Grandpa Jay's Visit

Well, we have had Grandpa now for just over a week. Life is interesting when you are taking care of an older individual. Reed's dad is blind, due to Alzheimer's. The Alzheimer's has now progressed that he has a lot of trouble remembering and gets confused easily. It requires that either Reed or I (or someone) is with him at all times. The first few nights Reed slept upstairs on the living room floor in case he got confused and started wandering. (This has happened before!) Now he seems to have adjusted, somewhat. We keep a monitor in his room so we can hear him downstairs where we are staying. We have also started putting a chair in the hallway outside the room and bathroom so that he doesn't wander the wrong direction. He did that a couple of nights and so we have instituted some safeguards. We worry about him falling. Last night we tried to prepare him for the different schedule of Sunday. Reed has meetings first thing in the morning and so we wanted to get him up and showered (he needs assistance) and ready and then he would come in with me to church. We told him what time we would get him up. Well he woke up last night and thought he was late and that Reed had left without taking care of him. So on his own he got up and took a shower. Small problem, Jackie had bathed the kids last and so the shower curtain was outside the shower. Reed woke up hearing water running and found his dad in the shower at 3AM!! Reed had to mop up the floor (it took 4 towels) and get his dad dressed and back to bed.

Oh well, he keeps up on our toes!! We love him and really are enjoying his time here! He has a great sense of humor and is so humble over the whole thing. It has been a real joy to watch Reed as he is so patient and loving with his Dad. Even when we have cleaned the bathroom for the 5th time in one day. At least Grandpa has enjoyed the books we have put onto an MP3 player we got for him. After going through a ton of Lous L'Amour books, he wanted to change his name to Jay William Sackett!!