I don’t have a fashion post for you today. Honestly, it’s not always easy for me to come up with fresh things to share in fashion. I love fashion, but it’s not such a passion that I wake up thinking about it. I have a closet full of clothes and need to do another cleaning out soon. So needless to say, fashion is not always my priority to keep up with. Bless those girls who do it every day, I don’t know how they keep up with it all.
So today, I thought I’d do a life update. I haven’t done one of those in awhile.
First, let me say I’m very concerned about our country. I don’t talk politics on here very much at all, but to say that we have a lot going on in our country is an understatement. I know that God is in control and my trust lies in Him, but there is so much we are all dealing with last year and this year. I think most of you know that I’m a conservative. I pray that God will see us through whatever we are going to face in the future. That might sound like a downer, but I have to put my trust in the one who knows it all, otherwise I’d go insane! I’ll just leave it at that for now.
We’ll start with mom and dad. This year has not been that easy for them either. Right after Mother’s Day, mom started having pretty severe back issues. We’ve been to several doctor appointments for her and they did a scan which showed many compression fractures, one area worse than others. The neurosurgeon did not think she was a candidate for any of the”plasty” treatments, where they inject a cement like substance into the back to stabilize an area. But they did send her to another specialist who also looked at the scan and gave the same answer. He told us it would be a guessing game trying to figure out just where the pain was coming from and that if he did stabilize one area, it could cause harm in another. So for now she’s going to rest at home and try to heal up. Her pain level is definitely better than it was the first 2 or 3 weeks this all started, so it looks like she is healing up some.
{This is an old pic and she’s not nearly as perky now.}
We may have to live with this new normal, but he said a steroid shot might help her if she wants to try that later on. For now, she is going to give it a couple more months and see how she feels then. She’s pretty stable now, she can get up and move around as needed and she’s using a cane, but when she tries to stand in the kitchen for very long, it really starts to hurt. She’s not getting outside like she used to. She was always so active even the last few years, but this is finally catching up to her.
{Mother’s Day this year, right before the back pain got worse.}
We have a lady that we know, Sheila, coming in 2 or 3 times a week as needed. and she has been a God send. She helps mom with chores, bakes cakes and cooks some meals so that they have left overs to eat. I am going a couple of times a week and I take food as well. We have some good country cooking places close by so I go there and get food to go and it gives them plenty to eat on for a couple of days at a time. We are managing like this for now, but we may need more help in the future.
We are taking mom on Friday to get fitted for new hearing aids. She’s finally getting some and really needs them. Her hearing has gotten way worse the last year or 2 and she wants to wear hearing aids, so I’m glad she’s getting those.
{Dad and I on Father’s Day.}
I think I’ve mentioned before that Dad has dementia and it’s getting worse as well. It’s so hard to watch them decline with age, but I knew it was going to happen eventually. Dad turns 94 today and really, it’s amazing that they have done as well as they have for so long. They did really great in their 80’s and the 90’s have been more challenging. Dad is on a memory medication and it is supposed to slow it down, but he’s pretty bad with his memory. His long term memory is really good, but the short term is lacking. He can’t remember from one minute to the next what is happening. Mom has to take care of all their business now. We are trying to take as much off her as she wants to give up. I know it’s hard on her to be physically down and then to have to take care of dad too. He couldn’t live on his own if she wasn’t there.
He’s still been driving but I think the time has come to stop that too. It’s not going to be easy, but it’s part of life that we all face and deal with. We are new to dealing with all of this and we all learn as we go, don’t we? I’ve asked my friend, Vicki, for a lot of advice lately since she lost both her parents in the last 10 years or so. We don’t know what we don’t know until we get there and have to learn it for ourselves and that’s what our family is going through right now.
Mark and I planted tomatoes over there this year and they are doing great! That’s been a happy event of summer so far and we started picking tomatoes last week.
They are loaded with green tomatoes and finally starting to get ripe. We are all enjoying that for sure!
We aren’t sure where those little tomatoes came from, we didn’t plant a small variety like that. They don’t taste like cherry tomatoes, they have a full flavor of the big ones. No matter, we will eat them! We also ended up with a plant with yellow tomatoes and we didn’t know that either.
I’ve made Caprese salad a couple of times and I’m sure there will be more of this.
Renee and Lauren are coming home for a visit this weekend, so I’m looking forward to that too. It’s always good to have them home and with my sister moving away, it’s a little more challenging for sure.
My old house closed almost 2 weeks ago now and so that chapter in my book is complete. It was a lot of work to get it ready for the market, so that took some time and effort, but it was so nice to get it closed and finished. God blessed me so much with that house and I sold it way over asking price in this hot market! Mark and I went out to Henry’s, our local Cajun restaurant to celebrate the day it closed.
Miss Daisy turned 6 months old this week. She is a little doll and we love that gal. She’s so fun to wake up to every morning. We are still working on potty training, but she’s doing pretty well. Those small dogs are hard to train I hear and we are finding that to be true.
I finally got consistent on giving her a treat when she goes out and that has motivated her big time. The girl loves her meals and eating! I think she has reached her final weight and I’m not sure exactly what that is but I’d say 6 lbs or so. She’s still a little thing but has more than doubled from when we got her. It’s been fun having a new fur baby around the house. She is a bundle of energy and doesn’t let us forget she’s here. She enjoys playing hard and napping hard. We’re so lucky she goes to bed at 11 and sleeps all night until 8 or 8:30 every morning.
I thought you’d all enjoy a family update since it’s been awhile for that. Life is good, we are just getting into the hard stages of taking care of our parents. Mark’s mom is still living alone after his dad passed away last year and she’s doing fine. She wants to stay there for now, but I’m sure that might change in the future too. She’s 91 now, I think. I enjoy visiting with her, she’s a wonderful lady and mother-in-law.
We are very grateful for our health and our families. Life isn’t always easy but we just keep going, don’t we? God has been very gracious to my family and I’m grateful for that. I’ve got high cholesterol that I’m going to have to work on to get down. It’s been trending up the last 5 years or so and my doc wants me to go on meds, but I told him give me some time to try to get it down. I asked on my Instagram page and got lots of ideas so I’ll be implementing some of those. It’s not easy getting older either is it?! I haven’t had to worry about these things until the last few years. I have high blood pressure and now high cholesterol and I think it’s in the genes, but I’ll have to work harder at it now.
I hope you all are well! Thank you as always for coming by for a visit. I hope this peek into my family has been interesting for you. I can’t believe I’ve been writing this blog for almost 15 years, you all feel like you know me and my family! I’m planning to keep going, but eventually the posts may slow down a bit. I’m not sure I’ll keep up the fashion posts forever, we will see.
Thank you again for keeping up with me and coming by so often! I truly appreciate you all!
When it was time for my husband to give up driving, his neurologist talked to him. He explained that the meds he was giving him for seizures would no longer allow him to drive. He also said that he (the doctor) would be liable for prescribing the meds knowing he was still driving. He stopped cold turkey that day and we didn’t have to have that uncomfortable conversation!
That’s so good, Sharron, I’m afraid my dad won’t be as easy.
Parents aging is so hard.
No one prepares you for how hard emotionally it is. I am thankful
For my Moms independence and good health …. But know one day …
Thank you for sharing 😉
Thank you for the family update. It’s very difficult when our parents get to the age of needing care. Our roles reverse and it’s not easy. I cared for my mom for several years. She was legally blind, had hearing problems and dementia as a result of a fall hitting her head. I always told her I was going to try to keep her in her own home, but I moved her to assisted living when she almost set her house on fire. I had to get her to a safe place. It was a good move, she was around people, they took great care of her and she loved the food, in fact, she gained 15 lbs. while she was there. She lived to be almost 98. God bless you on this hard journey you won’t regret caring for them.
Thank you Tee, we want to keep them in their home as long as they can stay there, but we may have to move them eventually. We are talking it all out with mom and all of us will figure it out as we go along this path.
The elderly today need strong and very well-informed advocates.
God bless all who are looking after elderly parents. They are angels in my book.
You’re always so sweet to share about your family here on the blog and on IG. I really do feel connected to them all and enjoy reading about how they’re doing. I’m praying for your mama and daddy and thinking of you too. Thanks again for sharing 💜
Just want to send you lots of love and prayer.
Happy Birthday to your dad! God Bless Him!
I’m glad you give updates, I enjoy hearing all about your family!
Rhoda, I saw only briefly on your “Story” a conversation about cholesterol, but it went off too quickly before I read it all. Is that posted anywhere else? I would like to read those tips! Thanks!
Katherine
HI, Katherine, I did pose the questions on Instagram stories about high cholestral and got a lot of good ideas that I’m starting to implement to change mine. If you’re on Instagram, I saved them to highlights, which is the round circles on my profile page.
I love you Rhoda, and your dear family. Thank you for the update. First of all, a very Happy Birthday to your dad. Your folks are doing so well to get to these ages in the 90’s. My folks made it to 81 and 82. I’m not surprised to hear that your dad has some dementia….it seems so prevalent when people get that old and even for people a lot younger than your folks. I hope they can come up with a solution for your mom’s back pains….that’s so awful living with back pain. How great that the tomatoes are doing so well that you guys planted for your folks! That salad looks delish! Hope you all have a super good visit with your sis and niece coming up this weekend….and any of the little people too? I’m so glad you keep us updated on your family. You’re definitely like “family” to me! And politics wise….we are in the same boat as you…..putting all our trust in our dear Lord to straighten things out as He wills! We were all chosen to be here at this time by our Lord, so faith and trust is important now. I hope you and your hubby are watching the new series “The Chosen” all about the life of Jesus and his disciples. It is AMAZING! If you haven’t seen it and want a “gratis” DVD…let me know! God Bless You both.
Thank you, Diane, you are always such an encouraging person. Thank you for that! We haven’t watched the Chosen, but I keep hearing about it so I will definitely look into it.
I just love your transparency and seeing your heart! You are such a sweet encouragement! Prayers for your parents and for you.
Rhoda,
I want to wish your sweet Dad a very Happy 94th Birthday and lift him and your Mother up in prayer today as they face some tough health challenges. So many of your readers have faced exactly what you are experiencing with aging parents and family including my husband and I. I think that the lost of independence that comes from no longer being able to drive is one of the toughest issues for seniors and the hardest issue to address. I think it can be more difficult for men to give up driving although I had a great aunt who got her drivers license taken away by her doctor and she hid the letter from DMV and keep driving for another year until her health POA discovered she had been driving illegally! I would suggest what another reader advised and have your Dad’s doctor talk to him first. This way it takes some of the pressure off of family members and they don’t resent them for it. I had a family memory who was on dementia medication and while it never helped restore memory it helped slow down the progression for a while and then all of sudden its like it just stopped working and the dementia got worst quickly. This may be what you are experiencing with your Dad.
Lastly, like you I pray for our country and worry about the direction of things. I know God is in control but we as a nation have turned our backs on him and his word and I feel God will withdraw his blessings from our nation as we withdraw from him.
Dear Rhoda, I lost my parents many years ago and went through much of what you are dealing with now. It still is hard; I think of them every day. My parents were from North Carolina, so reading about your parents brought back so many memories and I found that to be comforting. There is something special about southern families. I really felt at home with your gardening and food posts!
Like you, I am on bp medication and started a small dose of cholesterol meds about a year ago. It brought my LDL down from 197 to 90. I have always had very high good cholesterol but because of my age and the bp issue, my doctor thought it wise to add that cholesterol med. He also told me that so much of this is genetics and that’s hard to battle. I’m not overweight, eat healthy and exercise regularly, so there you go! I hope these are the only meds I have to take because I don’t want to take them, either. Take care, and thank you for continuing to post.
My Mom has dementia and it is a struggle for my Dad. We try to help them as much as we can but they were always so independent and a team. I really appreciate your comment “You don’t know what you don’t know.” We are learning as we go and trying to give ourselves grace. I’ve always been a “fixer” but there are somethings that you can’t fix. I pray for you and your family and please know that your words mean a lot to us.
Rhoda, my aunt, who is almost 95, had severe back pain due to a compression fraction. She had lost 30% of the bone in one area. She had an MRI and then had the procedure where they insert the cement-like filling to replace the bone. It was out-patient and we were at the hospital for five hours. She did great and the procedure worked! She is now pain free. Just to let you know her experience. I love hearing about your family, especially your Mom and Dad. I lost my Mom last year at the age of 98.
Thanks Sharon, I’m glad your mom had a good experience with the procedure. Two doctors have said she’s not a good candidate for it, unfortunately. I hope that she continues to heal up.
Thank you for sharing your family update! I have followed your blog nearly from your beginning, and feel I know them all well. I feel that you are such an authentic genuinely lovely person, and I have rooted for you each step and success in your life! I was very happy you met Mark! Happy Birthday to your dad. My dad is 94 and will be 95 in December. My mom died at 91 two years ago so my sister and brother are now caring for my dad who is still living independently but needs a lot of help. I understand what you are going through. We are never really prepared for our parents to age, and it is an emotional challenge for sure. I would recommend having your dads doctor talk to him about not driving. That will take the pressure off of you and your sister. That’s what we did, and it was successful! Your dad reminds me so much of my dad- his garden, sense of humor, kindness, etc so I have enjoyed getting to know him through your blog- as well as your entire sweet family! Thanks again, and best wishes to you as you travel this challenging time with your parents! And, I as well, am very concerned for our country right now.
Hi Leigh, thanks for the encouraging words. I know many of us are in the same boat so it’s a challenge for sure. One day at a time, that’s what we have to do.
I love the updates on your folks they remind me of mine in a lot of ways; keeping all of you in my prayers as you journey through this stage of life. I haven’t had to experience this yet, it is good to get tips from those who have – it takes a village, glad we can learn from each other through your blog 🙂
Happy belated birthday to your dad!
My mom lived with me for a few years before she passed. What helped her was to have routines. She had cocktails with Dad for many years – to relax Dad from job stresses while she finished up dinner. I restarted the routine – splitting a bottle of champagne with heavy appetizers. We did eat a healthy, larger meal earlier in the day, so the appetizers were just the right amount in the evening. I also enjoyed having her “teach” me some of her favorite meals. I like that you continued the garden at your Dad’s home. He may not be working it, but the long term memory of gardening is still there and will help him.
In my town, there are many “communities” that have homes, apartments, and care facilities at various levels. A couple can start at the apartment level, with a food service and community activities available. As they age, one person may move to a more intensive care unit, but the spouse can stay at the apartment.
Some of these communities are so nice that I may look into moving into one before it is “required”.
Take care of yourself!
Rhoda,
Your generous (of time, spirit, hope and heartache) post RESONATES.
Many of us have experienced what you are going through in similar ways. We hear you.
Heck yeah, Fashion can take a back seat.
Family first.
Wishing you calm and hopeful days ahead.
And our beloved country could definitely use a miracle or two…❤️🤍💙🇺🇸🗽
Hi Rhoda, I have been following your blog for several years. You are so natural and unassuming. Many happy returns on your Dad’s birthday. We experienced dementia with my Dad also. Fortunately his personality did not change, and he retained his pleasantness and humor until he passed away. Regarding the driving, I took his car to work telling him I would have the oil changed, etc. while I was working which he thought was a great idea. . After awhile, he never asked to get behind the wheel, and that was one problem solved. You are charting new territory, and with faith, God will get you and your family through it.
Hello Rhoda! Always lovely to read your family updates! My Mom is 98 and has lived with us for going on 5 years. She got hearing aids about 2 years ago and transitioned to them very quickly and well! They make a huge difference! She is ambulatory but uses a Drive Rollator outside to walk on the sidewalk around the neighborhood. The model she has is fantastic if you find your mom in need of one. She does still walk everyday (except rain)…she is bent over due to Pagets and osteoporosis but never complains and is always cheerful. I work full time (I have a dental practice) and she needs a fair bit of assistance so it can be a lot but I am blessed, as you are, to still have her. I take her to the office with me on Fridays and the weekend and give her small tasks to do which she loves! I hope that your Mom’s docs can find a way to get her more comfortable! XO Debra
Caring for aging parents can be emotionally and physically draining. We have to remind ourselves that it’s not about us. But at the same time we have to know when to rest or ask for help. I too am a conservative and fear for our country and the things going on, I applaud you for speaking out. God is in control and we have to remain faithful, but it is so hard, especially when you watch the news. Praying for you and your parents through this difficult journey filled with so many decisions. May God Bless you all! I appreciate you !
Thank you, Jeanie, yes so many things going on all at one time. I have to remind myself that God is in control and I can trust Him with everything we face.