Mom is taking an hour nap.
    I decided that she'd drunk enough liquid (despite her protests and my continual, cautionary "Drink more, Mom,") in the last 4 hours so that an hour nap shouldn't hurt. I took the time to take a shower instead of the one I would normally take tomorrow, and update our progress through The Cleansing.
    I spoke with the colonoscopist's nurse today and had no problem getting across to her that we are most likely going to have a problem with dehydration, including giving her the details of my mother's daily dehydration index. She told me to allow her liquids until 0200 and to impress upon her that if she is not well enough hydrated when she comes in for the procedure and the crew has a problem finding a good vein for the purposes of administration of both medication and IV fluids, the procedure will be "much more traumatic" for her than it would normally be. This bothered me a little, as the story up to now is that colonoscopies are normally not traumatic. I haven't actually believed this, in regard to my mother, anyway, and have questioned it in regard to other of the elderly.
    We're on our way, though, and so far we're doing good. At 1500 I'll be guiding her into the bath, as I'm sure a bath will be impossible tomorrow before the procedure.
    One rather interesting bit of information of which I wish I'd been informed before today: It seems that broth is better than bouillon because it contains protein. Naturally, this wasn't indicated on the instructions, so I bought bouillon. But, I'm now draining all our cans of chicken for bouillon and this should do the trick.
- posted by gail rae @ 14:28   email...this post