house progress

We accepted an offer for our old house today, so that is a huge relief of tension. No major contingencies and closing Nov. 16.


The plan is to move Nov. 2, which is a tight deadline but looks possible.

Here are some pictures:

John's sitting room has a laminate floor and is walk-out to a carport with no step at all.

John's bathroom--the folding grab bar to the right of the toilet is not mounted yet. The toilet seat is a Toto. The wall is blue below the chair rail to make the toilet easier to see.

John's shower:


The controls are outside the shower because the shower head had to be mounted on a cement block wall.

getting close

I had hoped to move this week but the house isn't going to be ready. I'm not sure whether it is going to be ready in time to move next week or not. It is getting close, but the hardwood floors still need to be sanded and refinished, paint touched up, and the grab bars installed in John's bathroom.

John is a little more focused on packing than he was at first but there is still a lot to do. And I spent the afternoon today working in the yard of the new house, not packing. I realized today that we have 5 different people we hire to help us with yard work and packing, all of whom are pretty unreliable. I got upset Sunday when someone who had repeatedly said he was coming didn't show up, but I found someone else to help me get the bushes planted before it got too cold. I'm trying to be more laid back and figure if one person can't help someone else will be able to.

I will post some pictures once the grab bars are up. John's space is going to be really nice.

hope

I had a very sore back Monday and Tuesday from preparing a garden and planting a tree Sunday, but I am much relieved it is much better today.

The roofer came today and did a minor fix that he thinks will stop the leak in our current house.

The plumber pushed down the tree that wouldn't fall and the two dead trees next to it with his backhoe and didn't charge me anything. Another subcontractor said the plumber just wanted to play with his toy.

The refrigerator that seemed not to be working did eventually get cold (it took more than 24 hours). I was too efficient and ended up paying for a service call for a repair person to tell me I should wait longer, but it is still good news.

The renovations on the house we will move to are beginning to get to the last stages. The painting isn't all the way finished yet but most of the plumbing fixtures were put in today and the appliances come tomorrow. The big thing still to be done is laminate floors on the lower level and sanding and polyurethaning hardwood floors on the main level and in the attic (where more oak flooring needs to be added in the new dormer area). The light fixtures should start to go in Friday or Monday.

The realtor says he is hoping to have an offer for us on our current house tomorrow. He doesn't know if it will be a good one, but if that did work out it would be a huge relief of stress. We had an offer earlier in the summer and agreed on a price but it was contingent on those people selling another house that has not sold.

Our kids are coming home for the long weekend and I have Monday off.

John told the therapist that he thinks the antidepressant (Wellbutrin) is helping him. I don't see much difference in his ability to get things done, but he seems to be a little more engaged--now and then he does notice that I have feelings. He started going to a specialized hand therapist and his hand is finally getting better. It will be interesting to see whether he wants me to continue to put on his socks and shampoo his hair as his hand recovers. He doesn't seem to mind being dependent, while I wish he tried harder to do things for himself.

overloaded

I had hoped to move this week but the renovations are not done, so we are currently scheduled to move Oct. 22. So it could be worse, but I need to vent.

I had some landscaping taking care of last week, regrading on both sides of the house so the water flows away from the house and not straight at the driveway. I got beds along the foundation prepared for me at the same time. Saturday the university botanical garden had a plant sale, so I bought a good sized arborvitae (emerald variety), to go near the house between two windows where it looks a bit blank. Then I took John to a funeral of someone he cared about and then went to Atlanta to pick up a chair my daughter and I had ordered.

Yesterday (Sunday) started out with two men coming to move several appliances. I didn't see any need to buy a new washer and dryer and refrigerator, but since there were decent working ones at the new house (from when it was rented to students) I decided to swap now so the refrigerator could be installed along with the new appliances later this week (it needs an icemaker line). The person who was coming to help me clean couldn't come because of an injured foot so I unloaded and cleaned the refrigerator and cleaned behind it and behind the washer and dryer when they moved them. John tried to help a little with the cleaning but he is so slow that his help didn't amount to much. He didn't try to help reload the refrigerator. This morning I had to call the appliance service people--the refrigerator that we moved to our current house isn't cooling properly.

I was left with the job of capping off the icemaker line at the old house, as the refrigerator we moved there doesn't have an icemaker. My first trip to Lowes I came home with a cap that was too big, but John went back and bought a smaller one and that worked.

Meanwhile, I had someone coming to cut down some dead trees. They are cedar trees and the one he started with proved to be hard to cut--he borrowed a splitting maul from me to add to one he was already using to wedge the tree in the right direction. He eventually got it cut but it didn't fall--it is held by vines to two other dead cedars. He was going to come back today with a winch but it is raining.

While he was working on the tree I worked on digging a hole to plant the tree I had bought (ironically also a kind of cedar, but one that grows 12 feet tall and 3 feet wide). The clay soil was the right wetness to dig relatively easily so I dug a really big hole and mixed in composted wood chips and lime and fertilizer. I should have asked for help moving the tree and the 40 pound bag of wood chips, but I had enjoyed doing the digging and doing the whole job right. Not surprisingly my back is sore this morning.

These days I usually move to another bed when John comes to bed and wakes me up with his snoring or crying out or just shifting trying to get himself positioned in bed. So I moved around 4 am last night to my son's room (since he is away at college) and realized the bed was wet because the roof was leaking. I went up and put a bucket in the attic but I didn't get back to sleep. We have been struggling with this roof problem for a couple of years--it was supposedly fixed. I called the realtor who is selling the house and asked him for a recommendation of a really skilled roofer. He said they are either cheap or good and I said I want good.

The good news is that the roof leak in the dormer of the new house does seem to be fixed, though there is still a problem with a downspout backing up. I took my laptop back to the repair place this morning--they supposedly fixed it last week but it isn't fixed.

It is all more than I can bear.

I'm here

We had at least one of our kids home all summer but now they are both back at school. My daughter helped me a lot with decisions and shopping for the house renovation (a big help because John shows no interest). I taught both kids to drive (talk about stressful). The house renovations have been intense and are still not done--hopefully by the end of the month. Our current house hasn't sold, though there has been some interest. I've been posting renovation pictures on Facebook and instead of blogging Twitter has been about my speed (what I post there shows up on Facebook too).

John fell asleep at his computer and compressed the nerve in his elbow. The result was that he lost a good part of the use of his better hand. It is supposed to get better, but more than a month later it has improved only a tiny bit. He needs me to change his socks for him and cut up his meat. I wasn't expecting to be here already.

My tentative plan is to move the second week of October. Somehow. I am teaching a full load this fall.

I am grateful that John has been able to continue to take responsibility for helping his 98 year old aunt. She took a bad fall a couple of weeks ago and I met the ambulance at the emergency room, as I knew it would take him too long to get there. But he managed after that. Amazingly, nothing was broken and after a little more than a week at the nursing home she is back in her assisted living apartment.

feeling burdened

I've made plans to give away our cat tomorrow--John doesn't like her around because she demands attention. I'm not strongly attached to her but it is still a sad thing to do. I think I have found a good home, at least, someone who really cares about cats.

We are supposedly on vacation in North Carolina and John still seems to enjoy being here, though his hiking is really slowing down. I went back home yesterday and will go again tomorrow to deal with work and house matters. I'm worried I should be there today to look for anything in the rewiring that isn't the way I want it. I forgot to check yesterday whether they moved a switch I wanted moved--I know they didn't move another one. The good news is that they are hoping to be done today with the rewiring.

Our son missed his plane home from Spain Saturday and I had a hairraising time getting him scheduled for a flight the next day. But he is now home and with us on vacation. Next step is to get the details worked out to take him to start college at the end of the month.

I went to a Lewy Body support group yesterday, though I didn't stay the whole time because I wanted to get back to North Carolina for dinner. Still, I liked the other people and I talked about how confusing it has been for me.

doctor's visit

John had a neurologist's visit Thursday. John reported that his balance is worse and we both reported that he is moving slower. He asked about increasing the Sinemet but the doctor said no because the doctor found his muscles not stiff. The doctor seems most worried about falls.

We asked about when the doctor thinks Namenda should be started. He said when the Aricept stops working. What I wonder is whether the Namenda would be any better than the Aricept, which John takes only a half dose of because it causes him balance problems.

John reported that he doesn't get enough air through his nose and needs to breathe through his mouth. The doctor asked about allergy symptoms, but John said it is true even when his nose is not running. The doctor suggested more exercise to strengthen his chest and diaphram muscles. John said he would go back to using our exercise bike. He does take a 1/2 hour walk several times a week, but I don't know how aerobic that is.

After we got back from Massachusetts it was several days before I got John to go visit the other house, and then he didn't say much. The renovations are in the stage where everything is torn out and some of the changes are framed in. I did get him to make a decision about whether he wanted a larger closet or more built in bookshelves. But it feels like he isn't interested, which is hard on me. It is mostly just one more thing than he can deal with--he has trouble getting the necessary things done in a day.

I'm having a tough time because the main part of the budget for the program I run at work just got eliminated. My job is safe but it is discouraging and hard to know what to do. We also got a lowball offer on our current house and they haven't responded to our counteroffer.

John is home

John left Monday to go to New York city for a wine tasting, returned Friday. He was very happy with the wine tasting (and went to another) and he had one unsuccessful day of museums and one successful day. He came back saying he had had a wonderful trip.

I don't drink so I didn't wish I had gone. But it is hard that he does so well when he travels on his own, then comes home and is negative and confused. On Friday our son had had a driving lesson and done testing to evaluate his ADHD. John got mixed up three times in half an hour about which one our son had gone off to do that evening. And yesterday he was having particular trouble finding the word he wanted and sometimes used the wrong word without realizing it.

I think he is in a stage where he can hold it together when he is doing something he wants to do, but it is tiring so he doesn't do so well when he gets home. It makes sense that he would be awfully tired after a trip but I do get frustrated sometimes that he can't put together that kind of effort when it isn't all about him. On the other hand, I'm glad he is taking responsibility for his own happiness.

I've been deep in house renovations. After they cut a hole in the roof the carpenter and I batted ideas back and forth and ended up more than doubling the size of the dormer. He says I should take the attic room as my bedroom, it is going to be so nice. He also came up with a better idea for how to fix the staircases, which weren't to code. John initially didn't like the tile I had picked for his bathroom, but we went to Lowes to look at other alternatives and he decided he liked it after all when he saw it on a wall from a distance. So many decisions to make.

John and I walked around the badly overgrown lot with a friend who is a professor of horticulture and he told us what to save and what to cut down. I'm not good about asking for help, but I did and he was wonderfully helpful. John is eager to go after the poison ivy--something he has always gotten obsessed about. I think he also took in that our friend liked the house.

different directions

John is in New York city for a wine tasting and to go to museums. I've settled down so much about how he is doing, and I don't think he has lost much in the last year.

I'm very busy with the house we are renovating:

The first task is a new dormer for the attic.

busy

Trying to get John's aunt moved this week. She holds onto stuff worse than John. And I spent much of today dealing with the house we are renovating. I'm glad I was there when the rental manager went through--I don't think the students will be getting their security deposit back. Tired.

renovation planning

I spent four and a half hours with the designer and two contractors at the house we will be renovating. The good news is that having the designer supervise the whole process seems to make sense to everyone (and his charge for that service is extremely reasonable). It was a productive meeting--everyone listened to everyone and they came up with some new ideas, particularly for how to improve a problematic stairway. But I'm tired; it is hard to deal with on top of my job and worrying about getting our current house ready to show. And it is going to cost more than I had hoped.

I'm going out of town tomorrow for three days. The person who is helping John declutter and organize his stuff will come twice while I am away. I hope it goes well and they get far.

decluttering help

The woman who is helping us declutter worked for four hours on Monday and seemed to work well with John. I had a more difficult time--I felt judged by her. Some of that is me being defensive. But the important thing is whether she can get John to work through his stuff. She will come twice while I am out of town.

I'm feeling overloaded with working on this house and a meeting with contractors coming up tomorrow about the other house. And issues at work and going out of town to a conference.

spring break

This upcoming week is my spring break and I don't have any travel plans except to take our son on a day trip to revisit a college before he makes his decision. I'm trying to use the vacation to do things that have seemed too stressful to face. I've found most of the missing documents for our taxes, except the ones from Social Security (sigh). But when I went to look for one missing tax form I discovered I hadn't paid it. No doubt they sent the bill to the mortgage company for the mortgage we paid off, but I should have thought of that.

I was in a hurry to get this year's taxes done because of college financial aid forms but it has become clear that we won't get any aid, except at one school that offers scholarships for in-state students. I wrote some letters explaining our situation but our son doesn't qualify because of a savings account my father established for him, before considering parents' income. I'm glad our son has the money for college but it makes me feel badly about not helping him much.

The big task for the break is house matters. I was reading about basement refinishing last night and discovered that there is a better approach than what I have been hearing so far--wall and floor products that will not grow mold. I have an appointment with the designer tomorrow but the two contractors I called yesterday haven't called me back yet. We have an appointment Monday with the realtor who will list our current house and I had a good conversation with him on the phone. He used to be our travel agent so John feels comfortable with him. I'm dreading what he is going to say about what we should do to make the house look better, but I've already told him that is going to be a problem for us.

houses

Yesterday we met with a contractor sent by the insurance company about our leaky roof. I'm convinced he figured out what the problem was, and he thinks the insurance company will pay for fixing the roof as well as the damaged ceiling. But they are going to have to redo part of the roof and replace drywall to repair the ceiling, so it is going to be a mess.

Today we went through the house we want to renovate with the maintenance person for the realty company and a contractor he knows. It keeps getting more complicated. No serious problems, just lots of choices. For example, they recommend Konecto floating vinyl flooring instead of laminate flooring.

Tomorrow an appraiser is coming to look at our current house. I have had a couple of people express some interest in it, and I would love to sell it privately rather than through a realtor. The first step is a good, fair appraisal. Not easy in this market.

John is showing some interest in it all, but I still feel burdened because I am afraid of making mistakes.

tired

Two nonstop days of random stuff. I'm tired and discouraged. After sounding last night like he was getting into the idea of moving, John told our daughter today that he is going along with the idea because once I get something in my head nothing will shake me. And our son finally paid attention (after not being interested in going to look at the house earlier in the week) and wasn't happy that he won't have a room that is all his own. I've got too many things to do and less than a week before classes start.

I read an article on caregiver resentment today (page 5 here). At this stage I have plenty of time away from caregiving. But I have mixed feelings about the advice to take control. That has certainly been my approach, to get things like finances in better order because that is something I have more control over. But there are several dangers to taking control. One is that I might slip into thinking I can control what is at heart an uncontrollable situation. Another is that it is scary and overwhelming to feel responsible for everything--what if I make a mistake? And finally it is simply too much to try to do.

I'm going to take care of myself and go to bed early.

second visit to the house

The students who have rented the house until May 9 were all asleep when we arrived at 11 am. But we did our walk through and measurements anyway. John came for part of it and liked what the designer had to say. I think we decided the best way to solve the bathroom issue is to move the toilet and sink maybe 10 feet--in effect rotate a rectangular room 90 degrees. The designer didn't think the extra expense would be excessive and it would make both the bathroom and the room it is off work much better.

The big news is that even with half the lights burned out and the rooms full of college student chaos, the designer was able to convince John that his space could be made nice. And I think almost all of what we do will go right into the value of the house. The neighborhood is improving--most of the houses are simple ranch houses but three have been torn down and replaced with McMansions. Our house is not big but it is a brick house--more than a simple ranch house.

Another nonstop day. I need to go to sleep.

house

I made two appointments to look at the old house, one with a builder who is a certified aging in place specialist today, one with a designer tomorrow. I liked today's person. While he didn't seem to know much more than ADA requirements, he seemed to get my vision for the house and be able to work with our timeframe. He said we would have a hard time finding a house with as good an entrance (no step at all from the carport to the lower level) if we went looking for one. There are some questions about perhaps expanding the bathroom or making a new door between rooms that need more thought.

Most important, our daughter, who had never been in the house, liked it.

I went up to North Carolina to see a friend this evening and it is late. I will write more tomorrow after the second appointment.