Body Lotion Update

Dr. Pham, Mom's PCP, recommended moisturizing twice a day to soothe her itchy skin. I found an online article that rated the best lotions available at local drugstores. I chose 3 to start with: Palmer's Cocoa Butter Formula, Gold Bond Ultimate Softening Skin Therapy Lotion, & Curel Lotion for Dry & Sensitive Skin. All 3 worked very well for Mom; her itching decreased significantly after about a week of twice daily applications. Each 13 to 14 ounce bottle lasts about 10 days. After the 3rd bottle of Curel I discovered the CVS brand with what appears to be the same formulation as the Curel. But yesterday I could find neither, so I decided to try the Gold Bond Medicated Extra Strength Body Lotion. Bad idea. I tried a little the day I got it and was fine with it. But about 10 minutes after I put it on Mom this morning she started complaining about how cold it made her. The "medication" in the Gold Bond is 0.5% menthol, which causes a cooling effect on the skin. Not using that on Mom again.

Not recommended for people who have trouble with thermoregulation.

At breakfast Mom tried opeing her yogurt with one hand. And ended up with about half of it on the table. Then she did something that reminded me of one Kai was very young, she started to eat the yogurt off of the table. She has done a couple other things that are very childlike, the most common one being temper tantrums. Yesterday she was very upset about something around dinner time. She didn't want to eat with us and had me take her dinner to the middle bedroom, where she watches TV, and stayed there for most of the evening.


After Mom's blood draw this morning, we did 2 out of Mom's 3 financial errands. We skipped the last one because the weather was so wet. The first place we went to was a no brainer, it has parking located under the building with direct access to the floor we needed without going outside. We went to the 2nd place but it was raining harder & I could not get a parking space close to the business we were going to, so I decided to just go fill up gas & head home. After we filled up the rain had stopped so we went to the 3rd place since it was nearby, only to find there was no parking available. So we went back to the 2nd place, and got disabled parking at the sidewalk. Which meant we would get some protection from the drizzle that was starting up. We got a little wet on the way there, Mom liked the walk back better because we stopped at The Cookie Corner and bought some cookies. I need to grab a couple of those umbrellas on the bookshelf & put them in the Subaru.

Dad says the pain in his leg is a 5 on a scale of 10. Which is an improvement, since it was at a 7 when he was talking to Dr. Nakano about it a week ago. I used the last lidocaine patch on him this morning, so I hope the pain begins to subside quicker since he will now only be on acetaminophen for the pain.

Happy Birthday to Danielle & Zhara!