Groceries and Toilets….

I’m supposed to be at work right now.  Instead I am sitting here at home waiting for Ernie to get back from hopefully unplugging my parents’ toilet for the second time in as many days. Evidently my father has decided that the most efficient way to empty the bathroom trash is just to put it into the toilet. 

sigh.

My mother, like many women her age, uses some pads to help with a 78 year old bladder that isn’t quite as obedient as it used to be.  The used pads were wrapped up and in the trash—–since they’re like little sponges they aren’t really meant to be flushed to say the least.  Evidently this happened the first time around midnight on Friday.  Mom finally called us midmorning on Saturday—they hadn’t used the toilet since the night before.  Anyway….Ernie went over and used the patented Alice Blackwelder (his mother was very smart) of a little dishsoap and out everything popped. 

My poor husband.

So today I dragged myself out of bed early so that I could take my mother in for some bloodwork this morning.  It has to be early as she has to fast and therefore can’t take her insulin until after the test. When I came in my mother told me the toilet was plugged again.   

sigh.

She did agree that from now on there wouldn’t be any trash left in the bathroom.

We went to the clinic and hopefully I will remember in the future that Monday mornings are not a good choice….very crowded. Got back to her house and I tried my best to no avail.  The boys were still asleep so I came home so Ernie could go over there.  Haven’t hear any news yet.

I do worry about how my father is going to function in assisted living.  At least they’ll get regular meals.  On Sunday when I was making out the shopping list I innocently asked my mother what they’d had for dinner the night before.  She thought and finally said, "well, I guess we didn’t eat dinner last night."  When I glared at her she said cheerfully, "Oh well, we do most of the time."

I almost lost my mind grocery shopping with my father on Sunday.  Church was good as Owen came with us and he has a way of lighting us up and everyone around him.  He’s a powerful little guy.  He went back to their house while we shopped however.  My dad is moving more slowly than ever.  I cannot even begin to tell you slowly we inch through the grocery store….  Then he kept trying to arrange the groceries in the cart.  I’d stop, look around and see him back half an aisle or more.  I’d trot over there and try to convince him that everything was arranged just fine and that there was plenty of room.  He just ignored me.  We finally got to the checkout lane and I noticed that one box was torn up so I ran an aisle or two over to get a new one.  I came back to find him putting all the groceries in the cart sans bags….the bagger just kind of standing there.  I told him it would be good to have them in bags first and he agreed and put everything back and let them get bagged.

I don’t want to say that it’s like having a toddler but sometimes it IS like having a giant 80-something toddler and you can’t reprimand him or give him timeouts.  Oh well…one step at a time I guess.  Hopefully assisted living will help make some things easier….just as others get more difficult I suppose.

Thanks for all the kind and thoughtful comments all…you can’t begin to know how much they mean to me…..onward…..

—edited note:  Ernie had no luck…we have called a plumber….