Mental Decline & Dependency/Coping With Aging Loved Ones

Yesterday I decided that I could try to sleep at home again and not stay at mom's/aunt's as done the previous days. (My aunt seemed [and still seems] to do a bit better now.)

Thus, I only went there again in the evening and stayed a couple of hours, but led them go to bed alone.

The result: mother "lost" her walking aid and her keys. (She didn't trust me that I'd closed all doores, besides she never trusts the teacher of the driving school - which has lended rooms in our house - to shut them, too.)
While the walking aid had been re-found, the keys ar somewhere else ...

The next days, I'll continue to drive there just in the early morning (to avoid that mother gets up before the nurse arrives), a bit later again (as usually) and then in the evening.
And quite soon to reduce this to the normal one-time-visit ..... most probably on Sunday already, since both Mrs. Walter and I are engaged in the election committee (county administrator election).

I've talked with several doctors this week already, my aunt will be examined for getting a home care level (she'd refused hat until now, but since mother's nurse had to help her already in the morning ...).

Next week, Mrs. Walter and I will try again to start focusing the discussion with the two in the direction of stationary care - perhaps starting (as 'trial') with short term care ...

Just checking in here to thank everyone who expressed such kindness and
sympathy to me on my mother's death.

Many people feel that they just don't know what to say at times like that. I
can assure that you knew exactly what to say and I was heartened by it.

~George

Well, Tomkitten, George, Walter, et. al., Diane made the case for the residuals of being a care giver. Under such circumstances, we would never have them back, both for ourselves and our loved ones. I knew that my husband would never survive in a nursing home, but each case is different. Just know that I am one who can "empathize" with all here, regardless of the conditions.

Tomkitten--

Sometimes modern life makes simple inevitability terribly cumbersome and complicated.

Of course Bob wants to come home to die--if this is his time. Of course you want to have him at home, surrounded by familiar comforts and without medical gadgets.

By all means, investigate Home Hospice. The organization is sophisticated enough to treat Mind and Body as two parts of one invalid. I don't know whether your Official Housing Policy would permit Bob to slip away in your current apartment--or whether you'd be able to deal with him with the limited help of a hospice worker.

I've had several dealings with various Hospice organizations. In most cases the biggest problem is when the patient lapses into unconsciousness--or semi-consciousness--and the loving caretakers call an ambulance.

Hospitals must treat sick people--that is what they are there for.

Please don't think I'm devaluing Bob's long and courageous life, but if he were a beloved dog or a cat would you hesitate about allowing him to die at home in his favorite corner with you at his side?

By all means, use A2K for venting and musing--and for typing out descriptive words so you can see whether those words express what you really mean. Most Americans have very limited experience with any sort of death, let alone lingering and undignified death.

This thread has gathered a number of people who know what you are talking about and who appreciate the gravity of the decisions you must make.

Hold your dominion.


Walter--

Your mother and your aunt are two colorful old ladies who are adding new dimensions to the term, "Independent Living".

You're obviously rising above ignoble emotions such as murderous exasperation and sniveling self-pity. I hope your jaunt this summer helped you recharge your batteries because your duties as Devoted Son and Good Nephew seem never-ending.

Hold your dominion.


George--

Grief is a lonely place. I'm glad we can help while the fabric of your world is being pieced back together after your mother's death.

Hold your dominion.

Mental Decline & Dependency/Coping With Aging Loved Ones
Noddy - you touch on a very tricky subject: if your Loved One becomes semi-conscious, or completely unconscious, how do you know whether this is a prelude to death or a situation that can be handled with the aim of finding out what happened and then just making L.O. comfortable?

My feeling is to follow the route of least testing, etc; the minimum technology; comfort, comfort, and only comfort. This is what I have specified and what Bob has specified. And there have been several times over the years when I have bluntly said "absolutely not" when asked by hospital people about such interventions as ventilators, artificial feeding, etc. It's a rather strange sensation to come right out and make that decision.

Tomorrow he will go to our attached nursing facility for a couple of weeks of rehab. The poor soul has been moved around so much this month that he's thoroughly confused. I hope that the couple of weeks of unchanging background at Clark House will steady his mind to the greatest extent possible, and leave him better oriented to time and place.

Our Wellness facility works closely with Hospice; my only problem is that Hospice doesn't seem to want to deal with someone at Bob's level of mentation and physical condition. He is not considered to have been diagnosed with a terminal illness. Then too, he doesn't live alone; I'm there to manage his medications, see that he eats and drinks, and so on. I arrange his medical appointments and take him wherever he needs to go. All these things make him an unlikely candidate for Hospice. I wish it were not so, but they don't see him needing any of the services they provide. He needs great care, but not their kind, apparently.

The great fear is that he will fall, and he gets furious when told he must not get up and walk without assistance. And of course, the reason he must not is that he cannot. But this he doesn't believe

Anyway, I'll have a couple of weeks in which to think and plan and strategize, in close consultation with social workers, and all the rest. I don't like our chief social worker at all, but she has been magnificently efficient, so forget my personal feelings.

The worst thing would be for Bob to have to remain permanently in Clark House. That would be living death.

Tomkitten--

Some situations are neither fish, nor fowl, nor good red meat.

I hope Bob's stay at Clark House will be both brief and healing.

When my mother was dying in Home Hospice, the hospice workers told us to allow her to make as many of her own decisions as possible. Every so often her free will was tested against her physical limitations--and she wound up on the floor nearly every time.

Maddening.

Eventually she accepted that dying meant some limitations in physical activity--but that milestone was a hard-won milestone.

My thoughts are with you.

Hold your dominion.

My aunt finally agreed today to accept the help of a nurse in the morning as well as that a cleaning hlp (from the nurse's service) is allowed in her room(s). [I tried get rid of two inches of dust, hundreds of Kleenex' and "more" the other day.)
With the help of the nurse service, I'll try next week to get her to the psychiatrist's/neurologist's: she still on the same medication as she left the psychiatric hopsital ..... nearly 20 ago. (Since the neurologist"sent" her there [for nearly one year], she never wanted to go there agai. Thank God, even in a small town like my native town we've got three practioning psychiatrists/neurologists.)

Mother is fully enjoying her role as "older sister": which isn't calming me at all, quite theopposite.
However, I'm not staying over night anymore but driving there additonally to the usual "lunch round" early in the morning and late in the evening before and after the nurse arrives).


At least, things to tur to a better perspective ...

Walter--

I can see some glimmers of hope with your mother and your aunt--and with your sanity.

Sometimes we're very old and weary before we pay off our dues.

Hold your dominion.

I think of you all quite often. The people on this thread are extraordinarily caring and articulate about responding to continuing changes in the lives of those being cared for.

I hope you're around when my or Dys' time comes. It would be more comforting than just about anything else I can think of.

Diane--

Thanks for the kind words.

Yesterday, when I wasn't there, my aunt's docotor phoned. Mother talked with him.
His succestions to change the medication in a hospital were "resolutely turned away" [his words]: we/she could take care better at home.

I talked to him today: we'll try to get her better by changng her medication but a stay in the geriatric department (or perhaps a psychiatric hospital) seem to be the best ...

---------

Since more than 30 years, a driving school in our house holds lessons on Monday and Wedenesday evenings.
And as long as that, mother fears that "those people" don't shut the self-locking door properly .... additionally with the key, that is. (Which actually might have happened three times over all those years.)

So she went down yesterday - after I had left and shut ours doors - to look at it.
And now she searching the keys (the second pair of keys which got lost within five days).
Besids, 100€ are missing - she didn't admit that, but I told her, she actually couldn't have spend them when she went shopping.

-------------------------

And all this was discussed with her before 7 o'clock this morning, before the nurse arived.

And of course again at lunch time.



(She on one side behaving like the 9-year-old looking after her 6-years-old sister. On the other side, I'm her seven years old son ...)

Perfect summary, Walter. I know it's difficult.

My mother is unique .... and in combination with my aunt hyper-mega-unique.

Walter--

Grand Score: Civilization 7. Barbarians 6-and-gaining.

Will you and your aunt's psychiatrist be able to act in her best interests? Or does your aunt have veto power? Can you be added to your aunt's doctor's list of people to contact?

These days cordless telephones come with a Panic Button on the base unit. When you can find the phone it beeps frantically and you can home in on the noise.

Are Panic Button Beeping gadgets available that could be attached to the keys?

The missing money is a worry. Could it be stashed in a Safe Place or is it possible that your mother is listening to the blandishments of a neighborhood con artist?

I wish you well--you have your hands full.

When I fixed up my mother's house in order to sell it to pay for my mother's nursing home care (she wandered, alzheimer's) many years ago, I found a lot of money stashed under the carpets...

Both my mother and my aunt don't have however 'guardian' - but I act for both of them with doctors, hospitals, nurses etc (and with my mother money affairs - but there I've got a mandate.

Mother has got a "help buttom necklage" which connects her to the nurse service (at first to a dispatcher).
Both can't handle cordless phones, though.

The money isn't really missing: my mother is hiding it - like she did with the housekeeping my father gave her - only to make huge presents at birthdays and christmas. (Now, she gives my wife and me one and another time some banc notes.)
It's actually nothing to worry - we re-found recently some jewelery after having missed it for three years. But we didn't search intensively all over all places since my sister will inherit that :wink:

Walter--

I was thinking of some little gadget that could be attached to the keys that would beep when you pressed a button.

Since I'm there now three times daily for some couple of hours: I wouldn't like the constant beepings but prefer being active and look around :wink:

Walter--

I'm the sort of Luddite who can't even explain modern gadgets properly.

The keys are missing.

You do not despair. You walk over to a base unit--or take it out of your pocket--and press a button.

The keys will start beeping and you home in on the sound.

Then your mother and aunt start fussing that someone must be getting in the house because they wouldn't have left the keys there.

Maybe each blames the other.

Of course such a gadget might not be available, but if it is you would control the panic button.

You can get such ...

I don't think (for various reasons) that it would work.