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Pam
I have a Maine-Coon cat. I take her to the vet when the weather is warm and she gets shaved except for her head, bottom half of her legs and tail. She gets a bath, nails clip, and teeth clean. Then she gets blown dry. When she is done she looks like a small black loin. Lol And man it cost a lot, but she is worth it!)
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Well done, book. I remember your cholesterol problems. It;s terrible what stress does to us and not good how long it takes us to get back to somewhat normal.
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In the 20 years of caregiving mom, my dad struggled with high blood pressure. For me, about the 15th year, I started to struggle with borderline cholesterol - for years. Then dad had his stroke. I now had 2 bedridden parents and none of my 7 siblings stepped up to help me. I had a low income full time job which I could not afford to quit. That borderline cholesterol skyrocketed to very high cholesterol in 5 months.

The reason why I'm bringing this up is - I Almost Passed my Cholesterol Test!!!! … my cholesterol(H as in High), LDL(H) and Non HDL(H) went down.  Everything is normal except the HDL which went from 154 to 108.  I'm just 9 points over the optimal value... This means a lot for me. Because it was caregiving 2 bedriddens that got me there. And now, almost 3 years after Dad passed away, I'm almost normal.... It would be a BUMMER if I get the d*rn virus!!! I would be very pissed off! … Ohhh... {{{ knocking on wood }}}
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Book,

I get it! Fellow allergy and asthma sufferer!

Feel better 💗. Stay well. Take care. Mega hugs!
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Woke up this morning around 5am with a pounding headache on right side of my head (front and back), queasy stomach. It’s mango season and I’m allergic to mango. Have mango trees in front of the porch and in the back outside the kitchen window. No air con - so I have all windows and doors open for the breeze to enter.

I took Excedrin. I’m allergic to most sinus medicine, including Sudafed, Claritin, etc... My eyes or nose swells or severe rashes on my lips. I’ve had to find alternative means to deal with my severe sinus. I’m going to describe My exercise routine for sinus pressure. You can skip the rest of my commentary since it will be long and boring. I hope this will help with those dealing with sinus pressure.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Before starting, I washed my hands. I did my usual facial sinus massage using 8 small circular motions on each sinus pressure points on both sides of my face. Eyes close. Starting from the most sensitive part between the corner of my inner eyes and nose bridge. 8 circles going one direction, then 8 the opposite. Ow! That really hurt. And it ‘felt’ squishy.

Then I moved to the next sensitive spots just above the inner eye brows. 8 circles + 8 circles. Then I moved up to the center of my forehead. While tapping that, I also used my tongue to tap the upper roof of my mouth. I repeated #1 and #2, but this time after the 8th circle I swished my fingers up and outwards in opposite direction.

Next is the nose. There is only 1 pressure point at the corner bottom. From experience, I now do the 8 circles starting from the bridge. Then move slightly down 8 circles. Continue until I reach the upper tip. I always feel sensitivity there, too. And squishy feeling. By this stage, my nose is beginning to run. Finally down to the actual pressure points at the bottom nose. 8 circles, then swipe outwards. 8 opposite circles, then swipe out. I stay a little longer on this area because it’s definitely draining my sinus both inside and outside.

Finally, the pressure point a little below my cheekbones. You may want to google a photo of it for accurate position. 8 circles, then swipe outwards. 8 circles opposite direction, then swipe outwards. Sigh... sinus pressure released and I can breathe from both sides.
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I say grandog too!
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Well poor Chloe sure dosent get the full on spa treatment at the local Petsmart,, where they come home with a bow or scarf.. LOL I just put her in the bathtub and run the water and use a pitcher.. she is sooo deprived.. She is a short haired Chug ( part chihuahua and part pug,, but mostly pug in looks and temperament) I do have to take her and my DD chihuahua to the vet to get their nails trimmed a few times a year.. they grow like crazy. I did used to have a Himalayan cat that we had to take to the groomers,, they had to put him asleep to cut his hair and that was a fortune! I have read about the new "terms",, I solve that by calling them my grandog and my baby.. LOL And I wash my grandog Bella in the sink, she only is 4 lbs
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Pam,

I’m glad you and mom were able to have a ‘spa day!’ I bet your mom enjoyed the pampering 😊.
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Pam,

I wonder how much money is spent on our animals. A lot, I’m sure. They are spoiled! I spend a fortune having my schnauzer groomed!

The short hair dogs are so much easier. My greyhound was a dream. No grooming at the doggie salon. He needed bathing and nails clipped but that was it.

Grooming for dogs cost as much as human haircuts. I don’t blame them for charging that much. It’s a lot of work!

Have you heard the latest political correctness with animals?

Apparently, we are not supposed to refer to them as ‘pets’ anymore. They are now our ‘companions.’ The term ‘pet’ goes back to Victorian times where we petted/loved on our animals and the name pet stuck.

So, is ‘pet’ project or ‘pet’ student, etc. all politically incorrect? LOL

The PBS show, NOVA is doing an episode on our relationship with our dogs next week. I can’t wait to watch it.
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Well today in the rain, we all had a spa day.. sort of. Mom got a haircut and a pedicure ( its hard for her to do her toenails so a pedi without color is a treat for her) Hubs and I both got haircuts,, I got my color touched up too and I love it (too bad it wont look the same when I style it.. LOL ) and even gave the puppers a bath! This is the first time we got Mom out of the house since her hospital stay, and all went well.
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Wow..Me..thanks for asking...I am tired mentally and physically today....I am in the process of moving my mom into an independent retirement place. All meals included. Very small lovely place and close to my 3rd floor walkup condo. She was living with my brother for 7 years who is tired of her non stop chatter, messes and hoarding of boxed and canned foods. He is tired of grocery shopping. He wants his retired life back. She is 86, life long depressive and treated, anxious and treated and always focussing on her perceived bad marriage and health concerns..Mom is critical and negative some days. She always feels “rushed”. Dad been gone 13 years. For 4 years now I am the child that has purchased her meds, set up the box of her meds weekly, email Md with concerns, attends Md appointments, takes her to church, helps with showers, and does all her driving. I have been her social life for 4 years. Now I am the one who found the new Affordable place when my brother hit the wall and I am moving all the small stuff there. He will move some big things . I write her checks and monitor her finances. My retirement is stalled. I have no energy left for volunteer work or the HOA board I was on. I focus on daily exercise and take a couple days a week off for me {she texts during the time off}. My brother goes south 2 weeks every month and stays at his girlfriends. I am praying she finds friends at her new home and develops a social life. Some of my duties will need to stay intact..but I have high hope I can get back to my retirement at 69 yr old. I feel your pain...
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Kira, you are definitely not a bad person. You sound like a saint.

So your Dad has PTSD and is depressed. So that's his excuse for you taking the brunt of this? You are on the way to having PTSD if you don't rectify this. You deserve a life, a baby, all those great things. Get your Dad, your siblings etc. to cough up some cash so you can hire someone to take care of your grandparents. If they start making excuses then you need to put your foot down and start making your own excuses.
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Hugs Kira. Eldercare is NOTHING like childcare, in my world those are fighting words. And besides that, your dad should be the one "parenting" his parents, not you and your husband. Every week that goes by without you earning an income takes away from your own contributions to your future social security and saving so that you can afford to start your own family, it's time to set an exit date and focus on your own life. Don't expect anybody to step up with help or solutions until you step back, do expect a lot of flack but be strong!!!
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Kirabrowning92,

No, you are not a terrible person! No taking care off an elderly person is not like taking care of a baby. Babies grow up. The elderly decline and die. What a terrible thing to say to a daughter that he said to you! What does your husband think about this? It would make me very angry and I would tell him so! This makes me angry just reading it!

Unless it's late where you live, call your father up and tell him to take care off his parents for you are no longer going to be a martyr and you have a new marriage to work on and hopefully a family to build which can't be done under the present circumstances period. Nor arguing or yelling, just the facts and no which is a complete sentence! If he has the boldness to tell you and your husband not to have a baby, then you have the right to tell him no! You take care of your parents or somehow else make sure they are cared for and safe. I'd give him 2 weeks to a month to get it all together.
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HI, I'm new to the site. Im 27 newly married and live with my elderly grandparents. Due to there health I have quit working and am there full time caregiver while my husband works. I need someone to talk to but I've always been the strong one of my family and dont want my husband to worry. I'm so tired, I feel guilty because I'm not just physically tired but emotionally, and tired of taking care of everyone. You see my mother's health declined when I was 12 and I helped take care of her. At 18 i moved out and still helped but had my own place, which was nice. A year later I moved back to help and five years later (jan, of 2015) my mother passed away, it was devastating. I spent the next four years taking care of my dad, cleaning, cooking, grocery shopping, and keeping him from jumping off the ledge(he has PTSD, anxiety, and clinical depression. Losing his wife and best friend made it all worse). I then met the love of my life in may of last year, I moved out of my dads house and in with my at the time boyfriend. It was amazing to have a whole apartment to just us. To be able to have a life again after so long. Three months after we moved in together dad told me my grandparents needed help. My sister has 3 kids and my dad works 2 hours away from them. So all's that was left was me. My boyfriend and I talked and we agreed to move in with them and be there caregivers. We both found jobs near there house, it was all hard but ok. A few months after we moved in we got married (january 4th of this year happiest day of my life❤). However my grandpa fell at midnight on January 12th(he tried to go outside in the middle of the night to pee) He hit his head causing 2 brain bleeds. Surprisingly he was ok after a short stay in the hospital but the fall ment he needed full time care. So I quit my job and started being a full time care giver to them both. I feel guilty for saying it but I'm so tired of taking care of everyone, I want a life. I want a home with my husband, my own family, our own lives. What tipped the ice berg is the other day i told my dad i was feeling sick but knew i had stuff to do anyway(my gpa has an infected cut on his had that requires Epsom salt and ointment three times a day, i also do the cooking, cleaning, pill dispensing, laundry, doctors appointments, and shopping). His response was welcome to mother hood this is exactly like being a mom. After I hung up I cried for hours, because it's like being a mom without the good stuff! I want a child with my husband but I can't have one. My father and sister made that clear to me by saying "are you crazy you cant have a baby at your grandparents house, they cant handle that and they need you." I know they are right but it hurts because I want to be a mom.... sorry I'm rambling but I need advice.... I haven't had a break since we moved in here in september of last year. Everytime I ask for someone to help so my husband and I can get away for a day everyone is busy, has to work, has stuff with kids, ect. And honestly my grandparents cant be left alone for more than about 30 mins at a time...... I'm just so tired...... so stressed..... and so depressed...... I also feel so guilty for feeling like this..... is this a normal feeling or am I just a terrible person?
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Same here Willie. No sympathy card either and it was automatic withdrawal so they even tried to take out an extra month's worth.

We got that back though. It was definitely not a labor of love case there. Money, money, money!
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Gershun, ☹️. Having to clear out the room in 24 hours is what happens here too, since we knew about it sis and I started emptying the closet and drawers as soon as mom was moved to the "serenity room". And no sympathy note from the facility, just the final bill... one lady who still lives there after her husband died said that was so callous, she felt she got more support from the cleaning staff than from the administrators.
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Bootshop girl, the place where my mom was didn't start out mean. When we first were looking for a place for her we found this place to be really nice. Homey with a nice atmosphere. The nurses were kind and got to know my mom. But they rebuilt the place during my mom's stay and everyone was moved to the new facility. I had made my mom's room really cozy with some of her old furniture and pictures etc. But the new place didn't allow people to have any furniture, hardly any pictures, they fired most of the old staff and stuck my poor mom off in a room at the far end of her floor. My mom died three months later. She was extremely depressed in the new place and I'm sure she lost her will to continue. So when they phoned day after her death and said "get her stuff out of here" I shouldn't have been surprised.
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peewee -so sorry. Mine wanted me to leave my home and life here and rent the apartment next to her so I could look after her -translate - be her servant. They don't appreciate or care how much they negatively affect our health. It's all about them. (((((hugs)))) Good luck with the doctor and the bank.
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🍷🍷🍷🍷🍷🍷🍷🍷🍷

I am just here for the chips and dip.
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To all who have responded to my post on January 30, thank you!

It is now 7pm EST on February 1. No word from the doctor, no word from the bank. When they hear from me on Monday morning, it ain't gonna be pretty.

And... would you believe my mother actually said to me this afternoon, after I cried out in pain when hauling her out of her bed, "Gee, with your back acting up the way it is, wouldn't it be nice if we both ended up in the same room at the nursing home?"

😳
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Gee Gershun,
The place where your mom was was mean! So sorry!
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PeeWee and Cali,

We live with cats. They don’t live with us. I swear it is like they train us instead of us training them. I happen to adore a cat’s independent nature. They know what they like! Yes, sometimes a bit mischievous too. We love them anyway. My cat lived to be 16. She was a cutie!

PeeWee, 🍷🍷🍷

One for you, one for me, one for Cali. Cheers! A toast to all the magnificent cats in this world.

PeeWee, it sounds like you could use a magic wand to speed things up. Slow process. Hey, wine can take the edge off!

Best wishes to you.
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Good luck Peewee. I think most of us can commiserate with you. It seems whenever things need to done in a timely manner, it goes at a snails pace! And if you are an anxious & impatient person like me, it seems to go much slower. There is really nothing worse than trying to get a problem fixed while being at the mercy of other people!

Your cats are funny! But I am sure at 3am you think they are anything but funny. I love cats but I hate how particular they can be. My late cat Kayla, was particular about her water. She always had to had fresh water. It did not matter if the bowl had been filled an hour earlier, when she wanted water I always had to pour out the bowl and refill it with fresh water. And she required a bowl in the kitchen by the back door and a cup on the edge of the tub and the cup also had to be filled with fresh water when she wanted a drink!
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Oh yes by the way, when my mom died in hospital the care home phoned the very next day and said we had to have her room cleared that day or her stuff would be put in storage. No sympathy card or nothing.

Real nice huh?
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PeeWee, unfortunately your story is all too familiar. My mom has passed but I remember my frustration when my phone calls were not returned, No one I dealt with had a sense of urgency. I bet you that when the phone calls are returned you will suddenly be told you have to get your affairs sorted out immediately or you'll lose your spot at the facility. That's how it always seems to be. A snail's pace when you need something but get it done yesterday when they finally get back to you.🙄

I hear ya about the empty spot in an otherwise full food bowl with your cats. Too funny!
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Well, okey dokey, here's my tale of woe...

I finally decided that it's time to place Mom in a SNF. She's declined physically to the point where I can no longer safely or effectively take care of her. I reached this decision after I strained my back a couple of weeks ago (the sacro joint) and I'm still in a great deal of pain - heaving around a woman who outweighs me by 55 lbs. just isn't good for the healing process, even wearing a brace. This was a very tough decision to make, and I have a lot of emotions about it, but I realized that if I don't delegate Mom's care to others now, we'll probably be roommates in the same facility within a very short period of time.

So... I toured the only local SNF on Monday, ostensibly for respite care, until they advised that they do have openings for long term care residents. Mind you, I've had Mom on the waiting list for this particular facility for three years (moving from #4 to #2 during that time), but the hospital that owned it has now sold it to a for-profit conglomerate. (Apparently the hospital was reserving the available space so that they could transfer patients directly to one of their own facilities for rehab.)

After I toured the facility, the Admissions Director gave me my state's Long Term Care form for Medicaid, which has to be completed and signed by Mom's PCP for either respite care or long term care. I emailed it to her doctor that afternoon. By Wednesday, I hadn't received any kind of response, so I rattled his cage. He responded that the nurse and the other physician at the clinic were both out sick, so orders and such are taking longer than usual. Okay, I can wait, but not forever. No word on the form as of this evening.

In the meantime, I contacted Mom's bank to request some copies of older bank statements (I'm missing the entire year of 2015) for the Medicaid documentation purposes. They said they would contact the local branch to handle the request, and that the branch would contact me within 24 hours to advise me of the cost. Guess what? Here it is, Thursday, and no word yet from the bank. There's no local number listed in the phone book or on the website for me to inquire as to progress, so I'm stuck calling the 800 number, whereupon they tell me that they'll follow up with the branch, and...

And Hubs left this morning for a 5-day business trip. So here I am all alone with Mom ('nuff said), a bad back, 2 geriatric cats that start screaming at me at 3 in the morning because there's a tiny empty spot on the bottom of their otherwise full food dish, and a 5-month old rescue kitten who has yet to learn the meaning of the word NO, while I wait around for people who have heretofore told me that they'd be more than happy to render assistance whenever I needed it, but now that I've taken them up on it, they're dragging their feet and I'm stuck in limbo.

There's nothing worse than finally making a decision that you've been putting off for months, if not years, and then facing nothing but roadblocks... and that's even before starting the Medicaid process. Can't wait for THAT little drama to unfold.

End of rant. Thanks for listening. Feel free to join me for a glass of wine.
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@bookluvr
Thank you for sharing your story and for your encouraging words. There have been a few times while I was visiting her at the NH that she tore into me like a vulture on a carcass and I just walked out of the room. When I returned several days later she was crying and apologizing. That is not what I'm looking for. I'm just want her to show me a little respect and appreciation. I do so much for her and I'm the one that gets b*tched out. My brothers hardly ever show up, so when they do it's a happy occasion. Me, I'm like the old shoe; dependable and abused. I have not seen her since Sunday. I haven't decided if I'll show up this weekend or not. Right now I don't want to look at her. All I'm feeling is hatred for her.
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Bittersweet, reading your comments brought back so much memories of what I went through. My 'poor' (as in poor thing) brothers got all the sympathies, concerns for their health, etc... I got the verbal abuse, etc..

I was so very relieved when I read that your mother is Not living with you. THAT is definitely a Big Plus. I took years to whittle down my super sensitive conscience of 'doing the right thing' while cutting off my nose... Plus, hanging around here at AC helped me to see what is happening in the homefront. I read the different threads, even ones not pertaining to my situation. I learned a lot from reading other people's experiences and the advise given by others. I've been out of touch here. It's so difficult to try to give you advice...

All I can say is - if the casual outings continue to be abusive, then let her know that line on the sand. My dad kept punching me on my head whenever we disagreed on mom's care. I finally had to draw that line. I told him and my 7 siblings that I'm doing the "Strike 3 and I'm out." When he hits me on the 3rd one, I was packing up and moving out immediately. Bro of next door can take over. And I told this to dad, too. I told him that none of my siblings (none of his kids) can take better care of him than me. He would end up with bedsores or put in a nursing home. And he knows that that's what would happen if I walk out... He was on Strike 2 when he had his stroke. He was still abusive bedridden!... What I'm trying to say, with these examples, is that you, too, need to learn to put that 'line on the sand' or as others say 'set boundaries.' ..

On those casual outings, if mom is abusive, return back to the home, and then explain. I wouldn't argue while she's in the car with you. My Alzheimer mom had grabbed the steering wheel while bro was driving. The car was swerving as I (backseat passenger) tried to slowly peel her hands away from the steering wheel... So, no getting your mom so hyper that she might grab the steering wheel. Wait until the car's no longer moving. Little steps to slowly withdraw from her, which your conscience can handle. Yes?
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Lola,

Please go to a shelter. Don’t stay in your car. I’m so sorry that you are struggling. Hugs!
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