The following is more information
about last night. He continued communicating with his sitter. ( The sitter is
literally someone who sits with him 24/7.
When he was on the floor, he needed one because he was always getting up
on his own to go to the bathroom. Now he
needs one, so he doesn't pull out any of the things the staff has sticking in
him to save his life.)
Next, he wrote "The dialogue
is in . . . . English? Latin? That last
part wasn't clear. Ah, background
information. I set his Powerbook by his
head with Catholic prayers on it from YouTube. He was listening peacefully for
a long time. Then he started complaining
about something being in Latin, he was right. Latin Chants were playing. I stopped that one and put on prayers in
English. He still complained. However, he was on this breathing mask at
that point that made him sound like he was learning to play the kazoo, very
noisy. He may have been confused, not
understanding with something being in Latin.
The next thing he wrote in LARGE
LETTERS was" BE GENTLE." That was addressed to me. The respiratory therapist assured him that I
was being entirely appropriate. However, I think Mike was referring to a
previous interaction I had with a nurse where I wasn't so gentle. I had a few
unsatisfactory interactions with her and was telling her I didn't like what she
was doing.
In my first interaction with her, I
told her that I was under the impression that he had aspirated the fluid from
his stomach into his lungs. She kindly
informed me that they weren't the same organ. Really??? What a surprise. She
must think I'm someone who didn't make it past sixth grade. Okay. So I patiently explained to her that others
had told me that they thought he had brought liquid up from his stomach to his
mouth and breathed that liquid in. I
didn't want to strain her understanding.
But I wasn't sarcastic or anything like that as I spoke to her. Mike did
not observe this interaction.
The second interaction with this
nurse was the one that got me. She told
him just to relax and stop thinking. It is my understanding that this is
extremely difficult to do unless you have extensive training. I asked her if she could JUST stop thinking.
She assured me that she could. Okay. I told her that I thought it was a cruel
thing to say to someone who didn't have her level of expertise. She then told
me that she thought he was someone who thought too much. Let me see, as I recall, he is an academic
who spends a great deal of time in his mind thinking and has no training as to
how to shut it off. When my tone got tense, and I told her I thought was she
was doing was cruel, we were standing on either side of Mike's bed. Mike has a low tolerance for people arguing.
There was one moment the day before
yesterday, when he said, "Turn off the TV. People are arguing." The
TV wasn't on, but there was some commotion out around the nurse's station. He heard it and got upset. Mike remembers his parents as not stop
arguers. Well, his mother as a nonstop
yeller. He is very, very sensitive to
those bad vibes.
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