Another week...another leg of the marathon

Hi everyone,

Just wanted to let you know that not much has changed since last week. We continue to work on getting Mom the right dose of medication to reduce the agitation. It seems to be a work-in-progress. Unfortunately, she is most often either sleeping or in various levels of an agitated state and cannot communicate very well. Yet, she does have moments when she can say something so preciously clearly. For example, almost every time one of us daughters goes to her bed and holds her hand saying "hi mom", she will respond "hi hun" no matter what else is going on. She knows we are there with her, and we know she understands what we are saying to her. It's hard to get used to the fact that we cannot help her very well, and that is why we are trying to get the medications working to keep her out of agitation but still able to communicate whatever she can. She has spoonfuls of soup and of course, ice cream! Sometimes she gets ice-cream for breakfast because we will do whatever can bring her some pleasure.

We have all managed to get plenty of time at home with Mom and out and about as well. Thankfully we have a team approach, and of course Dad is so committed to her always. He is really amazing. We were told by Christie's husband Max, who went through a similar experience with his mother, that it is a marathon not a sprint. I feel like Dad has accomplished the equivalent of at least the NYC, Boston and Toronto marathons...and he keeps going and doing whatever he can for Mom. As I have said many times before, he is remarkable.

Thanks so much for all the well-wishes. We can definitely use the cheer-leading!

:) Karen