Well this has been a hectic week, especially for Pearl.  She has been found to have glaucoma in her left eye which was the cause of her "blurry" vision.  She found that when she put her hand over her left eye she could see much better....that happens for me when I cover my right eye!
Anyhow, she has been to the eye doctor twice, using (or missing) eye drops 3-4 x/day but it was found that the pressure was not coming down sufficiently.  Eye docs like to see it around 12 and hers started in the 40's, went down to 24 and then to 20 but stayed there.  The recommendation was for laser (not lasik) surgery to open a drain hole in the eye and that was done on Friday, 7/26. It was a simple procedure, done in the Wheaton Eye Clinics massive offices, and she was checked and released after an hour.  On the way home she even felt good enough to eat out even though her intestines give her problems.  She had to "run" to the bathroom and I took her to show her where it was.  We were done, hands washed and dried, I opened the bathroom door to leave and she turned and headed into the handicapped stall.  I figured she had to "go" again so I left her with the walker nearby and went back to our table.  Minutes went by and she finally came out, plopping into her chair she exclaimed, "I was sooo afraid!  I couldn't find the way out of the bathroom!" I thought I'd die in there!"  I said "Didn't you see me go out the door?"  "NO!", she said "I'm so afraid of everything, I don't know what to do!"  We all chuckled and went on eating........then I started to think, maybe she thought she was leaving the bathroom when she went into the handicap stall!  I started to picture her going in circles looking for the way out..... is it mean that it makes me smile?  Understand that the bathroom in this restaurant is so small, two people at the sink makes it crowded.
Back on track.....the morning after there is a voicemail from 7:20am with a tiny miserable voice saying how horrible she feels. Her eye is so painful that it goes up her head and down her chin, she didn't sleep all night.  I hear her fumbling to hang up the phone.  When I try to call her the phone rings 10 times and then her machine says "Memory is full".  She has never erased her messages!   I try 3 more times and then finally she picks up.  "Oh I feel awful....I called the clinic to ask if I could take a Tylenol but the girl said no, because it would interfere with the laser."  I KNOW that can't be true so I tell her that I will call them,  "Oh no, they aren't open today..."  I say that's fine, they will have an answering service, which they do and the nurse calls me right back.  When I tell her what is going on she says they can see her at 10:15am......it is now 9:10am.  I say she will be there and then go to wake up Rick who can easily be out the door way before me! 
So they get to the clinic and her eye pressure is now in the 40's, something has plugged the newly formed drainage hole.  The glaucoma specialist is not there and the doc brings in 2 or 3 more docs to confer and none of them want to touch her eye.....the laser is a specialty treatment.  So now Rick and Pearl have to travel to a satellite clinic where there IS a glaucoma specialist who tried another, more powerful laser with no luck.  Now her pressure was up to 56!  They sent her to the hospital to have a surgical procedure emergently to make a larger opening and drain the fluid.  It is now 2pm, they expect it to happen at 4pm and luckily Pearl had not eaten all day as she will be put under.  She doesn't go in until 5:30 though and I get a call from Rick at 6pm saying the nurses say she will be admitted.  Good! I think!  However, the doc says she can go home as she is "so perky and active".  Sometimes it doesn't pay to pretend to be something you aren't at the moment!  Especially since we have to have her back at the clinic at 9am Sunday morning!    

Addendum to yesterdays post:

About her painful tooth....."Euuuuuuuuwwwww.....it hurts when I touch it, when I try to eat."  She seems to have managed to eat her dinner but she wants me to know how miserable she is.  "I tried putting some 'Oil of cloves' on it...."  I have heard that that works so I tell her "good idea" and ask if she has taken any Advil for the pain.  She floats off in another direction of conversation, telling me about mail she got from "Marie's daughter - but it just had this in it."  "This" is a prayer card from a funeral for Maries husband and other daughter, obviously they had died.  From the return address it looks like Marie (IJ Bucks secretary from the 1960's) is now living with a daughter in Roselle.  I am afraid she will be asking me to call her like she had me do with another friend.  I end up being in the middle of a conversation(?) between deaf Pearl and her demented friend.....repeating the same stuff over and over again!
Annnnyhow, before I try to get out the door I ask her where her Advil is, "Oh I don't like that, I use Tylenol."  Fine, I take out 2 pills and pour a glass of water.  "2 pills.....nooooo, I don't like to take pain pills."  These are Tylenol, plain Tylenol.  "Well if you don't want to take anything for your discomfort then DON'T COMPLAIN about the pain!!" 
I have to learn how to let her words go in one ear and right out the other.  She is not looking for solutions or suggestions, she just loves to complain!!

"There's singing in my head"!!

"Do you hear the music?  It's driving me NUTS!!"  That is the latest issue with Pearl.  Phantom music, in her apartment, in the hallways, out her patio.....everywhere she goes.  "It was so bad during the night that I put ear plugs in and covered my head with a pillow!" but even that did not stop the music.  "It's religious music....Glory, glory hallelujah.....over and over again! They play the same song over and over all day and even at 2 am!"  Today she called to tell me how bad her tooth hurt (I had made a dental appt. for her weeks ago when she told Rick about the tooth, but she made me cancel it because "I'd rather go to the skin doctor."  She has what is called "senile keratosis" and I have taken her to 2 dermatologists over the years. Since she doesn't like what they tell her she thinks she can continue to "doctor-shop" until she gets the answer she wants!  But I digress......)  As I was talking to her and figuring out when I could get her an appt. at the dentist, she starts complaing about the music again.  "Is it on now?" I asked.  "Yes, and it's all over the place. I can't stand it, it's driving me crazy, I must have lost 4 pounds because I am so upset!"  She claimed that she had gone down her hallway to try and find the culprit.  Fine, I decided to pop over there and clear this mystery up.  Every time I have been to that condo it is very quiet, rarely is there any noise. It is a blessing.
So I get there and I walk the halls of floor #1, #2, and #3.....not a sound, no music, no voices, nothing.  On her floor,  #3, I run into a neighbor of hers just 1 door down and across the hall. A little elderly lady taking her trash out (or was that a body in that big bag???) and I ask her if she has heard any music on that floor.  Her eyes get big and she says "No....are you her friend?"  "No, I'm her daughter-in-law."  "Well she had me come in and listen but I didn't hear anything!!"  I tell her that I know and I have checked it out.  Another neighbor shows up and I ask the same question....negative answer and he sighs "What a shame."  I know what he is thinking.....she has lost her marbles!
  So I let myself in to her place, the only noise a VERY LOUD television show and I go to her patio to check out the area in the back.  Totally silent except for the birds and some people walking to their car.  Now I go in to see her.."HELLO....."  as she turns to me I ask, "Are you hearing the music now?"  "Yes, yes, do YOU hear it?" She grabs the remote and tries to mute the TV, "No, I just hear the TV."  She gets up and goes to the window, "Don't you hear that? La-la-la-la-la......la-la?"  She trills a tune only she can hear.....I try to tell her that it is like tinnitus, a condition that both Rick and I have.  "It's something in your ears, which is why no one else can hear it. You have to learn to live with it and try to ignore it."  Of course, "I can't! It's horrible!"  So I tell her that she needs to start thinking of a song that SHE likes and wouldn't mind hearing over and over again.  No luck.  She can never understand that there are many conditions that cannot be cured, her statement always is  "There must be something!"  She can't be happy that she has lived to 92 with hardly any medical issues except those related to old age.  She can't adapt to changes in her body and so makes her life a continual complaint that only makes us want to stay away all the more.  Just wait until I give her the information on "Musical Ear Syndrome" which has been around for 100's of years or longer!  She, who has always insisted on complete quiet and darkness when she goes to sleep, will find out that she should count her lucky stars that she isn't hearing the "Mormon Tabernacle Choir"!