One More Bird

 Three and a half weeks ago my friend went for a big walk around his local area to the park. When I arrived at his home after work I made him dinner and settled in for a chat. He started talking about the  dead bird he'd found and was wondering where he put it. I looked around the house and then decided he must have been remembering one of the previously deceased birds that I had said I would take to the taxidermist.... 

The next morning as I walked through his gate I looked at the small barren tree ahead of me and there carefully placed across some of the smaller branches was a very deceased green parrot. It had rained heavily overnight and it was saturated. I quickly walked back to my car and grabbed a paper bag and some tissues and collected it. It went back in my car to put in a bin on the way to work.

They say things come in threes and we now had a trilogy of deceased birds. The circle was complete and ending of sorts. But now I see it as a sign from the universe that things were about to change.

Less than a week later he was in an ambulance on the way to the hospital. Something had made him very ill. He was taken to the local hospital and then transferred to the next larger regional hospital over 100kms away. They couldn't find anything structurally wrong, it may have been a virus, but it was the trigger that decided that he could no longer live independently. After 9 days he was transferred to the hospital in the next town closer to home. And there he will stay until an aged care bed becomes available.

I'd been holding my breath for the months leading up to this point. His wandering had increased as had the sundowning and we'd had some very interesting moments that tested me. I knew it was getting increasingly unsafe for him to be at home. Fortunately on the day he became unwell he was at the day respite centre and they looked after him until I got there. Had this happened at home after I had already left for the evening it could have been awful. He wouldn't have died but he would have been at the risk of dehydration and would not have called me.

As difficult as the last two and a half weeks have been I see the events that have transpired as a blessing in disguise. My prayers have been answered, I'd been concerned about how he'd react when a room came up in aged care, how would I get him in there. But now being in hospital creates a stepping stone of sorts, it will be a gentler transition. And he's safe and well looked after and I don't have the same level of worry that I did. I'm much more relaxed and now when I go to see him I spending quality time with him. even at the stage he is at I still enjoy his company. It's nice just to be with my friend.

Caring takes a lot out of you and it completely changes the dynamic of the relationship. I'd been searching for ways to find the space where I could put down the carer role and simply be his friend. I found that in moments when we were at my house drinking cuppas together. 

I still need to be both his primary carer and advocate but there is now more time to hold his hand and simply be his friend. Despite the age gap our friendship of over 30 years has developed a very deep bond between the two of us. We are each others soul mate with out the romantic ties. And it's lovely to be able to sit and enjoy just being with him. 

The Era of Walking and Shifting Time

 My friend has gotten a lot more active of late. We live in a regional town and his house is about 20 mins walk from the main street and his favourite cafe. We now have a GPS watch which is my back up for when his phone goes flat or he forgets to put his phone in his pocket. 

His favourite Cafe is owned by an Italian family and in the evenings it is an Italian Restaurant. They love him and are so kind to him when he's there which is why he keeps going back, sometimes 3 times in one day. His short-term memory is poor and he'll often forget that he was there an hour earlier. But the beauty of a small town is that he is for the most part in a protective bubble and 5 days a week I'm never too far away. 

There's also another attraction to this business, one of his current stories is that I own the cafe and he's coming to see me. In reality I work at a resort 1 kilometre from the cafe but no amount of reminding him where I work has stuck.

Being active and walking is fabulous for his brain and his mental health. But I will admit when the increased activity first started a couple of months ago it stressed me out. I'm learning to loosen the reigns and let things flow. I'm never far away if he gets a bit lost and I keep an eye on where he is via his phone and the watch. I know the trigger points of where he starts to get lost, and I phone him as soon as I realise he's at that point. 

One day when the era of walking kicked off, I was half an hour away and noticed he'd walked into town, I called him and he'd said he was going home. I checked in a few times and after noticing he'd taken a wrong turn out of the dog park, on the way home, I proceeded to spend 20 mins on the phone with him, talking him home. 

We're working on keeping him independent for as long as we can and as long as he doesn't go looking for me in the middle of the night, we're ok.

Which leads me to time, he has no concept of it. This evening after I left work, I picked him up from one of his walks. I had some jobs to do at his house and decided to stay until it got dark as there was less chance of him going for his 3rd walk of the day if the sun was down. 

I looked out the window and commented that the sun was going down, his response was " it’s a bit unnatural, isn’t it?" I questioned what he meant, and he asked me what the time was "it's evening 5.30pm. His response " oh I thought it was mid-morning" 

20 mins later he said "I might go for a walk" I replied "no it's getting late" he responded " it's only morning isn't it? " I responded to him and said he was shifting time!

Needless to say I held my breath as I left and I've been checking that he's phone and watch are both saying he's home ever since.

Winter is finally descending on us, and his wings will be clipped for a while. But that then creates the challenge of how to keep his brain active and stop him going stir crazy through the winter months. I have some plans in place and we'll pivot as we need to.

Lib x

Photo by Jérémie Crausaz on Unsplash