Doing It The Hard Way

It has been quite a while since I last posted. Mom was not well, she was suffering from constipation. It started mild and turned severe after six days of no bowel movement. Had basically tried everything ranging from prune juice, laxatives, enema ... Eventually, had to resort to "assisted extraction" performed by me. It all because of the unscrupulous doctor who refused to do it, I have to take over the mission. Yuks!

Mom has been suffering from this defecatory disorder for quite sometime now. Every now and then, she would not have bowel movement for days. It is resulted from not drinking enough water, not getting enough exercise and from a diet that does not include adequate amount of fibre-rich food.

You must be wondering why I got her into that state when I was supposed to be looking after her. Well, it is caused by her depression, correlated with the presence of immobility and drug therapy. She refused to eat and constantly trying to reduce fluid intake in fear of wanting to go to the loo. Without food ( and of course includes dietary fibre) and energy, she hasn't the strength even to stand up, not to mention walking or doing exercise. If there is not much wasted substance in the intestine, there will be less movement of waste through the bowel due to a weakening of the bowel muscles. But, that small lump of rock-like feces that has been accumulating over five days would remained stuck in the rectum. Mom would sit on the WC for hours and strained herself. After the ordeal, she felt frail and refused to eat. And the vicious circle continues. Mom has been tremendously stubborn and not listened to anyone's advice. Literally cannot talk sense into her, all she wants is to live in her own world of innocence.

I can't bear to see her suffer. She felt bloated, had headache, swollen abdomen and felt extremely weak and lethargic. All these while, I have been giving her laxative, an non-digestible sugar lactulose to soften the stool and to induce her bowel movement. But this time round, she failed to relieve. I was so helpless. Brought her to the doctor, and all he did was busy telling me he did mechanical and digital (Erh???) extraction throughout his housemanship. But he refused to perform the rectal examinaton on mom to dislodge the hardened feces. Damn doctor. Took his prescription of Dulcolex and later found that there was no effect whatever. Mom was still bloated. Eventually, I have to do the dislodgement. Okay, I won't go into details here.

Mom felt so weak and feeble after the ordeal. It is sad to see your loved one suffers and you can't do much to help. That's why I haven't got the mood to write anything last week.