“We
have a delivery,” my husband told me. “It’s probably the box to return the
wheelchair leg rests.” We had bought a wheelchair online and one of the leg
rests wouldn’t lock into place. The company sent us a replacement, but they
wanted the defective part returned to quality control.
“OK,” I
said. “I’ll take the dog out and bring in the box.”
I
opened the garage door and immediately called Harold. “You need to come out
here and look at this.” Partially blocking one of our garage doors was a pallet
of folded boxes. A pallet!
He
wanted me to send a photo, but before I sent it, he thought to look on the
security camera. The next two hours were a whirlwind of trying to get someone
to come and pick up the pallet of boxes. First, we had to deal with the
confusion that both the company that delivered and the wheelchair seller
insisted we had received one box. Well, our shipping label was on one of the
boxes used to protect the bottom. Yes, there was our box, all right.
The
clouds gathered and rain threatened. After I texted my photo to the wheelchair
company, they promised to take it off our hands…eventually.
When
all else failed, my son dropped by and moved the boxes from in front of the
door. Eric said, “No one will pick it up today.”
“I
can’t even imagine how heavy it’s going to be once it gets rained on,” I said.
Eric rolled the boxes to the shop before the rain started. Now, I started to
worry that they would come to pick it up when we were gone.
So, the
outside boxes were now inside and safe from the elements. The whole experience
brought to mind thinking outside and inside the box.
When I
was a caregiver, I had to think outside the box often. Each day represented
getting a pallet of problems when you wanted/expected everything to go
smoothly. Jim wandered off and finally we thought to put an alarm on the front
door. Why just one door when we had four? That was the only one he ever used
when he decided to take off down the road. Every day brought about the
unexpected from Jim, and thinking outside the box becomes second nature. It’s
not unusual for the usual response to fail.
Sometimes,
it’s better to think inside the box. One of the best things a caregiver can do
is have a routine. People with dementia respond well to routine. Following a
schedule for grooming, toileting, meals, activities, and bedtime make life
easier for the caregiver and the person with dementia.
Sometimes,
problems seem unsolvable, but with persistence and a little help from family,
friends, or professionals, you can often achieve a satisfactory resolution.
The
pallet that was dropped off Friday was picked up on Monday, while we were home.
The boxes were on their way to the rightful destination.
My
husband received an email from quality control saying they sent us new leg
rests. Really? Again? Another email from the receiving department wanted to know why we
hadn’t used the “box” they sent us to return the defective leg rest. It was from
the same person we talked to when we received the pallet, with our shipping
label attached to an open box tightly wrapped inside the packing straps.
“Now
what do we do?” I asked.
My
husband’s reply was “Not our problem.”
That
brings up the final solution to problems beyond your control: Don’t think about
the box at all.
Copyright
© October 2021 by L.S. Fisher
http://earlyonset.blogspot.com
#ENDALZ
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