Sundowner Take 2

Mom has been in a downward spiral lately. She was stable and actually losing ascites fluid for a while until this past week. She has been sleeping more, easily confused, stutters when she speaks, and is unstable on her feet. She has been very confused with her medication and hasn't been able to take it by herself for nearly a week. She gets the days and nights confused, and the days of the week confused, and ends up taking Friday nights pills on Tuesday morning unless I watch her. She developed a habit of opening pill bottles and mixing pills in the bottles, and I have no idea what she takes at that point. Last time this happened, it was a bad mix of meds issued by hospice since they had not heard of one of her medications (and apparently didn't bother to look into it before prescribing something that interacted with it). This time, the only idea I have is that her body is building up the meds she's been taking and isn't releasing them. I don't know why that would be now, but she is essentially stoned. I hid her regular meds, but she refuses to even monitor or write down the meds that really make her head fuzzy (the sleeping pill, anxiety pill, pain pill, and nausea med...this nausea med is the one she overdosed on before and is what caused her home health nurse to report her to her doctor and got her onto hospice in the first place).

Yesterday, she overflowed her toilet for the third time. There was quite a mess in the room and I still have a lot of laundry to do. Tonight, she didn't take her meds, and she can't seem to stay down. She keeps walking around the house with her eyes closed. She has been up three times since she said she was going to bed. She tried opening plastic steam bags and when I asked what she was doing, she said she wanted tea. She fell (luckily, on me, so she's not hurt). If she keeps this up tonight, I will have to take her to the hospital or call them to the house to take her in until she detoxes. Maybe it's not her meds and it's something else. Maybe this is just part of the liver failure; some sort of toxic build up that comes and goes in episodes. I have no idea, but I have a feeling the doctors wouldn't do anything but monitor her. The upside to that is that at least she'd have a nurse to keep her safe and maybe they can sedate her. It's called "gentle restraints". Instead of tying her down, they drug her up so she sleeps it off. When she did this last time, she had horrible hallucinations. She sometimes still gets mad at me for being my aunt and keeping her tied to a bed in the basement we don't have. Maybe it's better if she doesn't have such terrifying false memories. Hopefully, this last time I put her in bed will be the last time tonight. I moved her "uncontrolled" meds out her immediate sight, and for now, that's hidden enough such that she won't find them even a foot away from where she normally keeps them.