As a CarePartner, I seem to have taken on a greater sense of responsibility to make sure we are ready for whatever comes our way, even those things that have nothing to do with my husband’s diagnosis. For instance, we are currently undergoing some inclement weather. It has been cold and snowy in our neighborhood for several days now and we haven’t been able to go anywhere. If it hadn’t been for my back-up supply of frozen foods, we would have gotten hungry. I did run out of almond milk, so my coffee has been black for a couple of days, bummer. We finally made it out to buy groceries yesterday and now they are predicting another round of snow for tonight. When is it going to end?

We always try to keep up with medications, making sure we have at least a 2 week reserve. I am not as good at keeping an eye on my supplements and one of them ran out in the middle of this storm. I have been doing without it, a reminder of the value of tracking my entire medication regime as carefully as my husband’s. There is a refill on one of his medications waiting at a local pharmacy, we’ll pick that up today before the next round of weather hits.

We have been lucky this time, our power has stayed on and we did have food to eat, albeit frozen leftovers. We keep a stock of candles and wood for the fireplace just in case we do lose power. We didn’t need to leave our house this time so we stayed put. We had almost everything we needed and now have a chance to restock before the next wave hits. Preparedness matters, whether it is for something health related or something totally outside that realm. As Bob Dylan once said, “You always got to be prepared but you never know for what.”