Not good that its happening, but good that we caught it before she did something like set the house on fire. We've been watching more closely since she fell last spring and cut her head quite badly, but even with all that, she still has been hiding some issues from us. That's much harder for her to do in the 24-hour care she's been getting, so los of stuff coming to light.
The part I'm having the most trouble with is the guilt I feel over this. I'm feeling it because we didn't do something sooner (I'm niot sure WHAT I was supposed to do, but SOMETHING), and also over the need to liquidate her assets somewhat (like I'm trying to get my hands on her assets). In truth, we've been trying for several years to get her to do something about her increasingly apparent memory issues and her falling. We did manage to convince her to see a neurosurgeon a few years ago to get a shunt installed (she has Normal Pressure Hydrocephalus on top of everything else), but she's been in denial about everything else.
The people at the assisted living facilities are all telling us that this is normal, since she's been independent for so many years, and doesn't want to need to depend on someone else. As far as the assets go, the whole point of what Suzi & I are doing is to be able to provide the best care we can for her. That means taking certain steps to ensure that her finances aren't drained by things that won't provide benefit to her (like selling her old car that needs several thousand dollars in maintenance & repair). The thing is, I know all these feelings are just not accurate (but it sure doesn't help deal with them).
The worst part so far is having to do something with her dog. The dog (JJ is his name) is a sweet dog, but has no real socialization to speak of, and isn't house broken (Gwen apparently didn't have the energy to deal with that, and certainly wouldn't have welcomed any intervention by us). Normally, I'd say we should just take him on with our own dog, but JJ can't seem to stop humping our dog, Lady, and we haven't been successful in getting him housebroken (at 9 years, it's pretty late for that). After a few days around JJ, Lady starts hiding in places with low ceilings, and snapping at anyone/anything that comes near her. It simply isn't fair to her to make her live with that, and I will NOT put up with a dog that does his business in the house. That leaves pretty much one option at this point, and it depresses me because the shelters are swamped with pets abandoned because the economy is so bad that their owners simply couldn't afford them any more (for those that don't know, TX is showing an official unemployment rate of roughly 8%, but masks the real rate by denying between 1/2 and 2/3 of all unemployment claims). At any rate, it will be almost impossible for him to get adopted (he's cute and sweet, though, so maybe...).
