It's quite hard to accept some forms of advice when you know your "patient". This post is purely so others can compare.
Mum is on a roller coaster of sleep and awake/alert.
Being diabetic, she has to eat, and needs a protein rich diet doe her bedsores.
Consensus in the medical profession appears to be - keep blood sugar levels high, but higher blood sugar levels mean less inclined to eat. Of course when she's in one of her sleep phases, she doesn't eat anyway.
She's been in hospital for 2 weeks with a UTI, and when she came out, they'd changed her insulin regime completely. This in itself is annoying because she's been stable on one long-acting dose in the morning for years, now we have a smaller long acting dose in the evening and short-acting when necessary.
The problem is, it's such a small dose that her blood sugar is constantly high. In consultation with the nurse, I've upped her dose by 2 units, and it does seem to be at a better level now. Before it would get up to 1.90, never below 1.30, adding another 2 units it's now between 1.20- 1.40.
That's the diabetes.
Mum hasn't been diagnosed, but I believe she has the symptoms of Lewy body dementia. Twitchy legs, unable to find words and slurred speech, sleeping a lot, totally immobile and incontinent/constipated now. Some days perfectly lucid, others a complete zombie, or even both in the same day.
Take this morning, she woke up (or was woken up) a zombie, hardly ate a few mouthfuls, this evening she's smiling and ate a good sized portion of food.
I take each day as it comes. When she's in her sleep phase, it's very easy to think she's not going to make it, but just let her sleep and she seems to rebound eventually.
My biggest worry is messing up the insulin - too much or too little - so tonight I didn't give her any until I was sure she'd eaten enough (if she hadn't, I would have decreased the dose).
To my mind, it's all very well specifying a certain dose of insulin, but you can't take that on it's own, it has to be flexible.
The roller coaster part is the bit I'm finding most weird. One day she can sleep for 24 hours and not verbally respond to anything, the next she can ask for a dvd by name and watch 3 episodes in a row.
It's certainly a weird learning curve.
Mum is on a roller coaster of sleep and awake/alert.
Being diabetic, she has to eat, and needs a protein rich diet doe her bedsores.
Consensus in the medical profession appears to be - keep blood sugar levels high, but higher blood sugar levels mean less inclined to eat. Of course when she's in one of her sleep phases, she doesn't eat anyway.
She's been in hospital for 2 weeks with a UTI, and when she came out, they'd changed her insulin regime completely. This in itself is annoying because she's been stable on one long-acting dose in the morning for years, now we have a smaller long acting dose in the evening and short-acting when necessary.
The problem is, it's such a small dose that her blood sugar is constantly high. In consultation with the nurse, I've upped her dose by 2 units, and it does seem to be at a better level now. Before it would get up to 1.90, never below 1.30, adding another 2 units it's now between 1.20- 1.40.
That's the diabetes.
Mum hasn't been diagnosed, but I believe she has the symptoms of Lewy body dementia. Twitchy legs, unable to find words and slurred speech, sleeping a lot, totally immobile and incontinent/constipated now. Some days perfectly lucid, others a complete zombie, or even both in the same day.
Take this morning, she woke up (or was woken up) a zombie, hardly ate a few mouthfuls, this evening she's smiling and ate a good sized portion of food.
I take each day as it comes. When she's in her sleep phase, it's very easy to think she's not going to make it, but just let her sleep and she seems to rebound eventually.
My biggest worry is messing up the insulin - too much or too little - so tonight I didn't give her any until I was sure she'd eaten enough (if she hadn't, I would have decreased the dose).
To my mind, it's all very well specifying a certain dose of insulin, but you can't take that on it's own, it has to be flexible.
The roller coaster part is the bit I'm finding most weird. One day she can sleep for 24 hours and not verbally respond to anything, the next she can ask for a dvd by name and watch 3 episodes in a row.
It's certainly a weird learning curve.
