The Pills, The Pills

February 10, 2012: If I may be permitted a note: In the event that one finds oneself near unto being overcome with pain, I suggest that it behooves one to actually take all of the medications that one is actually being prescribed, prior to getting one’s daughter to call the doctor to insist that one need new drugs.

I get that the steroids made her hallucinate cats, and that that was a bad thing. Not that the cats themselves were so bad. It’s just that she was afraid that the bears would see the cats nibbling at her fingertips looking for cat treats, and then the bears would sneak up and chomp her hand off. Anyone can see that this is a serious problem.

So no steroids. But of the drugs that actually have worked in the past, drugs which she is currently being prescribed – how ‘bout we take those drugs and see whether they help? Kinda crazy, I know. And, um, just wondering: why didn’t her doctor friend who stayed over at the house last night catch any of this? Or if she did cause Mom to take the prescribed drugs yesterday, how is it that she didn’t mention to me when I spoke to her that Mom is having trouble remembering what she can take? This poor woman has twenty or thirty pill to take every day, she is in some of the worst pain of her life, and no one has noticed that it’s difficult for her to keep clear records? I’m glad Mom kept as much of a record as she did, because I was able to tell the nurse at Hospice what Mom had taken in the last six hours. The nurse promptly told me that Mom had not taken her every-four-hours-as-needed-for-pain drug. Gosh, that was ever so helpful once we got it in her! Who knew?

I think I will get a big 24 hour analog clock. Then I will attach pill holders around the circumference, one for each hour. Then I will put in each pill box the pills to be taken at that hour. Maybe we will rig it like a cuckoo clock so that a box pops open on the hour with a gay tune. And there can be a little note in the lid every four hours: only take oxycodone as needed for pain. Seriously, the doctor who slept over last night didn’t catch that? And what about nights when no one is here (most of them)? How much unnecessary pain is my mother enduring? I am going to have to move up here soon.