Mom's Pain

It is interesting to me the use of pain to describe Mom's right side problems by all the folks who make their way through here in a week. It is the first question they ask, "Are you in any pain?"  Mom moves her head which each of them interprets as Yes....it's not....and then they ask, "Can you show me where it hurts?" To which they receive a blank stare from Mom.  This process, for me, has become a discovery of Mom's body language.  Learning the difference in her looks and her noises, her breathing.  Watching the movement of her right side, and her left side, which is not without it's issues.

Mom's pain is from non movement.  She is stiff and sore when she moves.  If Mom is lying still asleep or awake, she is in zero pain. Her left leg does do some restless leg spasms that can go on for some time.  The other night we were up for over an hour before Mom calmed down.  This was the worst I have seen, they usually pass in a few minutes, faster if she lets me rub her leg and unwind her hip, but, Mom has a hard time letting go.  When she doesn't want me touching her I sit and breathe deeply, reminding her to find her breath and through her breath find her body.  I remind her to let go.

I change Mom first thing when I get home from work and on the weekends I set my alarm and get up about the same time. Sometimes she wakes up and wants to watch tv, and sometimes she just wants to go back to sleep.  For the last two nights, Mom has barely even opened her eyes during the whole process, which now includes cleaning and bandaging of the spot and leaves her lying on her right side for a quite a few minutes. Last night and tonight, she just moved where I put her like a rag doll barely making any sound.  She opened her eyes and looked at me a couple of times, but basically just slept right through it. I moved her right leg all over, rolled the hip to the left, raised her right hand a bit to have her hold the peg tube, (she doesn't really hold it, I just rest it in the palm of the right hand, so it stays in the front and does not get pulled behind her back.  I tell her the right hand can still do things.), barely a grunt of sound, just slow sleepy breathing.

Mom is not in any kind of chronic pain.  The last two nights prove that to me, so I am letting go of the worry that I might be wrong. I am not wrong.  Mom just needs to move more. Say a prayer for that one folks, she's still a willful child, lol, and that's just painful for me. I've got to get creative.