The Nursing Home Mafia

You may laugh at the title, but a series of unfortunate events led Hyde to view key players at the nursing home as members of a cabal out to emasculate Daddy and him (yes, yes, it always comes back to him). I will be the first to admit that some of the staff made choices that were ill-advised and had disastrous results. I can even get mad about their behavior and decisions. I just couldn't, and still can't, get behind Hyde's conviction that they had a PLAN.

If only he could have realized they weren't cohesive enough or devious enough to form such a group. If only he could have realized that the basic problem was not that they were evil, but that they were incompetent. (True, some were arrogant and incompetent, which is not a good combination. But most of them were simply well-meaning but incompetent. Put the two groups together and you have a recipe for poor decisions leading to bungling and ineffective actions, but not a well-thought-out plan to "take down" Daddy or Hyde.) If he could have realized that the impact of their intentions was different than their intentions, he would perhaps still be here today. For this was the beginning of the end.

As far as I can remember, it all started with a phone call from the nursing home to Hyde regarding Daddy's behavior. He had, allegedly, begun making sexual advances to Mom's roommate, as well as (gasp!) to Mom herself. The person on the phone (a nurse who had previously been held in high regard by Hyde) indicated that Daddy's behavior had become aggressive, lewd, and uncontrollable. He had, allegedly, begun "playing with" himself when being given his bath. According to Hyde, he was pressured into giving them permission to move Daddy immediately out of the room that is next door to Mom's and down the hall so that he would be isolated from his "targets." Hyde remembers being told that if he didn't give permission, WE (the children) would be held liable if anything happened.

The story at this point becomes a big, convoluted mess (surprise!). It all happened very quickly, too.

Hyde gave his permission. He later found out that Daddy had also been given at least one unauthorized shot of Estrogen during this time (hence, the emasculation accusation) because someone (not Daddy's doctor) determined that the problem was that Daddy's testosterone level was too high.

Let me stop here and say, unequivocally, that I think both decisions, moving Daddy and giving him Estrogen, were senseless, reactionary, and they should have known better. Nursing home staff, of all people, should have been aware of the fact that such a drastic change in Daddy's behavior (he had heretofore been one of their most polite, beloved, and decorous patients) indicated that he had entered what is known as the premorbid stage of death. He had already, prior to this situation, begun exhibiting symptoms of aspiration pneumonia (he had Parkinson's and swallowing had become increasingly difficult). In fact, one staff nurse had notified Hyde that Daddy's "time" might be near.

And yet, because of incompetence coupled with poor communication-NOT a conspiracy-decisions were made that led to the final blow for Daddy (and, ultimately, Hyde): Daddy fell and broke his hip during an agitated excursion to get back to Mom.

Interestingly, this also set into motion Hyde's decline into the final premorbid stage of his schizophrenia.