Follow
Share

My husband has had urinary incontinence for at least 4 years. He is also on diuretics, which makes it worse. We can't find any diapers that are truly leakproof. He refuses to wear a diaper at night and consequently there is a crater in his mattress from urine. He sits on the edge of the bed in the morning and just "lets go". The area rug is soaked and I don't even want to know what our fairly new laminate floor looks like underneathe. We paid over $1,000 for a lift chair for him a year ago, and it also has a urine crater in it. The flooring planks under it are buckling and warped. The chair has stopped working. If I buy another one, he will ruin that one too. He refuses to be catheterized, and with his penchant for infections, life-threatening ones, that terrifies me. He needs the lift chair to get up or I wind up calling 911 for help. He is stubborn and resistant. I think he truly believes that his chair, at least, will be "self-healing" and he turns a blind eye on all the other damage (too extensive to list) that he's caused, leaving me to deal with it. Does anyone know of a truly waterproof lift chair like they have in hospitals? It obviously can't cost thousands. I am at a loss to know what to do or say to him.

This question has been closed for answers. Ask a New Question.

20 Answers

Most
Helpful Newest
First Oldest
First
" He needs to be in a nursing home for physical care, but it would take a terrible mental toll on him." But isn't the current situation taking a terrible toll on you? Does he matter more than you do?
Helpful Answer (12)
Report
CTTN sums up exactly what I was going to write. If his welfare is more of a consideration than yours, he's going to continue to refuse responsibility for his toileting needs.

This isn't intended to be rude, but the chair isn't the issue. It's your husband's attitude.
Helpful Answer (4)
Report
Hugemom, your message hit home for me and I'm sure for a lot of people. How did we ever become so unimportant to ourselves to allow this to happen. Caregivers are people who have great caring for other people. We also need to include ourself in that circle of caring. You are in an intolerable circumstance, but are afraid to offend your husband or make him mad. Sorry if that is blunt. I am really saying to you things I have been saying to myself lately.

One question -- If you were urinating all over the house and bed, what do you think your husband should do to make things better?
Helpful Answer (3)
Report
Depending on what ability your husband has to help around the house, this is what my 97 year old Mom did when my Dad refused to wear any type of a Depend product. After numerous "accidents", with Mom down on her hands and knees scrubbing the carpet, the next time Dad had an "accident" she handed him the cleaning supplies and stood there watching him clean and giving him directions.

Well, after a few times of Dad cleaning up his own messes, I started to see Depends for Men on Mom's grocery list :)

There are leather lift-chairs but they would cost much more then the cloth ones. You could purchase blue sheets to try out, these are squares or rectangle pieces of cloth that can absorb liquid, then you throw them out. To try one, you can find them in the pet store in the dog aisle as puppy wee wee pads. If they work, then go on-line to get the blue sheets for humans. Some companies sell "seconds" which work just as well but couldn't be sold as "first quality" due to mistakes in production. Those are very inexpensive.
Helpful Answer (2)
Report
Thanks for writing back. I'm glad you have family to help you make decisions and that you found a chair. This is probably too late to bring up but here goes. Don't wait until that's all you can do. Put one foot in front of the other. By then you have nothing left to enable you to make the important decisions you will need to make and your family will have two of you to care for. It cheats you of being able to spend quality time during the last days you have with your husband and depletes your ability to plan for your own future. Move forward with that meeting sooner rather than later. You have so much hard work ahead of you. Take extreme care of yourself.
Helpful Answer (2)
Report
I suggest you have your family meeting with an elder care attorney. It will save you untold stress and money in the long run.
Helpful Answer (2)
Report
It sounds like your husband's dementia has caused such resistance to care that it makes it impossible for you to care for him in the home. All of the suggestions are not feasible if your husband is not inclined to try them. Since the nature of his resistance is so prevalent, I'm not sure how aids coming in for a few hours or part of the day would help. I might explore placement, so that he can be somewhere that they have shifts of people who have the training and equipment to handle these issues. I wouldn't think that continuing with his current behavior would be very sanitary and could eventually cause some health problems.
Helpful Answer (2)
Report
Pet stores sell black light indicators that show where urine has been spilled/sprayed. I've had friends use that to see what areas were affected. They also sell multiple products for breaking down urine and smell. I've used Nature's Miracle for cat spray, and flu accidents.
Helpful Answer (1)
Report
Hi Jessie! Yes, it does. and here is why from chemistry website
You can use a black light to detect body fluids. It's actually a good way to look for pet urine or make sure a bathroom or hotel room is really clean. Cat urine, in particular, glows very brightly under ultraviolet light. Urine glows under a black light primarily because it contains the element phosphorus. Phosphorus glows yellowish green in the presence of oxygen, with or without black light, but the light imparts additional energy that make the chemiluminescence easier to see. Urine also contains broken down blood proteins that glow under a black light.
Helpful Answer (1)
Report
Exactly, Sunnygirl1, he can pee on the floor, in the chair at the NH, and they would clean it up.
Helpful Answer (1)
Report
See All Answers
This question has been closed for answers. Ask a New Question.

Recent Questions


Popular Questions


Related Questions

Ask a Question
Subscribe to
Our Newsletter