Dressing

It is cold and rainy out. Sure does not seem like May except for the nasty weather. Tornadoes all around us. I pray for all the families in Joplin Mo. and surrounding towns effected by the storms this week. We have more coming tonight in our area so take care. I am ready for spring to be over and summer to start. It hasn't seemed like spring anyway. Cold most of time.
Since my son is getting up at 5:30 every morning for his summer job . I have been getting up too. We eat breakfast together. I have seen him more the last week than I have for months. His school hours are all different and we seem to be up at different times. But now he leaves and comes home the same everyday. I like it but I am sure it is hard on his girlfriend. Last week I think they only saw each other one maybe two days. She came over to have supper with us one night and she told him he was so nice and lovable. I told her absence does make the heart grow fonder. LOL!
I am going to go bug mom in a minute . She won't like it . But since I am up earlier she is up earlier. Makes since right? I start getting her ready to get out of bed and hour earlier. I don't think she notices the deference much . Just as long as she is getting fed. She does like to eat. Thank Goodness.
I haven't wrote about any tips from the Alzheimer's Caregivers Playbook I was reading for awhile so thought I would do that.
Mom is easy to dress now. We just put her in an hospital gown and she is ready to go but I remember when it was not so easy. Making her change cloths and take a shower was really hard. She was stinky there for awhile. But later on she started letting us give her showers.
1. Allow twice the amount of time you think it will take for her to get dressed.
2. Don't act rushed or in a hurry.
3. Limit her choices to two outfits. Let her pick which one she wants to wear.
4. Lay her cloths out in the order she needs to put them on.
5. Talk her through getting dressed.
6. Use short , simple, one-step instructions.
7. If she loves one outfit and refuses to wear anything else , buy several outfits that look just like it.
8. Use pants with elastic waist and pullover tops to make dressing easier.
I always wanted to make mom some cloths with velco on them but never got around to it. We could just rip those suckers off. It was getting really hard to get her in pants right before she stopped walking . She would fall at any moment . Her knees would just buckle under her without warning. I finally started putting her in skirts . Seemed to go faster. And when is was potty time . Skirts were much easier to pull up then having to pull pants down. But that won't work for our male love ones. I would go with the Velcro. LOL! We got mom shoes with velcro instead of shoes strings . I love them. When she still wore shoes anyway.