I'm tired of cooking/preparing 3 meals a day. It's just the two of us but boy oh boy can that woman eat!! She stays slimish, I get fattish. It's bad enough I do everything here much less start making her one thing and me the other. At times I feel guilty when I buy her fast food cuz of the nutritional value....not to mention I eat it too.
Good news for anyone careing for a sea snail.
Negative posters please ignore this information, while true the post is a joke.
p.s. was taking my mom to an orthopedist to get her knees injected. moms legs gave out during the transfer. I couldn't hold her up and get the chair repositioned underneath her at the same time so I lowered her to the ground. I could not lift her myself to get her back into the chair. just at that moment an angel of a nurse who was just leaving her shift saw us and came over and helped me get my man back in her chair. She saw that my mom had her shins and knees scraped up and recommended that we have the doctor take a look at them. So i take mom inside to the doc to get those same skinned knees injected. I felt so guilty. I explained what happened and Doc checked her out and said wow, her knees really got banged up! He cleaned them up. Luckily no skin broken where he needed to do the injections. I felt so bad.
Jeanette PLEASE use this time to get lots of sleep and to do something fun. (NOT the pool boy!)
Katie, I did that last week with a diaper. Lesson sooooo learned!
Mom went to hospital today...just spent 5 hours in the ER and she is in at least overnight. Testing for infections. I am exhausted as I was up all last night while she woke up every 45 min. talking and seeing things that were not there. This is not characteristic of her. It feels strange that she is not in her room though...I am soooo tired and going to try to catch up on sleep, if just for one night.
Next time mom falls call hospice to come and hel[p you. If they cant't get her up they can call the EMTs to help. they won't transport her anywhere unless she is hurt and the nurse will direct that. You can back up the nurse if the EMTs give her a hard time and want to do IVs or anything. keep a copy of her DNR posted where everyone can see it and one in your purse. Relax and enjoy the respite you have permission to garden. No risk of that in the frozen NE yet.
She was up for a few hours yesterday, but mostly in bed, asleep. She said she was tired. She slipped from under me when transferring her... we camped out on the floor until my oldest arrived to assist. Man he made good time! Basically, she's now sleeping all the time. Refuses most food, drinks a small amount. My heart is breaking and I am so damn tired. Scared to send her to Hospice House, scared to keep going cuz I will drop any second now.
Thankfully, my carer's and hospice workers have been my Godsend, including Lisa the lady who has been with us for 8 months now.
Is it bedtime yet?
But I digress. My big whine - Debo, I can cap you! - is that caregiver A was late for my respite and had to leave early, and caregiver B, who's supposed to be here at 6pm for one hour to give mother her supper, was fifteen minutes late and, um, drunk. I think. I couldn't quite believe it. My guess is that she clean forgot she was meant to be here, went to the pub, remembered, thought ohmygod and hared over here as fast as her wobbly legs would carry her.
I don't know what to do. I mean, she wasn't actually reeling and hiccuping, but there were those faint fumes in the room that you can't think where they're coming from, and she was more garrulous than usual, and flustered. It's not the kind of thing you can ask the agency to investigate without causing really serious repercussions. And I'm not quite sure enough that she had been drinking. She'll be here again on Sunday: if there's any repeat I'll ask her straight out.
Quite honestly I was more concerned anyway with mother, who's been floppy most of the time and argumentative the rest of it. And she won't stop scratching her eye so I've had to start the chloramphenicol ointment our GP prescribed last week, which means four battles a day for a week while mother squeals and wriggles and I pin her head down and strong-arm the stuff into her eye. It's not as abusive as it sounds, but it's not fun either. I'm tired. I'm going to bed. Debo, with luck you will find at least one respite caregiver who's as lovely and helpful as some of the ones we've met. Teething troubles, merely - keep chasing the agency and they'll soon get it sorted.
Debby I do agree with Jessie that volunteers can be unreliable. Not all the time but sometimes think it does not matter because they have not been in a caregiving situation and they can come another day. Others are totally dedicated and go way beyond what they are assigned to do.
Talking of the Bible, I think it cannot even begin to enlighten us to the ways of God. Considering that he knows everything -- all the chemistry and physics, etc, that makes the entire universe works -- how could a little book really show much? God is totally awesome and gave a bit of the spirit to all the things living (and maybe unliving). I learn more about God watching the birds and squirrels than I do listening to a preacher talk the Bible, since the animals have not had their knowledge adulterated by cultural expectations.
That preacher is the very reason I created a thread on how people misuse the Bible when it comes to caregiving. I should have included preachers in the title!
https://www.agingcare.com/questions/parents-manipulate-you-as-a-caregiver-176024.htm
He either does not know his NT Greek very well or was never taught it for the verse about obeying your parents specifically used a word for children that means young children. BTW, that verse is followed by a verse telling parents not to provoke their children to anger. How many of our parents have provoked us to anger before we even became an adult?
We are not little children anymore and don't have to obey our elderly parent like we are still their little child!
I would not listen to any TV or Radio program that had him on. He's out of touch with both the Bible and real life in that particular area. I'd hate to hear him preach on mental illness. I guess he would think it is either all in their heads or means a person lacks enough faith or has some hidden sin they need to confess.
I hope your mother did forget some of the damaging things he said. We don't need that kind of preaching or the begging for money kind of preaching on TV, but that is almost all that is out there.
IOW, I doubt he has any serious hands-on experience with changing an elder's poopy diapers or listening to someone ask him the same question several times. He is too busy for that. This is not criticizing him for being busy, but it is saying not to be critical of others who are also busy. It is easy to tell other people how you think they should live, without taking it to heart for ourselves.
I understand his thinking that we should take care of our parents, but sometimes we can't do it. I do not like at all what he said about still having to obey the elders we care for. It shows lack of understanding of the reversal of roles that caregivers face. I don't think he really had any idea what he was saying, to tell the truth. He probably meant to honor and respect, but he came across as very convicting. I hoped that my mother would quickly forget some of the things he said, since it would be used to strip any power of adulthood from me.