In 5 days my Gramma will be 100.
And she lives with me.
Gramma’s daily routine is pretty simple. I lay out her clothes the night before, so when she gets up (somewhere between 10am and 2pm), she gets herself dressed in her room. This is a little bit of a process because of the oxygen tubing getting caught in her pants and/or shirt. But the mental and physical exercise of dressing yourself leads to self-satisfaction and independence, which I’ve found is highly treasured among the elderly.
After putting in her hearing aids and getting her glasses, she heads across the hall and puts in her teeth and washes her face with water. She dampens her hair (regardless of how much hairspray was in it the day before!) and uses a pick to comb through it. How her hair looks is VERY important to her, and she worries if it’s been more than 3 months since her last perm!
If I’m in the kitchen when she comes down the hall to the table, I usually say something along the lines of “Good morning, beautiful lady!” By now she’s been up for more than an hour and has done her morning exercises (getting dressed!), and having someone acknowledge your hard work goes a long way. She lights up at my greeting!
Her breakfast bowl is prepped at the table. Because I’m still working, sometimes she has to finish getting the rest of the stuff together: starting the countertop teapot for hot water (I make sure there’s an inch of water in it so there’s enough but it’s not too heavy), get the half and half from the fridge (milk would do, but we’re trying to beef up her calories), get a pint jar and put ice and water in it to drink. By now her water is hot and she puts the electric teapot on the seat of her walker and moves it to the table. When she finally sits down, she adds a big dab of Jif crunchy peanut butter and AT LEAST 2 tablespoons of sugar to her oatmeal before pouring in the hot water, stirring, and adding the half n half. Considering how sugar-conscious our world is, THIS OLD WOMAN EATS A LOT OF SUGAR!!!
She drinks at least one cup of black coffee at breakfast. She’s told me that she used to drink cream in her coffee when she was young, but when they moved up to the city from the farm, she couldn’t find cream as good as “that old Jersey cow,” so she gave it up altogether.
We do her medicine and vitals sitting at the breakfast table. I ask her how she’s feeling (I make a point NOT to talk to her while she eats because choking on her food is an issue), so we talk a bit while we take blood pressure and discuss our day. Then she rises from her seat and moves to her chair by the window where she can look down the street.
The rest of the day varies. Often she will nap in her chair until about 4:00 when she perks up and starts coloring in her latest Mandala coloring book.
She gets out of the house 4 or 5 times a week. Once is on Sunday, when her son picks her up and takes her to church (he is very faithful about this and we’ve been really impressed. I’m a children’s minister at another church, and she would miss her friends if he didn’t take her.)
On other days, she will ride along with me while I run errands. Occasionally that includes “supervising” me while I redecorate a room at church with a new month’s theme. Other times she enjoys going to karate with our son; she is flabbergasted at the tiny girls that get out there and “do all those moves!” She enjoys just riding in the car and waiting while I run in to a store; the mental stimulation of getting out and about helps keep her aware of the world around her, I think.
At dusk, like any old farmer’s wife, she’s ready for bed.
Old habits die hard, and that’s not one that’s going away anytime soon!
Photo by Johannes Plenio on Unsplash
But you are a chosen generation, a royal priesthood, a holy nation, a peculiar people; that you should show forth the praises of Him who has called you out of darkness into His marvelous light: (1 Peter 2:9 KJV)