Mental Decline & Dependency/Coping With Aging Loved Ones

That's the trouble Foxfyre..
You know who they are, but they are no longer the soft loving thoughtful understanding human they were were.... they are now a a body that eats, breaths, sleeps ( most of the time ) , who has to be fed by a stranger, has it's nappy changed by a stranger, in the company of many others having to live the same way.. if you were a dog they would put you to sleep.
You can still love the person they were and not have nightmares knowing you have to see them each week NOT the person they were.

It is a good film, very sensitively done, very moving.

Maybe too near to reality for some folks here.

Hmmm.... I saw Thomas a few weeks ago in Manhattan, handed him Tante I.'s latest 2-page expose and he promised to scan it to you the same day.....and he's far too young to be afflicted with Alzheimer's, so I'll get on his case.

Happy Easter to everybody.

PS well that should be clear enough..... and anyone here who loves dogs will love the cartoon
http://able2know.org/topic/131279-1#post-3621632

My aunt has meanwhile left the hospital.
But she's very, very weak - and doesn't want to live anymore.

Mother isn't doing very well, too.
I have to tell her about aunt (she hasn't visited her since weeks, since she doesn't want to visit "all the old people there" in my aunt's ward (could go there via lift and wheelchair).


We'll see ...

I don't know how you feel about prayer, Walter, but I'm praying for all of you. Call it good wishes if you prefer...

Thanks, Tomkitten.
(A Father is working as [kind of] social worker in that home - and it's a seniors home for nuns as well: I'll ask them to assist me, in any way.)

Best wishes from me, too, Walter - this is obviously a difficult time for you and your family. Btw, did you ever receive the 2-page summary from Thomas - it might distract you somewhat

Thanks, High Seas. It's not easy, correct.


(And no, I didn't get it.)

Checking in..thoughts to Walter and the elders.

Adds apropo the movie with Christie (a fav of mine) - I could no more watch that than pull my own teeth. even after all these years.

Also checking in to see how Walter and his women are doing.

We (stuff, doctors and I) had a kind of conference today to find a way how the two could meet without ... well, all the trouble that happened before, and without getting the idea that it was an arranged meeting, kind of 'last' or similar.

Since the Franciscan ('social worker') Father knows them and talks with on a regular-irregular basis, he'll try his best, again.

(Aunt is doing bad as the last days; mother walked a couple of meters today.)


This is a photo of my aunt, taken the week before Easter (before her 86th birthday and before she went in hospital). The photo is/was thought to be published on the home's homepage ...

You have her eyes, Walter. I'm sorry to hear that your aunt is not improving. Good that Mom is up and walking, though, if only a little bit. It would be wonderful if Mom and Aunt could see each other again, but maybe it is good in concept rather than reality.

Best to you and Mrs. Walter.

Thanks, Swimpy (from both of us).


It is a good concept, if they could meet - that's what I thought/think (or better: what I think/though to salve my conscience).

However: all the times they've met (in the home), my mother was trying to "convince" her very loudly about what she should do and what not - ending usually that my aunt cried and wanted mother to leave.

Today, I could speak, for a quite longer period with my aunt. (She told me as well that she wants to die/will die soon.) She asked, where mother is. When I replied that mother had fallen again a couple of times, had to be at the hospital for checking ("nothing serious happened to her"), but can't walk ("you know, she would never use a wheelchair") but that I or a nurse would accompany her to visit aunt when mother feels better - then my aunt replied: "She had been here some time ago. All the time she's speaking only very loud ..."

So, I suppose, my aunt just wants to know where mother is, if she's still alive, if she's at a safe place.

Mother didn't ask about aunt for a couple of days - I didn'r raise this topic.
Mother stays in her room now all the time (gets her meals there). I felt, and this was confirmed by the nurses, that she isn't discontent with this. (Nurses like the meals in her room: they can thus better check that and what she eats [mother always thinks and though that she's fat].)


So, we'll wait and see if and when they want to meet/can meet.


[As an aside: though I don't have any contact at all with my sister since more than one year, I informed her with a letter about aunt's situation. In as short and official words as I could.]

"Father Klaus" talked both to mother and aunt a couple of times last week.
Mother visited with him aunt - but since she ... well, she tried again and as usually to "dominate", so this meeting was just a short one.

Obviously, however, everyone was okay with it.


Aunt ask for and got the "Anointing of the Sick".
Since that day (days, including the day she saw mother), she doing a lot better = talks more than just two, three words.


Mother didn't mention that meeting at all nor does she ask about her sister.

Looks like the short visit did your aunt some good. That's probably the best for both your mother and her sister. Good for Father Klaus for recognizing when to cut the visit off.

Have been to the near by city, watching their football (soccer) team in the first relgation match for getting in 2nd federal division .... when during the first minutes Mrs. Walter tried phoned me (and later send sms's due to the noice in the stadium): my mother, whom I had visited before had fallen down and was driven by an ambulance to the local hospital.
There, they diagnosed a hip fracture and sent her to a hospital here. (The local hospital in my native is a department of that, no surgeons there during night time).
She'll get the operation tomorrow morning and is quite happy (sic!) to have "something not normal".

Obviously, the guardian angels were taking comb time this time.

Oh no. Sorry to hear this, Walter. I hope Mother is not in too much pain. Hoping for the best.

Hoping for the best too.