My wife loves me. In our freezer, we keep a supply of frozen vegetables from the grocery store. We try to eat fresh veggies with our dinners but it's not always convenient. I had some periodontal surgery earlier this week (receding gums - I think I'm getting old), in the wake of which I was somewhat limited in what I could chew, e.g. no steak for me for a while. So that evening, she cooked me some fish, which is nice and soft, and asked me if I could eat some cooked frozen peas, and I said yes. That's how I know she loves me: I like cooked frozen peas, and she doesn't. But she made them anyway, for me.
A bit later, when we were pondering whether or not to keep the leftover peas (we bat about .500 when it comes to consuming leftover vegetables), she said that she would put the peas in the fridge in a Tupperware container, and then the next day when the peas were cold, she would mix them with mayo and eat them that way. I responded by making retching sounds; it didn't sound very appealing to me. But I mentioned that occasionally my mom used to come up with this cold dish concoction in a cake pan consisting of lettuce, peas, mayo, sprinkled grated cheese, and various other things. It was the sort of thing she might bring to a pot luck dinner. Ah yes, my wife responded, that's called seven layer salad. That's right, I agreed. After which I waxed eloquent about how much I detested seven layer salad.
So a few minutes ago, she stopped by my desk to show me what she had created for her lunch today: cold peas mixed with mayo, with shredded cheese sprinkled on top. I guess it was three layer salad. I would have made more retching noises but was on a phone call with a client.
Having thought about the matter for another 15 or 20 seconds, seven layer salad may be the dish I like the least - it is the thing from the buffet line at a parish pot luck that I would be least likely to put on my plate. Although I've had chilled vegetable soups (Cucumber cream soup? Really?) that might be tied for worst.
What's the food you detest the most?
I hate flavored coffee. But I tend to avoid specific cooks more than any specific food. Some people just can't make things taste good, their kitchens or food handling practices aren't hygienic, or they use processed food loaded with a lot of salt.
ReplyDeleteIn the rehab facility where I recently stayed for 30 days, the food was objectively . . . let's just say "not delicious." (I really don't remember the hospital food from the seven previous days. I'm not sure why. I was fully awake and aware. All I remember are the endless containers of artificially sweetened ginger ale.) For some reason, however, I generally ate everything they served quite eagerly in a way that I (and others) found inexplicable. Much of it was ersatz. The syrup for pancakes or French toast was dietetic and was labeled "Table Syrup." The cold cereals for breakfast were those little boxes that open to become bowls, and what passed for Cheerios, Rice Krispies, and corn flakes were no-name brands. For reasons unknown to me, I was on a "heart healthy" diet and never got a single packet of salt, even when I was served hard-boiled eggs.
ReplyDeleteIn any case, the one thing I didn't eat—and would never eat, even if prepared by the finest chef—was liver and onions.
David, I think salt is permanently banned from hospitals. Even in the cafeterias for the visitors.
DeleteDavid, I'm with you about the liver and onions. Or any other kind of organ meats. My dad was a cattle rancher. My parents were big on the idea that you don't waste meat. If an animal died to provide you with food, you eat the whole thing. That meant if there was a side of beef in the deep freeze, there was also heart, liver, and tongue. There is nothing you can do to make those things palatable. My dad had a thing he made once in awhile called son-of-a-gun stew. Don't even ask what's in that. I don't like game either. Though I would eat a pheasant wishbone. To be fair, my mom didn't make me eat those things, except for the two bite rule. We had to eat at least two bites of everything. Luckily our little dog, Skippy, was glad to help me out by consuming a couple of bites under the table.
DeleteAdmittedly, I don't go out of my way to eat beef liver, and don't really care for braunschweiger (sp?). I do like the giblets from a roast chicken, including the chicken liver. It's tasty when it's hot out of the oven (or even chilled from a night in the fridge), naturally basted with the juices and herbs.
DeleteI hate peas, Lima beans, and canned beets. All of which my husband likes. But now he has a colostomy which restricts many of his favorite food choices. But peas are ok, unfortunately.
ReplyDeleteAnne, how is your husband doing, are you staying at your son's house now?
DeleteI lost a long answer. So I’ll leave it at this - my husband s doing better but everty5hing is very hard. I am falling apart which is bad for my husband to see. But we hired a daytime caregiver which is helping. But the nightmare that started on Sept 22 is continuing. No recent new crises though, thanks be to God,
DeleteI’m now on Xanax and looking for a dr who can prescribe antidepressants for me. I’ve never taken them or Xanax before. No docs around. I found an online prescriber for the Xanax - a bit sketchy.
Saw this today - wonder how she would feel if her sister hadn’t gotten better mitpraculously and never would.
“This is one of my most beloved Scripture passages, and one I do not take lightly. At my parish in Kentucky in January 2012, I quoted parts of this reading and Dan Schutte’s beloved song, “Here I am, Lord,” to encourage attendance at an upcoming retreat. Several mornings later, I was walking out of a hotel in Fresno, California to be with my sister, who was in ICU after a serious accident. I remember literally crying to my husband as we got off the elevator, “I know I said, ‘Here I am, Lord’- but I don’t think I really meant it. I can’t do this.” We concluded that the best I could do was try, and to trust God- knowing there was no turning back.
As we sat by her side daily, we saw my sister miraculously recover fully over the next few weeks. And I learned that when I’m called by God – I must go. And God promises to stay with me as I travel the unknown path before me.”
—Donna K. Becher, M.S. is an associate spiritual director at the West Virginia Institute for Spirituality in Charleston, West Virginia. Her training is rooted in the Exercises of St. Ignatius of Loyola.
A new prayer for me - I now pray every night for a peaceful death forvme and my husband and for everyone. My sisters death was sudden. Four of my husbands college friends - close to not so close- have died in the last two months. Two were sudden - like my sister. Two were “ peacefully,” in bed at home, surrounded by loved ones. Heart attacks and cancer. I have learned to hate emergency rooms - if it’s near death. I pray that my husband won’t die in an ER. I pray that I won’t either.
DeleteAnne, I am so sorry for your own struggles. Re: Xanax and other antidepressants: I'd think any general practitioner could prescribe them for you, assuming s/he agrees you're a good candidate. Around here (with an abundance of medical providers), they'd be inclined to refer to a psychiatrist but I don't think it's really a requirement.
DeleteHaving seen a number of loved ones on those meds over the years (the ubiquity of depression and anxiety is one of the reasons I think all families have their dysfunctionalities) I would say, be prepared for lots of trial and error until they find a med that works (more or less) for you, and the right dose.
I'll continue to pray for both of you. Wish I could do something concrete to help, too.
Jim, primary care providers have no appointments for new patients here for months. Or they don’t take Medicare. So no PCP. For now.
DeleteAnne, I have seen two doctors via Zoom since getting out of rehab and talked to one nurse practitioner over the phone. I know very little about connecting with a telehealth provider, but I found this link. Understanding Telehealth
DeleteMy insurance is Medicare.
Sorry, I am sure I am naive about this, but I'm surprised that many doctors refuse Medicare patients. Around here, that would be refusing a very big chunk of potential patients.
DeleteThere are many Medicare supplements and advantage plans out there, and they're not all created equal. Many doctors feel that some of them under-compensate for services or have excessively long payment wait times. In addition payment to any given doctor may vary, depending on whether you are in a preferred coverage area or health care system.
DeleteAnne, do please be careful with the Xanax. It might help with anxiety for a week or two, but benzodiazepines are very addictive. They are rarely prescribed for the elderly because they cloud judgment and can cause side effects that lead to falls and auto accidents. Went through benzo withdrawal with my mother in her last years, and it caused medical crises for months on end.
If your husband has a caseworker from his rehab place, please call them and explain that you are in crisis and need to see someone right away. Sometimes they can leverage you in to someone sooner. You might also try seeing a talk therapist. I have little faith in that per se, but they can also sometimes get you in to see someone.
Forgive the free advice. Back to prayers.
What Jim said about trial and error with psych meds is definitely true. One of my family members has had trouble with anxiety and depression. He said that for him the anxiety is way worse than depression. A general practitioner tried to help, but he didn't make real progress until a psychiatrist got him on the right med. Talk therapy helps too, especially in combination with the meds. I am seeing a lot of ads for online talk or text therapy, I don't know if that works, and I don't know how easy it is to vet the therapist.
Delete"Now my bug problem is insomnia, no matter how tired up I am. My monkey mind won’t stop thinking about what we will do in three or so months."
DeleteBetty suggests dealing with the insomnia as a disruption in your sleep cycle due to irregular sleeping times, and the lack of strong daily sun cues due to the cloudy weather. Your intuition that the sun in L.A. might make things better is on target.
Try having regular rising and going to sleep times. As long as the weather outside is cloudy these might not need be too tied to sunrise and sunset. Use exposure to artificial lighting to enforce these. Get one of the lamps that are sold to combat depression and use it to awaken yourself and keep yourself awake at the beginning and early parts of the day, turn it off in the "evening" and also stay away from computers in the "evening." These steps might help reset your sleep clock.
Pray for sunshine and adjust your sleep habits to it. Your family might have to help by taking night duty until your internal clock has reset for a week or two. Then ease back into night duty occasionally if desirable for everyone.
A prescriber for anxiety pills should also be able to give you something to help you sleep. Same cautions for sleeping pills. Try to get your environment a little reshaped so that they help you deal in tandem with your changing environments rather than trying to override them.
Another strategy in dealing with insomnia is to manage the hour or more before going to sleep. Do only routine things that do not require much novel mental or physical exertion. Your body essentially learns to go to sleep before your get into bed.
DeleteWhile I get into bed shortly after ten, Betty knows that my mind shuts down around nine so she knows not to engage in novel conversation or activities that might engage my mind or body.
That does not mean that they don’t do anything significant in the nine o’clock hour. We usually sing vespers with the monks at that time. However, they are very predictable.
Betty was once a licensed massage therapist. She gives me massages twice a week during the 9pm hour, but I am already half asleep during that process since my body is so relaxed and my mind is turned off.
So try to manage the hours before getting into bed to reduce novelty and increase predictability so that your body prepares for sleep at the same expected time.
Thank you Jack. You have offered a lot of good suggestions. I very much appreciate the kindness. When people are kind to me now I often fight tears. I’m fighting tears now.
DeleteBefore the accident, my husband and I had settled into a boring, but comfortable old age. I thought we would walk gently as we approached our final chapters. He has always been physically active - house, garden, sailboats, fixing cars. I was the reader, always with a book in my hand, or reading news, or journals like The Atlantic. Now I don’t read. He sleeps a lot, and we walk in the small park across the street if the weather is nice. Although he feels nothing below mid- chest he has had pain in his upper chest and back for months. X-rays, cat scans etc in the hospitals and rehab center didn’t show any problems. But two short laps around the small park in his wheelchair exhausts him, and causes pain. He naps from around 2:30 to 5 pm each day, he still has nurses coming a couple of times/ week, OT and PT once/ week and he stays in bed for that. Wound center trip weekly. Gets up in the morning sometimes into his wheelchair, but if it’s a medical visitor day he often is in bed until lunch., He has never been talkative, always reserved, and now he seldom talks to me at all. He seldom talks to anyone. Yesterday his caregiver found one of the kids balloons and she started a game of tossing the balloon to him to make him reach his arms. I took over and was surprised that he enjoyed it. He was smiling. I almost cried it was so good to see him smile. Except for smiling occasionally at something the grandchildren do, I haven’t seen him smile since September 22. Before the fall, he cooked breakfast, lunch was separate, we would have a simple dinner, which I cooked, and watch tv for an hour or so. Then he was back in the basement or the garage working on a project. Our conversations during the day, including on our daily two mile walk, were typical of long married couples - the kids, the grandkids, politics, where we might go next on a trip - it was supposed to be Hawaii - friends, - nothing deeply intellectual. Sitting on the couch holding hands now and then while we watched tv. A quiet life, and after 54 years I could read his silences. Now I can’t read them anymore. Since he is either occupied with nurses, therapists, and the daily bed bath, wound dressing change, in bed exercises, wheelchair exercises which his caregiver has him do, I sit and do nothing. She prepares meals, and does household work for my son and daughter in law - laundry, sweeping, vacuum etc. She also preps dinner - cleaning vegetables etc. We pay her salary and are happy to pay for her to help them, not just George. But I can’t focus on anything. I sit at the computer now and then to pay bills. I call hospital billing departments that failed to note our supplemental medigap insurance when we get a bill for what Medicare didn’t cover. Very grateful fo Medicare and our supplemental policy as his total hospitalization and rehab bills are getting close to $ one million now. Almost all covered.
George goes to bed at 9. We usually watch an hour of tv first in order to keep him up until 9. I’m exhausted by then even though I’ve done little to nothing all day., I turn out my light at 10 every night. I toss and turn for four hours until I get up to turn my husband to his other side and wedge him in. I wake up around 7:30 every day and just lie in bed. There was a small study next to the room and bathroom they built which opens into it. My bed is in there, right next to his room. I leave the door open so that I can hear him if he calls before his turning time. There is no novelty and it’s all predictable. The house is a tomb all day with my son and his wife at work and the kids at school. I feel like I’m dead inside.
Thanks for your excellent summary of your present situation. You have learned well the art of summarizing data. It should help you and George to progress out of your situation.
DeleteThe routine and boredom of your situation reminded me of studies of nursing homes. They found dramatic improvement in the health and mortality of residents when they introduced novelty into their lives that gave them small responsibilities, e.g., taking care of plants. Many places now have visiting pet therapy.
“Yesterday his caregiver found one of the kids balloons and she started a game of tossing the balloon to him to make him reach his arms. I took over and was surprised that he enjoyed it. He was smiling.”
Besides summarizing information, you have the skill to note data that might help to make things different, e.g. you noted that sunny L.A. might make a difference.
Ellen Langer, a social psychologist like myself, but who teaches at Harvard, has done very innovative research in this field and written an interesting book, on healthcare, aging and illness:
Counterclockwise: Mindful Health and the Power of Possibility: Langer, Ellen J.: 9780345502049: Amazon.com: Books
In an author’s note at the beginning, she writes: This book could be read as anti-established medicine. It is therefore important to state that if I personally were to experience extreme health symptoms, I would go to my doctor, but there is little else that I would do that is traditional.
A patient in a nursing home complained she needed someone to place a tissue on her nose when she needed to blow it. Ellen began working with her in very small steps until she was able to do herself.
You need to investigate a thousand different little ways to improve your life and your husband's life that are like the kids balloon. A lot of this will be trial and error.
Betty has an undergraduate degree in art therapy as well as being accomplished in many forms of art. Start with looking at all the art materials that may be available in your homes with the grandchildren. (They may also prove a way to relate to your grandchildren)
Try them out even if they might not appear to be very promising. Betty suggests fifteen minutes a day on a daily basis to give an art form a chance. You and your husband likely will develop different art interests, and conversations about those differences will arise. Visual art may be a way of bridging your hearing deficit and his mobility deficit.
While I have never thought of myself as an artist, I got a good camera back in 2009 and now have taken tens of thousands of pictures with it and my iphone. While I have taken a course on Photoshop, I enjoy the very simple but increasing sophisticated tools available as standard apps on our computers.
I got out my copy of Counterclockwise and will likely write a review post soon. It is a very interesting and challenging book.
Jim, I actually like seven layer salad. Except I don't make it very often because it requires too many ingredients, and makes a lot for just two people. My favorite church potluck salad is broccoli salad; the kind with sunflower seeds, raisins, bacon bits, and coleslaw dressing.
ReplyDeleteBut I'll give a hard pass to Polish Easter soup at a potluck!
DeleteKatherine, is that what the Poles around here call Duck Blood Soup? I may have tried it once or twice, but have a hard time getting past the name.
DeleteDuck blood soup is different, but I have heard about it too. Easter soup has hard boiled eggs and buttermilk. I never did understand how that would be palatable. Then there is borscht, Polish is different from Russian borscht. I think they both have beets, which I am not wild about.
DeleteI cannot eat or watch somebody else eat oysters or any kind of mollusk. One of those Deuteronomy proscriptions I totally agree with.
ReplyDeleteThe first time I sat across the table from someone eating a lobster, I arranged things so as to block a direct view of it. It doesn't bother me any more, but I won't eat lobster.
Delete"Watch somebody eat" reminded me of a decades old (1959) Shelly Berman routine called Buttermilk.
I love lobster. Prefer that restaurants take off the shells though. The Chesapeake Bay is famous for blue crabs ( delicious) and oysters. I love the crab but not the oysters. I also prefer someone else to dig out the crabmeat.
DeleteI like lobster, though don't get it very often. My go-to crustacean is shrimp, which I always have if we go out for a birthday or anniversary.
DeleteI almost forgot to comment about the food topic!
ReplyDeleteGenerally, I am willing to try new foods, and dishes. I agree with Jean that cooks are better predictors than the ingredients as to whether or not I will like the food.
Betty is very good at blending foods, textures, seasonings, etc. As she explains it, a lot of cooking is in how things are cooked not just the ingredients.
In general, I like vegetables, if they are fresh, and especially if they are fresh from my garden.
I also like left-overs, and I eat them both cold and heated, and like to combine them with other foods and ingredients.
Betty and I both like to cook in large quantities, so my refrigerator is usually full of both large containers of things that Betty has recently cooked and small containers of defrosting food that I have cooked in the past.
I eat about four meals a day at various times, not the traditional breakfast, lunch and dinner meals with their set menus. Betty and I have dinner together on Tuesdays, Fridays, and Sundays. That is when she usually uses her creativity to make a large meal that will likely last me for several more meals.
On Friday night Betty had a meal of potatoes, Brussels sprouts, with a special carrot/celery, vegetarian bacon topping covered by a special sauce. Sunday morning, I had everything but the source covered with various melted schredded cheese.
There is a big bowl of leftover vegetable soup (more like a vegetable stew). I had a cup of that cold with sour cream yesterday. Today I heated the thick vegetable soup in combination with a can of Campbell’s Chunky Sirloin soup.
In putting things together, I like to have garnishes such as olives, salad dressings, fruit (there are apples, pears, and grapes in the refrigerator), varied cheeses, and various crackers.
I like opening my refrigerator and becoming creative with its contents. Most of these meals are smaller than a regular meal even though they may have two or more ingredients. I usually have a cup of this, and maybe a cup of that.
However, knowing that I can get carried away I have a variety of large serving dishes. So, I often end up with these large meals that are really too much for a single meal, so half-way through when I know I am full, I wrap the rest of it for later in the day or the next morning. Often when I eat that second meal, I will add an additional garnish or two.
It always puzzles me that people have food in their homes that no one likes. Maybe that accounts for the 30-40 percent of their food that Americans throw away.
ReplyDeleteWe have to be very thrifty and work around our various ailments. I can't eat a lot in one go because of spleen enlargement from the cancer (sorry, tmi), and Raber needs to eat heart healthy. So we live mostly on oatmeal and homemade soup and stew. Fortunately we like it, and cooking is something I can still do. Our cholesterol, glucose, and sodium levels are great. My anemia is borderline, which is considered acceptable for my overall condition.
I make food in small batches, so leftovers don't go bad before someone eats them. We eat produce in season. I freeze some, though freezer space is very limited. We try to get most of our meat and eggs from locals to help spread the wealth around the local community a bit. The meat lady has a very sweet Australian shepherd mix, so going to the farm makes a nice little outing.
Hospital food is dreadful, and so is Meals on Wheels. Fruit cocktail, artificially sweetened jello, and no-salt canned spaghetti sauce with mushy pasta got really monotonous for my mother. We always brought dinner or took her out. Toward the end, she would be waiting with her coat and purse, which broke my heart sometimes. Pretty sure she had more pizzas delivered than were good for her, but food is one of the last pleasures many elderly people can enjoy so I sure wasn't going to begrudge her!
I've been doing more cooking since the weather turned bitterly cold. I made some Olive Garden-style chicken gnocchi soup, and cornbread, which we've been eating for a couple of days. Also made some mince pie filling, though I haven't made the pie yet. My "mince" is vegan, unlike the pioneer mincemeat recipe my mom used to make for the holidays. Hers actually had meat in it. Also a fifth of madeira and a fifth of brandy. It made a big batch, and was very well preserved. It was also quite heavy. My grandma and my mother in law both made green tomato mincemeat with the last tomatoes before frost in the fall, which I liked. Theirs was meatless as well.
ReplyDeleteMince pies seem to be a bygone thing. My gramma made them with venison. I never liked it much, but the uncles who shot the deer did and insisted we all take a bite.
DeleteMaybe write down some of yr recipes? When I was doing family history, I tried to record food my grammas made, what would be on the table at holidays or how they made their coffee. So much of women's lives 100 years ago was about food. You understand the food, you start to understand their lives more.
Stay warm. Below zero most nights here and not getting out of single digits during the day.
Jean, if you keep talking about that really cold weather, I may move out there. Only down to the teens here.
DeleteMince pie is also a British thing. You see it sometimes on their cooking shows, also plum pudding (I always thought it needed to have actual plums in it).
DeleteOne thing we used to make for the holidays is fruit cake. I remember making it when I was home from college on Thanksgiving break. I'd wrap it in a tea towel soaked in brandy and set it aside to age until Christmas . I don't make it anymore. Too heavy. I don't think anyone misses it. One old-time thing my kids still like is Great-Grandma's recipe for "cream candy". It's kind of a blonde fudge.
Sounds like your area got the polar vortex too. I don't mind the cold as much as the big snow drifts and ice that will be here until Easter. I didn't used to worry about walking on ice but now I do. Today the temperature is supposed to get above zero for the first time in nearly a week.
You stay warm as well. I hope everyone's furnace continues to work.
I love fruitcake, but I get the no alcohol kind. I have never tried to make it. It's expensive, and you can't get it in small sizes from the monastery. The Boy works at a specialty grocery place and said there has been a nationwide citron shortage.
DeleteWe did not have big piles of snow--maybe four or five inches. It fell on a lot of rainy slush and froze solid, so back roads are awful, though the highways are clear and dry.
The little town south of us lost power for two days because of ice on the lines. Some posted photos of transformers blowing. We were fine, and our furnace is just a few years.old, so we are thankful.
School buses have been late. Apparently one of the drivers was threatened by an irate parent. Parents who work want to get the kiddies off to school on time so they aren't late for work. Having to wait 20 minutes for the bus ratchets up tempers for parents who will be late for work.
Cops have been up at the high school, which is on a treacherous crossroads, nailing high schoolers who think they can go like bats out of hell in their street rods. They have bugged county crews to sand the intersection.
If anyone wants to check out some interesting recipes for fruitcake, google Black Cake. It got kind of famous after the novel and tv series of the same name. It's a Jamaican/Caribbean thing. I started to read the book, and got bored and turned it back in to the library. But found the recipe interesting. Way too much work to actually make, but I think it might taste good. According to the book, it's the cake of choice for upper class weddings there.
DeleteFor my parents' 25th anniversary I made Lane Cake, which was a recipe from some southern relatives. It's a large, elegant four-layer cake which I haven't made since. Also a lot of work.
DeleteEmily Dickinson made black cake for the neighbors. Not sure how it got to be a favorite with a a 19th century Yankee recluse, but the recipe is here for anybody not Skywalker out: https://www.washingtonpost.com/recipes/emily-dickinsons-black-cake/
Delete* Skywalker = paywalled. Stupid auto correct.
DeleteThe volume/quantities for that Emily Dickenson cake is crazy. I'd probably divide by 4 (although the 13 eggs makes it hard to divide into an even number...)
Delete