Monday, January 10, 2005
I'll probably use this, today, as a "Stuff I Want to Remember" area.
- She had a bowel movement yesterday at 1300. I would have posted it in her stats area but I haven't yet visited there and probably won't until tonight. Good volume, surprisingly easy movement. In the evening, though, she thought she had to eliminate, sat on the toilet for a good 15 minutes, was sure she had, even complained about eliminating being "a little hard". When she arose from the seat she hadn't shat and when I cleaned her there was nothing...not even the detritus that appears when she farts. She had, however, peed. Occasionally she sometimes mistakes, in her mind, urinating with defecating. I think this has happened twice before in the last year. It's a very curious glitch...makes me wonder about the structure of her brain and how old age scrambles things.
- I noticed when she awoke today that her right elbow was the tiniest bit bulbous. When she was suffering from low sodium and over-hydration both her elbows collected so much water that she appeared to have skateboarding elbow pads implanted beneath her skin. As her physicians dehydrated her and upped her sodium in the hospital the pads quickly disappeared. So I'm taking this as a sign that perhaps she's been drinking too much liquid lately. I hadn't thought so: I'm careful not to put her through "water torture" anymore, but she has really been enjoying her instant decaf coffee lately so I think we'll scale back on the liquids for a day or so, I'll watch her carefully, and we'll see if the right elbow water pad disappears. If I'm right, it should be gone by tomorrow morning.
The Water Whichery aspect of caring for an Ancient One is, as usual, one of the trickiest. This time I have no idea what could be causing her body to retain water, but just in case she might be suffering from a little CHF (I don't think so, but she might be) I've got her sucking oxygen now and will keep her on it for as much of the day as is possible.
Later.
