Chapter 53 - Quiet Times

There seems little to write about. I made the observation to her a few mornings ago that I have not been called in ages to assist with showering & drying, and only dressing when she needs to wear a coat. I look back through my little note book (the fifth in the collection) to find references to stiffness & being uncomfortable around 7am during the last fortnight or so. Take this morning for instance - the alarm woke us at 6am for first meds then at 7am she called to me that her feet were "sticking out of bed". Hardly, they were in the centre of the bed, her knees slightly bent, although when I pushed her legs a little further over she said "That's better." By 7:30am she was restless, stiff & her toes were curling, so she needed help to rise to sit on the side of the bed. Unable to return to sleep I rose for a shower. She was beneath the bed clothes when I returned, asleep soon after. Only one dark incident - last Monday morning she woke to see a tarantula on the ceiling. I suggested that this may have been her waking mind mistaking the shape of the grab bar above her bed as something else. I really hope so. On Sunday last she had her hair trimmed; although she asked to have it cut short, she was advised to keep it pulled back into a pony tail as there was little to be done with such fine hair. In the recent past washing & coming her hair had been a major effort, often ruining the remainder of a day. Seems not so lately.

She has had negligible pain, and then only in her left arm, probably from pulling herself around in bed. What has produced the improvements? The new mattress for better sleeping, the bedtime Horlix suggested by the Caring Physician rather than sleeping pills (although these were only taken for a couple of weeks), ongoing Bowen Therapy, the two magnesium & calcium tablets she has taken daily since the 22nd August? Nothing else has changed physically as far as I can tell; certainly not her specific PD meds. This is a puzzle. How can we measure the effects of changing parameters? What does good?

Time to check on her.