Visit on 2/14/11

From Steve

Not a good visit. Mom said she was very depressed. She said she was tired of being stuck in her house constantly. She wants to drive again. She doesn't understand why two weeks ago she was able to drive and now she can't (she used the time frame "two weeks").

She told me she wants me to teach her to drive again. She said she got in the car three weeks ago (her time) and practiced driving while in the garage. She apparently tried to turn the car on. She said she couldn't remember what all the "things" in the car were for (buttons and levers, apparently). She also told me she drove to Krogers a week and a half ago, and everything was fine. Her eyes teared up quite a bit while she was telling me all this.

I explained to her that it was too dangerous for her to drive right now until we could resolve "this." She told me she hadn't had any more headaches since she had her MRI so she's better now, and she thinks she can drive. She said she'd been driving for years and she wants to drive again. I told her that the reason the doctor doesn't want her to drive is because of coordination issues. That sometimes her feet and hands aren't doing what her brain tells them to do. I told her that maybe something happened and that's why she had headaches a few weeks ago, and that whatever that was had maybe also caused the lack of coordination. I told her that until that was resolved and the doctor said she had her coordination back, it was just too dangerous for her to drive. (Note: we got her to the doctor by telling her she had headaches. She played along with that until she realized that's why she wasn't able to drive anymore. Now he's saying that since the headaches are gone, she can drive again.)

I begged her to please not try to drive again. I told that we would do anything to keep her safe. I told her we'd hire a driver. She said she just wanted to drive like she always has. I asked her to please consider ways that we could help her feel better and to give us some ideas.

Other than that, her mind actually seemed sharper than usual. However, she also couldn't remember getting an MRI done at first, and she also asked me three different times who the doctor was.