Tuesday, September 14, 2010

Friday morning I got a call from mom's home health nurse. This was the first time she had called me...(always calls sisters closer to home) so I was pretty scared when I saw her name on my caller ID.
She said she had gone to mom's that morning and had found her sitting on the bathroom floor. She had gone to the bathroom and was trying to go back up the ramp back into the east room, when she had fallen backwards. She said she didn't think she was hurt, just couldn't get herself up off the floor.
She said she thought the new bathroom was really wonderful and was going to help her immensely, but the ramp was just too hard for her to navigate. She thought a step would be easier for her. She also suggested more hand rails....one in the shower too.
Oh man I was sick thinking of her falling in there...just what we were trying to prevent!
I called Kelley and told him what Nancy had said...
It was my weekend to go to mom's anyway, so I hurried and got ready and headed up there.
(Teina is a sweetheart and called me and asked me if I wanted her to go instead since I had been up there so much lately...very thoughtful!)
When I got to mum's she was just sitting there staring out the window. I asked her if she was ok and she said "well sure! why wouldn't I be?"
I told her that Nancy had called me and told me about her falling. Mom said "I don't know why she would say that...I didn't fall!" "Are you sure mom? she said you had trouble going up the ramp"..."No! I didn't fall...I'm just fine!" ok mom...just so you are ok.
So we left it at that. I could see when I helped her to the bathroom a little while later that she really couldn't make it up the ramp. It is the smallest slope, but it looked like she was climbing MT. Everest. She was holding on to me and the rail by the toilet, but she still had a hard time keeping her balance.
Well around five o-clock, mom and I were sitting there watching tv when we see this hand reach around the corner and flip the switch to turn on the bathroom light. I thought it must be Dennis's hand, I hop up and open the door and it was my sweet husband! He had left work a little bit early and headed right up to moms. I sure didn't expect him to do that.
When I said before that I never loved my husband more than that moment,..well take that one moment and times it by 10 and that's how much I loved him then!
He went right to work and started tearing out the ramp...(dang!, he had really put it in securely!)
Luckily, he had two and a half tiles left over when they put it in and it was just enough to make a nice little step.He is amazing.
He installed the hand-held shower head, and another handrail on the other side of the step.








This was much, much better! she didn't have any trouble at all going down and up this little step! Mom and I are so grateful to Kelley....(biggest understatement of the year!)





3 comments:

Angie said...

So scary that you got that phone call I am sorry! Seriously if I had the money to send Kelley on a cruise I would do it in a heartbeat! He is so amazing!

kat said...

No wonder I can't find a husband...nobody can compare to dad!

Denise said...

Wow!! I can't believe all the work that Kelley has done to fix that bathroom!! We are so indebted! I agree with Katie, it is SOOO hard to find guys like that these days!! There are so many little things that people do for Grandma that we never even hear about!!