Blogs are made for posting!

OK, it's been a hundred forevers since I posted anything, and so it's high time to make up for the lack. I kind of hoped that my regular postings would be of a devotional, inspirational nature, but the overachiever in me rose up and thwacked that idea in the head: " What inane tripe is this you're writing? This isn't blog material!" So, nothing got written. Well, begone with that! If you read my very first post, I stated then that my blog would be a sounding board/thinking space/release valve, and I got stuff! As the old proverb goes, "Sit down, shut up, and hang on!" (My, but is't that rude?)

The last couple of weeks have been just chock-full of activity and new things. Foremost on my mind is my dad. He's going on seventy, and stubborn as they come about taking care of himself. I talk to him on the phone every day, because he is the primary caregiver for his mother, my grandma, who is 91 and in late-stage Alzheimer's. She is still somewhat functional, but can no longer tend to her needs (meds, meals, remembering to bathe, etc.). Dad and I moved in with her when my grandpa passed away, back in 1979, and I left home from there for college, marriage, and my adult life. Dad stayed on, and over the years he has been there for all seasons.

Now, things are changing. About two weeks ago, I noticed he didn't sound right on the phone. He told me it was just a cold, and not to worry about it. I fianlly got over for a visit that weekend, and saw right away it was more than a cold. The left side of his face was hanging slack, he was drooling on that side, his memory was a little wonky, his speech was slurred if he didn't try real hard...all the classic stroke symptoms. He flatly refused to go to the ER, but finally I convinced him to see a doctor on the following Monday. Sher took one look, sent him to the hospital, and confirmed that he had in fact had a small stroke. They also found signs of one medium and several smaller events over the last two years which he had ignored. Add in chronic hypertension, bp 220/155 (which he has known about but refused to treat), and diabetes, blood sugar at 350 (ditto), and he was a pretty sick man. They kept him a week, getting him back into the realm of normal readings, and trying to convince him that all of this is manageable (and that management is necessary!) His standard answer is that our lives are ultimately in God's hands, and we go when He says so. God bless the cardiologist who looked him straight in the eye and said, "You are correct, but what are you going to tell God when He asks you why you mistreated this poor body He gave you while you were here? Don't you love Him enough to look after yourself?" (I have been trying to make this point with him for years, but I'm just his kid, what do I know?) The doctor also knocked the props out from under him when he said, "You know, the kind of strokes you've been having don't kill; they just leave you helpless, peeing in your pants while others feed you and clean you up. Is that the condition you want to be in when you finally do leave this life? How is that at all fair to the people here who love you?" (Graphic, but most effective!)

So, now Dad is on an adventure, learning how to live all over again. And I'm on it with him, coaching, supporting, explaining...It's not unlike taking care of kids again, except this one is independant and willful and needy and...wait, where's the "except"?

There's more to say, but I'm gonna leave it there for now. I need a chance to review my thoughts, and organize them into something that actually says what I'm trying to say. Stay tuned!