Archive
Dan’s Covid-19 Blog #12: How Covid is teaching this old dog new tricks
Teaching this old dog new tricks? Really? Dayo, Claire's black lab/greyhound mix companion for the last 9 years, is getting older and not seeing as well. He loves retrieving the frisbee from the river but more often these days, he can't see where it lands. Fortunately...
Dan’s Covid-19 Blog #11: Easy does it…
I invited my father-in-law to watch Mission of Honour, a 2018 film about Polish fighter pilots who helped the RAF defeat the German air force. It was not long before I realized that he could not keep up… He was not following the dialogue, the jokes or really the plot...
Dan’s Covid-19 blog #10: Labour of love
There's an old Christian song rattling around in my mind today, particularly these two lines: "We'll guard each one's dignity and save each one's pride, and they'll know we are Christians by our love…" If ever there was a by-line for my care of my father-in-law it is...
Dan’s Covid-19 Blog #9: Gratitude for loving support…it takes a village
As my father-in-law is naturally isolating more and more due to his dementia and its affect on his self-confidence, I am heartened not only by the exceptional medical and dental professional care I rely on, but by the loving support we are receiving from friends and...
Dan’s Covid-19 Blog #8: Gratitude for medical support
In this time of Covish, slogging along as a caregiver to a vulnerable father-in-law, I remind myself regularly of just how blessed I am. I do this based on the model of what a Jewish son said his elderly mom always said whenever he complained about something. She...
Dan’s Covid-19 Blog #7: Simmering
Mount Etna, Sicily 2018 Like a big pot on a stove full to the brim, I am simmering ready to splurch and splatter here and there. Recently I got a flash of insight, a glance into myself when the veil lifted for a second and I saw this ancient simmering stew of...
Dan’s Covid-19 Blog #6: Alcohol and Covishness
More notes from a Covid-19 Caregiver's journey... Boy am I shaky this morning. Fortunately my pulse is okay (which means no arrhythmia) even if my chest is fluttery with free floating anxiety. The last two nights I must confess I have had a fair bit of scotch -...
Dan’s Covid-19 Blog #5: A ray of sunshine to warm my heart
More notes from a Covid-19 Caregiver's journey... In the gathering darkness of trying to ameliorate the worst aspects of my father-in-law's dementia, knowing all the while that this mission of mercy is in fact a losing battle, out of nowhere a ray of sunshine pierced...
Dan’s Covid-19 Blog #4: Hawking and spitting
More notes from a Covid-19 Caregiver's journey... Something pretty crucial, a turning point of sorts, has been dawning on me lately. But I'm not going to make the same mistake I made with my mother-in-law, the now deceased beloved partner of 60 odd years. Let me...
Dan’s Covid-19 Blog #3: A good day today
Notes from a Covid-19 Caregiver's journey... On our walk today. my father-in-law and I agreed that the sky looked like God's pen in his ink well, ready for Him to sign off on the glorious sunny day He has given us. Earlier as I drove my wife over to her temporary...