Penny continues to get weaker.
On Wednesday, the personal care attendant said she no longer felt comfortable helping Penny walk, so she will be doing everything bedside from now on. Starting last night, I’ve been having her use a bedside commode rather than walk to the bathroom. It’s been rather amazing how well she has managed that walk for the past five weeks, and she has wanted to do it because “if I don’t walk, I’ll lose all of my strength.” And until the last 24 hours, this has worked quite well.
Penny has also had two gentle falls when trying to get out of bed without assistance. At 2:15 am this morning I found her on her knees on the floor next to the bed. I couldn’t get her to tell me whether she was trying to get out of bed or simply fell/slid out of bed, so I’m not sure exactly what happened. A similar thing had happened the night before when she was trying to get up by herself. There were no injuries, and I think it was more of a gradual descent than a fall.
While I was helping her back into bed, I noticed she felt warm, so I checked her temperature. She was running a low grade fever. I gave her some Tylenol and monitored her closely the rest of the night. She had a more restless night than usual – lots of tossing and turning, but no more attempts to get up, and no falls.
She still had a fever early this morning, but by 9am, it was gone. And she has been sleeping much more peacefully since then.
Our nurse, Margie, stopped by for a bit to check in this morning because I reported the fall and the fever. It isn’t clear what caused the fever. One possibility is a return of the infection she has had twice this spring/summer. Another possibility is that as she is getting weaker, she is having more difficulty regulating her temperature. For now, we will just monitor for signs of infection or a return of the fever.
The other challenge going forward will be getting her to remain in bed. Often when she wakes up, she wants to get up, not remembering that she isn’t strong enough to do so.
We’ve ordered a longer bed rail, and I think that will help. The current bed rail is great for holding pillows in place and giving her something to grab onto when moving or trying to get up. But it only covers the top couple feet of the bed, so she can easily move around it to get up (or fall). Until that comes, we will just have to monitor her more closely and remind her when she wakes up that she needs assistance (or more likely, that she doesn’t actually need to get up).