole in the living room drywall and another near a chair. I asked and he finally admitted to falling but not hurting himself, thank god. He didn't admit to the walker grab and by looking at the way the hole was situated I know it was the walker.
I can't be there all day to say "find the walker" so I go to work nervous and afraid. I have help in the a.m. and at lunch.
Just venting but any feedback will be welcome.
Cuttercat
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Cuttercat
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This probably sounds very familiar to lots of folk reading this and looking at the holes in their walls. Unfortunately the time will come, if it hasn't already, when Charles can't be left alone safely. I had to leave work 6 months after diagnosis to avoid C causing himself serious damage, which he still managed to do when I was in the house with him but not in the same room. That's when I bought the baby monitor so he was never really alone even if I was not in the room with him.
I'm sorry not to be able to give you words of encouragement but this is what happens with PSP.
We are probably at about the same stage in this PSP life. No walker for my guy yet, but I see him doing the same kind of stuff when I get home from the office. Just yesterday he decided to change out the light bulbs from the exterior lights of our home. Sure enough, he had a fall and cut his leg in a couple of places. He had blood on shorts, shirt and leg, but acted as if nothing had happened. Finally he admitted that he lost his balance and wiped out. A very proud and strong man and it's hard for him to see things around the house that need to be fixed or replaced and not be able to help. I don't want to stop him from trying but wish he would tell me what he is thinking before he does it so that I can be there to help. It is getting harder!
I agree with NannaB, there comes a point when leaving him alone for too long can be dangerous. I am making a career move in September and will be able to spend more time at home. For us, it has been 10 months since the PSP diagnoses but was diagnosed as PD since 2012.
sounds a bit like me I am fed up denying that i had a fall, just because it makes me feel stupid. So i deny that it happened however my wife knows by the noise it makes although i don't usually damage the furniture she is always accusing me of doing that. I still love her though.
I definitely don't want to sound like his mother! haha! He looks away when I ask if something happened and tries to play it off with a care free response like "it's just a little bump", "it's all good", "its nothing", but yet he has blood all over his shorts and shirt! Sometimes I just have to laugh and try and make the best of it. I know he worries when I worry so I am trying hard to just let some things slide. Last month alone I hired a handy man to fix a towel rack that was used for support and pull out of the wall, a toilet paper holder that was torn out of the wall, replacement of a cracked toilet bowel water container that cracked when he fell too hard on the seat and it hit the back wall and cracked and two antique chairs that he split when he fell back so hard to sit. I also added 3 handicap rails to the bathroom. Oh well, it is just stuff and as long as he is not the broken one, then I am going to be okay. This is the test of TRUE LOVE!
do feel the full sensation of the fall. Such as when you cut yourself, are you aware youre bleeding? or are you aware you have a bruise or a swollen...whatever
Bruce would often come out of a fall with small or large abrasions with the same amount of "Pain". I say his pain index is diminished ...how about your index?
I think that I am an expert in falling I very rarely have uncontrolled falls so usually i don't hurt myself, I did however have a fall about a month ago that ended in up in A &E and had a couple of stitches to my abdomen I in fact thought it was nothing but my wife insisted that i went . Guess she was right again. but i would say that my pain threshold is deminished
Oh baby sends chills of our life as i gaze around my holie house.....I am also reading NannaB's post and I hate to say it but, it's true.... there comes a time when he cannot be left alone.
I used to call it "the lawn mower affect". the walker would (still is) be way out in front of him as if he were pushing mower up a hill ! Naturally the stability that the walker could provide was lost as Bruce and it got farther from each other.....I kept working in 2012 though he was diagnosed in 2013...but the holes came just before and definitely after....I realized I could no longer safely leave him.....almost every wall has some everlasting marks of B's head, and shoulder defying the stronghold of plaster! I just told someone else here of my little songs to help him remember to use his walker correctly:
"Hand to hip and you won't slip" "Heal to toe so you can go" They may seem demeaning but what can I say im a 5th grade teacher....with little other help!
I also bought an exercise strap. It's very rubbery basically made4 of rubberband and i attached one end to the handle of the walker , he then would wrap it across his biggest part of his bum , and then hold onto the other end with his other hand. This whole apparatus as it were helped him stay strapped and closer to the walker eliminating the lawnmower affect as he walked.....If he did fall the walker would be released and he would not hurt himself or it .....Did it work? yes, but I still had to be there ....and pretty soon that didnt' even work as he became stuck to the floor and could not figure out how to walk....that's where we are at now...
Well dad is ready to go to the gym so I'll take my leave
I tell my mother that J could bring down an entire empire if left to do so. It has become better since he is less mobile. It must be awful for you to have to go out to work with the worry of it on your shoulders. x
Cuttercat, please don't hate me but I found your post amusing. Not the fall God forbid but the idea of him lifting his walker and you coming home with holes in the wall and him there with an innocent nonchalant expression like nothing had happened..hee hee....Sorry.
That nonchalant look...and that is after you have taken as many precautions....Last night after devising a way for him to sit while he is brushing teeth etc....I gave him a small spitune whereupon he set it down and proceeded to spit all over the floor...He just giggles and I spend two minutes fuming...wiping up and getting over it!
There is humor in everything. Thanks for getting that in my post. And they never admit it, probably afraid of going to the nursing home, which will be a long way down the road, nevertheless.
So many echoes here for what we go through... my lvely looks very solemn when I ask her why:
She is in another room lying on the floor,
She has a parcel (and a grin) and and was nowhere near the front door
she is lying on the floor with the cat on top of her... both with big grins!
And here's one... I just realised that I had somehow adopted a mis-calculation on who should put how much into the joint account over quite a few years... we're talking me being down some very serious £. (Not that it actually matters... we run separate finances and have a kitty - habit from the first ten years of living separately I guess).
I foolishly said, "How on earth could I have got that wrong?" Without looking up from what she was doing she said," Because, sweetheart, you are seriously stupid."
Just to add my two cents. It was hell for a couple of years dealing with the falls and all the damage to him and to the furniture, to the plumbing (three smashed toilets), to the drywall (there is still a head-shaped hole in one bedroom wall) and quite a few of my favorite things - and to my heart and nerves and arms. I ruptured both of my Achilles tendons dashing to the sound of crashing, too .Now it has been many months without any major disaster, because he doesn't get up on his own and is usually in a wheelchair. In some ways it is a mercy. I'm just saying, hang on! This phase will pass. Child-proof what you can, put things you treasure away. Try not to worry too much! Love, ec
Gosh... And you are so on the ball too... Gulping and mentally preparing... Can I really do this... One day at a time and today was not so full of hugs. Some days I run out of cusses.
Time for bed... tomorrow, get up and do it all again.
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