Dennis Seever

Thanks so much for your prayers and your interest in Dennis' progress.

Journal

Monday, August 25, 2008 9:42 PM CDT

The new trailer is getting a lot of use. On Saturday, Dennis, Tim, Renylor, Andrew and I went to Prairie Winds Park. Dennis drove his scooter up on the trailer, and backed it down when we got to the park. He rode it around a large pathway a couple times, and then he was done. Meanwhile, Tim let Andrew splash his feet in a kiddy wading pool and swing on the baby swing. Tim would have stayed longer with his family, but there was a football game on, so the TV game won out. Dennis is happy the football season is here.

On Saturday morning Rachel took Dennis with her when she used the trailer to haul two loads to the dump. We got rid of stuff that we had been waiting a whole year to get rid of.

This afternoon I went to the Caregiver Community Consultation in downtown Calgary, which has been held in a number of locations around Alberta in the past couple of weeks. It consisted of people who work for professional caregiving organizations for the disabled and family caregivers caring for disabled loved ones. It was helpful to talk with other people, including three people there I already knew from other caregiver meetings. The themes that came out in the consultation were that there are not enough respite opportunities for caregivers who are experiencing burnout; there’s not enough funding, and professional caregivers (like Rachel) aren’t paid well enough to keep them working in the field. I consider myself very fortunate to have Tim and his family living here (so they can check up on Dennis if I’m away), and Rachel who is willing to move in for a few days when necessary. I am indeed blessed because other people don’t have that kind of backup.

I mentioned that Dennis was thinking about “buying” a camper with line of credit checks. Several people at my table told me about William Watson Lodge in the Rocky Mountains, which has inexpensive cabins available for disabled people. We’ll need to check it out next summer and see if we can rent a cabin for a few days.

When I got home, Dennis again “asked” me about buying a camper, and then wrote numbers on a paper—40000, 2000, 1800, and several others. Now what’s that all about? I already got him the trailer hitch and trailer that he was pestering me about previously. I thought that would be good enough to satisfy him, but I guess not.

E-mail Author: jseever1@shaw.ca

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