Hello Fellow Seniors - It has been an extremely busy and emotional six months since last July.  My Mother experienced another TIA (which is a mini-stroke for those of you who might not be familiar with the terminology) the end of July.  As a result, she spent about a week in Penrose-Main Hospital.  By all appearances, she seemed to be "near the end", which is when I inquired about hospice care and permanent placement in a local nursing facility.  The process went from coordinating with several local nursing centers as well as narrowing the choices down according to her medical insurance in addition to locating a facility that would accept Medicaid-pending status!  At the same time, I was introduced to Pikes Peak Hospice and Palliative Care, which has a facility right there in Penrose-Main; however, there was other criteria involved, which my Mother's situation did not meet.  After going through the "process of elimination", the choice was Pikes Peak Care & Rehabilitation Center, at 2719 N. Union Blvd., 80907 (there is no affiliation to Pikes Peak Hospice and Palliative Care).  I had also received several positive references from a few outside sources, so I felt completely comfortable with the choice.

Upon my Mother's admittance at Pikes Peak Care Center (PPCC) finally at the beginning of August, 2013, I was immediately introduced to SolAmor Hospice; and subsequently, after the initial evaluations and screenings, my Mother began receiving hospice care. 

For the following month or two, through September and into October, it appeared that Mom was not making much progress.  When she was released from Penrose-Main to PPCC, she was yet unable to feed herself any longer, she was finally officially diagnosed with Dementia (which was a condition several of us in the family had been aware of for some time, several years in fact; however, her primary physician, then in Michigan, never offered a diagnosis), and she was in an almost comatose state (at times, the nurses were unable to rouse her in order for her to take her medications much less eat).  Her weight dropped from 103 to 85 over the next couple of months, and she had pretty much lost all mobility from her waist down which made her wheelchair bound.

As SolAmor continued to provide hospice services to my Mother, near the end of October into November, it appeared she was beginning to "come back to herself".  She began working at feeding herself once again, she had been placed on a puree' diet and began eating up to 85-90% of all the food on her plate, her speech and ability to work at recall began to improve as well; however, the lower-body mobility still has not improved.  She hasn't used her walker since last July.

Because of my back and leg issues, I am no longer able to take her on outside visits without some assistance by a CNA or Aide of some sort.  For Thanksgiving Day, PPCC had planned to serve a typical Thanksgiving dinner; so I joined my Mother around Noon, and we were served in one of the lovely day rooms, The Mountain View Day Room, along with several other families.  It was a very pleasant afternoon, the food was excellent, and we enjoyed good conversation with several of the people sharing our table.  A week or so later, my Mother asked me, "Who were those people, where we went to their house for dinner?"  She was trying to tell someone who had asked her if she'd had a nice Thanksgiving that we went for a drive through some park to someone's house, someone her daughter (me) knows but she doesn't know who they were!  I have attempted to explain to her several times, now, that we just went down the hall from her room to the really nice day room (which is a room where I take her often when I visit so we can sit in the sun and see Pikes Peak through the picture windows), and we were just sitting with another family who were having Thanksgiving dinner with their loved one, that we didn't have to go out anywhere, we just went down the hall.  She still does not comprehend it.  It is a very sad thing to watch someone's mind losing itself to Dementia!