An Adjustment for Us All

For the next four days my brother in law will be staying with us.  This is so my sister in law can stay 24 hours a day with my mother in law, who is recovering from radiation implant surgery.  She is going to have to take my mother in law Wednesday for another surgery. No one was available to be with my brother in law while my mother in law and sister in law were in a hospital in New York City.

We live 150 miles away and couldn't be there for various reasons, although we had been there the past four days.  And, will be returning in a few days to help care for her after this latest surgery.

I've blogged about my brother in law several times - he is in his 50's and has a developmental disability called autism.  He is set in his routines but has been up here before.

Except he's only stayed with us overnight.  And this is going to be an adjustment for all of us. Not just him.

He watches a lot of TV and likes to be by himself most of the time.

We have a small house.  We have only one TV.  A relative lent us another TV but we found the cable connection in my son's old room (he never had a TV up there but he had a cable connection put in there years ago) didn't work.

So, last night, we were all on top of each other because he wanted TV and that was down in our living space. (Our house is smaller than some apartments).  It was chaotic, I had a headache, I was receiving texts, going to an exercise class, and trying to get hold of someone (I never succeeded) along with my spouse spending time with his brother, stocking the fridge with food he liked, and showing him how our shower worked (it had changed since last time).


I have my own routines and they were getting disrupted! (I'll survive.)

It will be interesting to see how my brother in law adjusts to all these recent changes in his life.

As we adjust, too.