Chapter 92 - The Easy Things

"I'm impressed with the ease that you do that" she said as I sat on the edge of my bed, lifted my legs, pivoted on my bum then rolled onto my side, pulling up the doona as I did so. She lacks any fluidity of motion getting into or out of bed. I have already described how she shuffles to about centre of the side of her bed, then with much effort she lifts her right knee as far as possible toward the centre of the bed then tumbles onto her right side. Should she fall on the bedclothes she is unable to extricate them from beneath her. Often I need to assist in raising her right knee to the level of the bed before pushing on her foot to force her knee toward the centre of the bed. Getting out of bed is more difficult and requires much effort from her to pull on the bed pole to bring her body as close as possible to the bed's edge so that she can lower her legs over the side in order to tilt her body upright. She is unable to move the lower half of her body at all, is unable to push on the mattress with her feet, unable to take the weight of her bottom ever so slightly to aid in sliding in bed, although the satin strip does help. However, she is often forced awake when her legs stiffen out straight to protrude her feet over the edge of the bed. That forces her to get out of bed & back in again, because she is unable to withdraw her legs no matter how hard she tries, and if I push her legs toward the middle of the bed they seem to settle in an unnatural position which causes discomfort. Out & back in seems the only solution, crazy as that may seem.

She had to skip her second physio appointment because our local PD group meets on Thursday mornings. She attended the next week. An hour & a half of exercising. Afterwards she surprised me when we did a little shopping; she walked quite well; almost strode along the footpath from shop to shop, and later that evening we walked the village.

Then last Saturday night we ruined her stability by attending a birthday event for a neighbour, held at a Chinese restaurant where we had eaten before. She did not eat very much, rather cautious after the problems at Xmas, and drank lots of water while there. At home during the night she had to rise at least 3 times, not for the toilet, but in an attempt to ease pain in her legs from tremors that prevented her being comfortable in bed. Also thirst. She needed my assistance to rise then return to bed. She walked the house a little. She was unable to quench her thirst. I had eaten much the same as she had, albeit with a glass of red, without feeling thirsty at all. She was unfit to attend church as a consequence on Sunday. Since then she has been very shaky. Chinese restaurants are now declared off limits. In looking back, she has had at least three, maybe four bad periods after eating Chines food, at first we failed to associate PD problems with Oriental cuisine.

Today she was able to cope with the physio exercises. Immediately after that she had her hair cut; something she had postponed for over a year. She is strange with short hair again after all these years. At least she will no longer need to comb & tie back long hair each morning; an activity that has given her a lot of pain. Her fear of sitting & trembling in a hairdresser's chair had discouraged her for a long time, yet the young girl who performed the task was not troubled by the tremors. Back home after a stressful morning she was listless and tired with a headache. An attempt at going to bed failed after she was unable to be comfortable. She has been watching one of her favourite movies. That reminds me, yesterday we went to the theatre to see the movie about Jane Austin. I even bought a box of Malteasers, although she would have preferred Jaffas. Perhaps next time.