Medication drama

Two days ago when Dad went to the VA hospital the doctor du jour sent him home with an antibiotic for his cold. This added another med for him to keep track of. He's supposed to take one a day for 10 days. This morning called for me to come over. He said he wasn't feeling well, like something was wrong. I checked out all his meds and threw away a bunch of old, expired pills. The antibiotic wasn't with his regular meds. He had it in on his desk. There were 4 pills left! He had taken 2 the first day, 3 the second and 1 today. I guess he had gotten them confused with his diabetes meds. I wrote instructions on some paper and on the pill jar.

When I came back here I told Jim what had happened. He Googled the name of the antibiotic and read what it said about overdose. It said call poison control. The woman I talked to was very helpful and said he was probably ok since he didn't have any severe symptoms. It could have been much worse. I went back to Dad's to ask him more about how he was feeling and to get the pill bottle so we could talk to the doctor about it. While I was at Dad's Jim called the VA to try to get in touch with the doc. No luck there. Some bitch on a power trip was manning the phones and wouldn't put us in touch with anything resembling an actual doctor. We hate the VA.

I called the Leeces and talked to Dede. David was out on a bike ride so I gave Dede the lowdown. She said she'd have Dave call us at Stacey's tonight. When I talked to him he said he felt Dad would be ok and to let him finish up the course of antibiotic. I got the pills back from Dad so I can make sure he takes only one a day. He can handle his regular medication routine (well, usually), we just can't add anything new. But I think it's getting to the point where we'll have to manage his meds.

We're going to have to start managing everything else, too. While Dad was snoozing in Stacey's family room we (Stacey, Drew, Mindy and me) were in the kitchen making a list of the things that need to be done to get Dad's affairs in order. If we can take care of a few things and whittle the list down things won't seem so overwhelming.

We're also going to spend some time cleaning Dad's house. I talked to him about this today and he's open to the idea. He really needs to simplify his life. His house is so full of junk and clutter he really can't function well. Also, Jim thinks it's possible that there may be some kind of environmental factor to Dad's problem. What if mold or some old improperly stored chemicals or the water is partly to blame? Also, Stacey thinks the house is just plain depressing. Cleaning it and getting rid of all the crap would probably help Dad to feel calmer, less stressful. He thinks more clearly when he's not stressed.

Sometimes Dad can seem like he's mostly normal so it almost feels like it's too soon to be taking some of these steps. But lately there have been some pretty big lapses in his memory and confusion in his thinking. I sometimes hesitate to bring these things up with him because it forces him to confront the horrible truth and I know that's so frightening for him. It almost seems cruel to do that. And yet, I think if we can present this stuff to him early and give him a chance to get used to the idea it might make his transition easier when the time comes. There's no way to know for sure if we're doing the right thing.

So, ok, we just keep going.