Saturday, July 20, 2013

Saturday, July 20, 2013

Ken walked twice around the Atrium yesterday while I was in Victoria. In the second session he walked around once more. I did not get any packing done, but I did organize and eliminate.

Ken walked around the atrium once this morning, but he had feeble knees. He quoted the scripture in D&C 81:5. Top of Form D&C 81: 5

Wherefore, be faithful; stand in the office which I have appointed unto you; succor the weak, lift up the hands which hang down, and strengthen the feeble knees.

We now know what feeble knees are. It makes it hard to walk.

It is so hard to not over help. I got so frustrated last night that Ken wouldn't communicate his needs. He really wanted to be independent, dangerously so. When I finally went over to my bed and left him with the sides of his bed down, he sat on the side of the bed for a while, falling on his back and getting himself up again and again, and then he stood up and walked five steps by himself over to my bed and then fell down on top of his IV tubes onto the head of my bed.

When a toddler is learning to walk they don’t have so far to fall to the ground and they don’t have old breakable bones and hips. It was painful to hold back.

But I need to let him make messes and do whatever he wants and try to only help him when he asks for help.

The reasoning is too slow and unreasonable to act on, but we are managing better today because he is getting stronger and I am hovering less. He needs space to do things at his own pace.

Ken thinks he can do things, forgetting that it might take more strength than he has. He just automatically tries to do what he has always done, like rinsing out his toothbrush when the bathroom is on the other side of the room with a bed and chair in the way and he is connected to an IV with its complications. We call the IV coatrack Matilda. And she has to come along on all excursions.