Miss-identified again....

I was at the nursing home visiting Mother, and had an unusual (for that venue) thing happen.  Though admittedly, this type of thing seems to be occurring more often lately.  And I'm not complaining...

It was Mom's bath day, and her regular aide was not on duty.  The temporary aide was Sam (a guy.)   Mom objected to taking a bath and refused to go, which the nurses later told me, has happened before.  When I arrived, I stepped unknowingly into the fray.  Mom confessed that she had refused her bath - didn't want one today.  I knew there was a problem at that point, just didn't know for sure what it was.  So I made a visit to the nurses' station, where they relayed what they thought the problem was: presumably because the aide was male.  I understand that issue completely.  I agreed that it may well be the reason, and suggested getting one of the girls to help out. 

So I went back to Mom's room, and we were chatting when the male aide came in.  He asked me if I could join them in the shower room, so so that there would be another woman present.  You could have knocked me over with a feather.  This was just like the Dermatologist's office, when the clerk handed me the key to the women's room!  (See prior blog "Down the hall, then turn at the first hallway and..." )  Miss-identified again, with no makeup, lipstick, earrings, other jewelry, perfume - nothing other than my normal long hair, nails, stirrups, top and ballerinas.   Fortunately Mom is hard of hearing, thus she didn't hear a bit of all this.

Unfortunately, I had no camera, thus there is no picture.  However, you can look back at my earlier blog "At last!  Feminine Shoes all day, every day... " to see a recent picture taken at the nursing home.  That's exactly how I looked - ironically enough, the very same outfit!

With no time to ponder different approaches (and in 20-20 hindsight, there were at least one or two), I gently and quietly mentioned to Sam that unfortunately, it wouldn't work too well.  "Because regardless of how I'm dressed, I'm her son."  And, I asked:  "Perhaps one of the girls could help you out?"

Sam must be the only staffer there who didn't know - many staffers simply address me by first name to eliminate any need for gender-specific Sir or Ma'am.  (The few elderly residents I talk to - including Mom's roommate - mostly just address me as Ma'am, and that's fine.)  Fortunately he didn't appear to be embarrassed - probably not the first time he's seen or encountered a crossdresser - and he left to go seek help for the task.  As it turned out, one of the girls showed up about 15 minutes later, just as I was leaving, to take Mom to the shower, and she accepted that willingly.

Who knows what the current gossip is about me around the nursing home?  I guess that as long as they take good care of Mom, (and they do) I really don't care!