The last couple of weeks have been a whirlwind. Not because of the Christmas celebrations or the Year End celebrations but because my granddad was diagnosed with Lymphoma in early December. Thankfully, the doctors said that it is a milder case and had only prescribed 6 doses of chemotherapy. He's already done with one dosage just after Christmas and came home just before the New Year, now it's all about keeping him healthy until the next dosage which should be in 3 weeks time. Honestly, I'm thankful that it is a milder case and so far, most of the family (namely his children) have come forward to help. However, this experience has shown me that a majority of my aunts and uncles, have no idea what it takes to take care of their aging parents.
I don't have much experience with older people aside from what I've watched on the television and my own grandparents. Sure, I've met a ton of older people in church but I know better - people aren't always like how they seem in public. I think it is quite similar to having a child, where parents are the ones who know the child best because they see the child both when they are at home and when they are in public. Of course, the advantage parents have is that they have the power to shape how their child behaves in public or at home. While when it is your aged grandparents, you don't have a choice but to live with it and take the necessary steps to not go insane.
Having said that, a geriatric doctor has confirmed that he is 80% certain my grandad has the beginnings of dementia. At least with this diagnosis, my blood pressure does not rise when my relatives insist that his forgetfulness is because of old age and nothing more terrible than that. My grand aunt says there is a patch that could help with his dementia unfortunately there is no medicine that can help curb his other attitude issues of being grumpy and impatient. Another benefit with this diagnosis is we can take steps to ensure what happened in March last year does not happen again. Where my granddad went to the atm to withdraw money, but forgot, and said someone had stolen his atm card and was stealing money from his account. Naturally we made a police report and the police had video evidence that it was him at the atm and not someone else. Why nothing had been diagnosed before now was because he refused to allow us to follow him to see the doctor and insisted on always going on his own. The only reason the hospital had a geriatric doctor see him was because they realized he stopped making sense the longer you talked to him. So I guess it was a blessing in disguise.
I'm not entirely certain what I had planned for 2020 because all I saw, upon the diagnosis, was a long road to recovery plus having to explain daily what is happening to my granddad to him and seeing that he does not understand what we are telling him. And while I can barely muster the enthusiasm for a new year, all I can think of is, this is the first day of the rest of my life and how I'm going to survive it. Because I'm fairly certain I will survive it, it just depends on what mental state I'll be in afterwards.
I think finding this part of myself is going to help tremendously. I've found I explain myself better through the written word than I do verbally. Also, I think I need somewhere to vent. It does not matter if no one ever reads this, but I feel a bit comforted with the knowledge that I've unburdened myself without requiring someone else to carry my burden for me. Not for the first time, I find myself rather excited to go back to work. Because if I'm being really honest with myself, I'm not sure how many more days I can endure my grandparents antics without having a serious breakdown.
Until next time, please be kind to every person you meet because you never know what they could be going through right now.
Love, me
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