The Case of the Stolen Dentures

 Monday, January 17, 2011

Mother is really strong again.  Today she pushed her walker instead of letting us push her in it.  She can stand at the sink and brush her teeth for a long time again.  She has taken to removing her potty from her potty chair and pushing it on her walker to the bathroom to empty it.  That’s fine with me.

Yesterday, after sitting in her chair all day trying to figure out where she was, she was so happy to find out we had a bed in the house for her that she finally agreed to take a nap about 4:00. 

Later, I set her bowl of stew on the table to cool a bit and went in to wake her up for dinner.  When she spoke, I realized she’d taken out her dentures.

“Where are your teeth?”

“Over there.”  She pointed to the table cart. 

“No, they aren’t there.”  I went in and checked in the bathroom to see if she had put them in her denture soaking dish.  Not there.

When I came back into the room, Jerry had found one of her hearing aids in her bed. 

“Where’s your other hearing aid?” I asked her.

She put her hand up to her ear.  “I don’t know.”  How many times does she say those three words every day?

My stomach turned as I thought about Skipper.  He chews up everything, especially dirty things.  He drags Chloe’s underwear out of her stack of dirty clothes and chews them up under the dining table.  He loves shredding paper towels, toilet paper cardboard, and candy wrappers.  If nothing else is around, he can always find a pencil or an ink pen.  Now, we buy him bones, but the treats he find must be more delicious.

With dread, I pulled back the chairs and crawled under the dining table.  There was the bottom of Chloe’s bathing suit, now crotchless.  There was one of Mom’s dirty diapers, in shreds.  Yes, there was the top denture.  I held it under the light.  Yes, Skipper had chewed a pink hunk off the top and caused a crack from the front to the back. The edges were jagged and sharp. Disgusted, furious at the dog, I started stuffing the trash in a plastic bag.  There, under the curve of a table leg, I found the bottom denture, unharmed except for dog slobber, but no hearing aid.

I had torn her bed apart twice looking for it, and Jerry was on his second try.  Now he was crawling under her bed, sweeping the broom all over the floor to find the missing hearing aid.  No luck.

I took Mother in to the dining table and showed her her dentures.  “The dog chewed them.  See, there’s a big crack!”

Her mouth formed a perfect “O.”  A pained frown dragged her whole face down.  

I started mashing up the veggies in her stew with a fork.  The meat was really tender and fell right apart.  She ate a few bites without much complaint except to tell me it was hot.  Lots of Ro-tel.  She took a swig of milk but kept on eating. 

After dinner, when I tried to put her to bed, she was still upset.  She couldn't remember why.  She just knew she was mad.

"It's time to go to bed," I told her, trying to pry her up from her potty chair.

"Why?" she wanted to know.  Her eyes really searched mine, as if she thought I was hiding something.

"Well, you usually want to go to bed after dinner.  You don't have to.  You just usually do."

After I pulled up her diaper, she stood leaning against the side of the bed.  She stuck her chin out at me.  I didn't feel like arguing.  I think she wanted to.  "Hey, Jerry," I said, walking into the living room.  "Why don't you go talk to Mother?"

"What's wrong?"

"She just doesn't want to go to bed."

I settled onto the couch and picked up my crossword.  Jerry was back in a few minutes.  "I don't know what I've done, but she's pretty mad at me."

"What did she say?"

"Something about church and me being worthless or messy or lazy I think...  Mostly just nonsense.  It's her tone of voice."

"Did she go to bed?"

"No."

I stuck my head around the door, peeking into her room.  She hadn't moved since I'd left her. 

"Come here," she demanded, and as I walked closer, she continued, "Are you even a Christian?"

"Well, yes.  My name's written in the Lamb's Book of Life."  I stared right back at her.

She looked down at me even though she was looking up at me.

"I think I'll just go to bed," she told me, irritated.

"Yes, well, it's time," I said.

Mother was still mad at us this morning.  “I can’t hear!  I can’t hear!  I don’t know where this is!” she kept saying, covering her right ear with her hand.  When I reminded her she’d lost her hearing aid, she looked surprised then upset. 

Fortunately (sort of), Skipper had pooped in the house last night, right in front of the washing machine as always.  Gingerly, I picked up the little turds with a paper towel and gave them a squash, just to be sure there was no hard plastic inside.  I don’t think he’s eaten the hearing aid (yet), but he has definitely hidden it.

When I took her in to eat her oatmeal this morning, I showed her her broken denture again.  She tsked and shook her head, but she didn’t complain.  She gummed the oatmeal and blueberries just fine, every single bite.

When she arrived, we showed Sue, the nurse, her top denture.  “I think a little super glue and a file ought to take care of them,” she said, cheerful as always.  “Otherwise, you can get a little grinder and start grinding up her chicken…”

We'll see which solution works.  I’m still holding out hope for finding the hearing aid.