I had a coordinated care meeting for mom today, the first one I’ve had since we moved her to the new rehab and nursing facility in August. It seems she is settling in fine. She’s her usual social self when she wants to be, and she goes to her room, shuts the door and watches tv or sleeps when she wants to. What more can you ask for?

She still likes to go in to other people’s rooms and steal their drinks, or walk around the cafeteria and grab a milk or juice that an unsuspecting resident leaves unattended. They are going to try getting her a water bottle that she can wear and have with her at all times. Something that straps to her belt or something. I didn’t quite understand the mechanics of it, but they are hoping that helps.  My prediction is that there is going to be an upcoming post about this water bottle not working.

They wanted to hear what my concerns were.  I had the normal ones…how is she adjusting to the new med; is she eating; is she sleeping?  And then I had what is probably a really strange concern…I was worried that I wasn’t supplying her with enough clothes. Here’s why, when I went the last two weekends there were lots of second-hand clothes in her closet. My first thought was she’s gone and stolen some poor woman’s floral mumu dress and some man’s firetruck red blazer and put them in her closet. (It would not be the first time.) Then I looked at the clothes, and there was an iron-on label with her name on them. The only thing I could figure out is that the staff thought mom didn’t have enough clothes and instead of telling me, they were giving her charity clothes. Now, I am not above taking help when I need it…I may not ask for it enough, but that’s another story…but buying her clothes is something I can do, and quite frankly is one of the more enjoyable parts of this journey. It’s something concrete that I know I can do that helps!  And when you are going through this, you want all the hands-on, easy fix things you can get.  Makes you feel like you have some power over this thing you have no power over at all.

It turns out they weren’t charity clothes, well not in the sense I was thinking. People donate lots of clothes to nursing homes. It makes sense, I just never thought of it.  Anyway, my mom, one of the biggest busy bodies I know, likes to insert herself into the big reveals when the staff is going through the donated clothes, and she likes to call dibs on the stuff she wants. Hence, the mysterious dress and red men’s blazer. They were donated clothes that as the staff was pulling them out of the boxes to go to the laundry, mom was laying claim to…presumably when she should have been at exercise class or bingo.

So, mom gets to grab the clothes before anyone sees them.  The staff gets a no cost way of making her happy.  And I still get to go on my Old Navy shopping sprees. Everybody is a winner.