It is sometimes difficult for me to explain to family, friends and staff about how best to communicate with Anthony now that he has become so silent. So it was refreshing yesterday to have one of the carers tell me that she had learned how important it was to explain to Ants that they were taking him to the toilet or shower etc. and sometimes using the hoist.
“If we explain to him first, everything goes smoothly,” she said; “but if we don’t, he resists.” I told her how grateful I was for this understanding, remembering the times, a couple of years ago, when the use of the hoist terrified him – late night phone-calls from the nursing home in which I had to calm him down and reassure him that he wasn’t being captured by pirates and put into a torture chamber.
Thankfully, these kind of hallucinatory panic attacks were fairly short-lived and now that Ants is less ambulant, the hoist is used often to transfer him from one place to another. As far as I know, this no longer causes fear for him.
Verbally, Anthony is very slow to respond (both cognitively and vocally) so you need to sit close enough to touch him, or give him a ‘nosy’ (nose kiss), or yell nonsense, all of which Ming and I did this afternoon. And Anthony smiled many times, especially at Ming’s antics and asking, at one point, who the ‘bloke’ was.
Me: I am NOT a bloke, Ants!
Anthony: Oh.
Me: It’s me – your wife!
Anthony: Yes, it is.
Okay so we are now into the fifth year of Anthony’s life in the nursing home and I am continually gobsmacked at how he continues to survive advanced prostate cancer, liver disease and PDD (Parkinson’s disease dementia). He is definitely way past his ‘used-by’ date but, as he isn’t in physical pain, I don’t worry as much; not only that – he is always positive, always accepting, always answering the ‘how-are-you?’ question with a whispered ‘fighting fit.’
jmgoyder 