(insert a loud scream here)

Excuse me while I whine a bit. I have a cough that rattles my teeth. Mostly it's a good thing that I love to stay home so much, because my chances of leaving here until this cough subsides is slim to none.

Yesterday, while I was enjoying being home bound and alone, I got a phone call from the nursing home.

My mom was not doing well. I'm not used to hearing bad information in such a steady stream, especially when it was SO unexpected. Many family members had seen her on Sunday, and she was doing very well.

It seemed odd to me that in just days things had gotten bad so quickly.

Then, the nurse happened to mention that they had changed her medications. Added two. Changed the timing on one. Two of them were medications we didn't even know she was being given.

I must tell you something about my parents. They have NEVER been able to handle medications.

The stories about my father are legendary. He once had a cold. Just a simple cold. My mom left him to care for his two preschool daughters and two preschool nieces while the mom's went out. When my mom and aunt arrived home, my dad was found on the floor in their bedroom looking under the bed. My mom questioned him, and he responded that he was looking for the girls. They were, thank God, safely in bed. After he had put them to bed he had taken a Contact cold tablet and lost all touch with reality.

My mom could not even take an aspirin without needing to go to bed.

So, back to Tuesday. The nurse said that they were having trouble waking my mom up in the morning.

Go figure. They changed one of her night meds to morning. This one helped her stay asleep. They switched it because they put her on an additional drug which needed to be given at bedtime. This one kept her awake. So they GAVE HER AMBIEN.

Are you familiar with Ambien?

NOBODY should take this drug.

I have spent the better portion of this evening googling drug interactions. The new one she is being given should not be give with the one she was already on. Yet she is being given both. The new one also causes extreme sleepiness, even more so if given with a different med she is still on. One of the many side affects of Ambien? Anxiety and agitation.

So, when they call me to tell me that it is very difficult to wake her up and when they do she is extremely agitated...

Well, you can expect that this will also cause extreme agitation in me!

I want to go there and give them 'what for'. But, in general they are very good people. And, I have never given 'what for' to anybody, ever.

Since I am coughing like one dying of consumption, I dare not go and spread my disease to other more vulnerable folk. Although I can think of a few of the less vulnerable who might benefit from a cough that might just rattle their brains enough to jar some sense into them.

Now, excuse me while I go scream.

(That reminds me, I've often wondered why characters who are chronically ill in novels are always described as thin, lovely, gentle women who bare their illnesses with much patience mixed with stealy resolve.)