Z is for Zonk

Last night, I eventually and finally got to zonk out so I was not so overwhelmingly tired and stressed.  I got to sleep and relax and cuddle with Woofles.  He slept with me all night and he's been wanting to cuddle or be near me when I am home which is very cute.

Zonking was good for me with all of this stress.

I've been so stressed with my mother. She says that her health is not bad, but it has been getting worse and worse, and worse.

I know that talking about her urinary incontinence and fecal incontinence may not seem like giving her dignity, but she can't take care of herself with it.  Briana and I have had to clean up after her so much that it's become our burden and she doesn't care one bit.

A huge problem is that she'll have these accidents in public and then she'll just turn to us and say, "I had an accident."  We'll have to bring her home and then she'll go in the bathroom (after falling all over and making huge messes in places) and then make a mess in the bathroom and be uncooperative about letting anybody help her get clean.

Briana and I have tried and it never works.  She has a fit when we try to help her.  She insists that she is okay.  We've learned that she's not.

I'm concerned that some of this has to do with her switching to oxybutynin from the Detrol L.A.  She was having problems before that, too.  However, I think it has gotten worse since she did that.  She won't admit it, though.

I'm also concerned about the long term effects of the Paroxetine (Paxil) and the doctor just keep increasing the does at her insistence because she is getting depressed.

I'd honestly like to see how she is off of all these medications that she is taking.  If she's only depressed but she can actually function, I'd rather see her be depressed and functioning because then we'd at least know that the medications are the problem and it's not more serious than that.

However, I don't know if that's the case because of her orthostatic blood pressure and how many times she has hit her head.

People say that it takes a long time to get off of Paxil, too.

Anyway, I hope I can get more nights sleep like that because I really need sleep.  Zonking feels great.

I also thought of writing Z is for Zeus.  That's what the vet office was first calling Woofles before I adopted him.  However, he is definitely not a Zeus and is definitely a Woofles!

I need help switching my room with my mom's room.  It would be great to have help to do this while she is in the hospital so that she is not in the way of the work.  She's ALWAYS in the way of work being done in the house.  She doesn't help at all.

She won't admit it, but she is a hoarder.  She doens't throw out any of her trash!  Instead, she throws it on the ground.  She throws her dirty clothes on the ground.  She then wears the dirty clothes for days afterwards!

I need more nights of zonking.  I need to have times when I can just sleep and zonk out so peacefully.  However, I also need to work and write articles to make money.

Now that I'm at the end of the alphabet challenge, I need other blogging ideas to keep me writing!

No Real Diagnosis

All we know so far is that our mom has orthostatic blood pressure.  Sometimes I wonder what would happen if they took her off all the medicines that she takes.  She only has four, but none of them are for actually keeping her alive.  She might be depressed and weepy and have more urinary incontinence and be dizzy, but I wonder if that would stop the fecal incontinence and not even feeling that she's gone to the bathroom on herself.

She says she doesn't want to be a burden for us.  However, then she starts whining and making us feel guilty.  I wish somebody could just take me for a day and give me a break from everything.

Briana is trying to be good, but the thing is that she KNOWS she needs to work on the things that I have to do.  I've just had to drill it into her mind over the days, weeks, months, and years.

Here's more information:

My mom is currently at Christus St. Patrick Hospital. She is in room 4143. Briana and I cannot keep going up to the hospital every day and we cannot keep calling her all the time. I do need to work and I need to be able to take care of our dogs and the house.

If anybody that is in Lake Charles can visit her, that is definitely appreciated. Then, if anybody ANYWHERE can call her to talk to her (all she does is say the same things over and over to us), it would be appreciated as she "doesn't have friends" and she tries to make me (and Briana) feel guilty about that. 

Call St. Pat's at             337-436-2511       and then ask for room 4143. That's her phone to her room and you should be able to contact her. Yes, she is always that hard to understand.
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Then there's all this:

Also, prayers are appreciated! She would never tell the health professionals the truth. She still doesn't tell them the truth. We need to know what is behind this "passing out" or "fainting" or "seizures" and all the falls and the slurred speech and sometimes feeling like one whole side is paralyzed. Then, also, what is going on with her not being able to feel that she needs to go to the bathroom. She has no idea when she needs to go #1 or #2. The not knowing when she needs to go to the bathroom constantly happens in the house and she says it doesn't, but it does. She wears the off-brand depends and it started only for a few accidents and now she says she can't feel the urge to go at all. She can't even feel when she HAS gone to the bathroom in her pants.

She gets up and it is very disgusting and she trails it through the house wherever she walks. Then, she makes a huge mess in the bathroom (it looks like four or five monkeys have been throwing poop around in the place) and she claims that she tried to clean the bathroom, but she hasn't tried at all. Briana and I always end up cleaning the toilet and the walls and the floor and anything else that happens to be in the bathroom.
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She tries to make me feel guilty for having friends. She tries to make me feel guilty for wanting to find somebody to date. She tries to make me feel guilty for wanting to go back to school.

She has these health problems. She lies to the health professionals. She fights off the EMTs if we call them. Thankfully this last time she didn't do that. However, that was a rare case and we were so relieved that she didn't fight them. She complains about not having friends, but she is the only one to blame for that. Years ago, she stopped going out and stopped talking to people. Then, when she did know people, she stopped calling them!

She even met one gal and talked to her all evening while Briana and I brought a dog house for Toggle to our house in trips. She told the gal that she might call her again. She never called the gal. It's not like she didn't have a telephone. She had her cell phone at that time. She just never called.

D is for Drinking

I could write about literal drinking, as the imbibing of any liquid, but that's not what I'm writing about in this blog post.  Instead, I am writing about drinking alcohol.  I have never been against responsible drinking.  Responsible drinking encompasses a lot.  It means not drinking anything or much if you are going to be driving. It means that you shouldn't drive if you are going to get drunk.  It means deciding to stay inside if you are going to get drunk.

I take Briana with me to trivia on Tuesday nights (and now, I know, if she can't go, I'll even play as a single person instead of having to join a team.  It's fun, and I'll be a "Pubby Dog!")  Anyway, the trivia is a round of trivia question and then a game.  One of the games last night was identifying an alcohol from one of the 16 new taps at the bar.

I have never liked alcohol.  I have drank some of it, but mainly it's been to try to get to sleep since it makes me fall asleep.  The first time I was drunk was in eighth grade and it was because I was at a seder where they asked you to take a drink of wine after taking a bite of a certain food and after a prayer and at all kinds of times.  I didn't really care for the white zinfandel, but that is what they used.  I remember how odd I felt and how the parking lot looked wavy.

Anyway, this time when I tasted the alcohol, I could actually drink a little bit and enjoy it!  If I left it in my mouth for too long, it still had that "alcohol" taste to me.  However, I could sip it gently and then take a sip of my Dr. Pepper when needed.

I second guessed myself with answering and we put that it was Unibroue Éphémère  Apple.  (I can't figure out how to get the word before Apple to be in the normal font).  Anyway, I should've gone with my first instinct and put Rogue Somer Orange Honey Ale.  I like orange flavored things, the the orange was not strong.  The sweetness must have come from the honey.  It seemed kind of like a cider, too, at times.  However, I now know what I should have put and if people have that to drink, I know I can enjoy it.

It's not something I'd drink lots, but I know I can enjoy the product.  I like that!

I was easily falling asleep before 11pm and I think I drank it somewhere around 8pm.

The Need for Makeup?

Many women think there is a need for makeup.  I'm writing this post because of the story of the Reddit user, "munner83."  If you haven't read the story and want to read it, you can find it from Yahoo! at Before and After Makeup: Reddit User's Startling Photo.

Honestly, if you look at it, you can see that all she has done is outlined her one eye in a bunch of black so at first glance, it makes it look like her eye is bigger than it is.  I understand that some people find this look attractive.    I don't think it's "not attractive."  However, the photo would look normal if it wasn't one half of her face done and the other half not done.  If it were a before and after, then it would seem normal.

Now, I don't wear makeup often.  I don't like it.  It feels really horrible on my face.  I have to have hypoallergenic makeup.  However, even after that has been on my face for a significant amount of time, I want it off.

Whether or not you wear makeup is purely your own decision.  With my seborrheic dermatitis, makeup could easily make my face look better.  Of course, I have to wash off the makeup and make sure to take care of my face by washing it and using the acne prevention pads with aloe and then aloe lotion with vitamin E.  My face can still look somewhat red, but if I remember to take care of it every night (every morning or day would work, too, but I'm finding nights to be the easiest time as I'm not rushed to do things), then it stays looking pretty good.  I can't forget to do make care routine, though, because if I forget, then my face starts turning red again.

This got off on a tangent.  What I was going to write about was the part that really upset me about that story.  At the end, there's a statement and it says, "Another user lamented that right or wrong, men often do not have the same cosmetic tools at their disposal as women:

'Now imagine you're a guy and you don't have that option.'"

Yes, beauty products are traditionally for women.  However, what guys don't have the option to buy the beauty products that are traditionally for women and use them?  Nobody but that guy has to know about it.  It's not like it's taboo now for guys to wear cosmetics.  These men, no boys, need to grow up and quit whining.  They have everything available to them that is available to women.  There's no reason they should be "lamenting" about these things.