As our parents get older, not only does it worry and frustrate us, it frustrates them even more. They realize very much that they are forgetting things and different people cope in different ways. The one thing I have seen in common with my mom, your mom, and my friend Carols mom is the medicine issue. I really believe that it is not the money for the medicine , so much as a reminder their bodies are growing older and beginning to fail and that makes them sad, scared and angry because it is something that they cannot control. So let's make it a little easier on them and keep the medication to a minimum .
I understand the concerns about her eating habits, but you can check and see if Meals on Wheels is viable in the Bossier City area. They do deliver once a day during the week. On weekends Judy, maybe could check on her and even have dinner once in a while with her.
It doesn't hurt to check with HB but they have to wait for an opening and that it is contigent on someone moving out or someone passing on. This is not something they can see in the future. I know you all like the convenience of Horizon Bay, but you may want to look at alternative places in the Bossier area. Due to the aging population and modern medicine, people are living longer and openings are harder to come by.
Your mom really loves it when you guys are there, especially when all of you are there. So possibly you could set up going when all three of you can be there once a month. I know when Richard and I were there she kept commenting on how much she wished it could be all of you together. You could work as a group on things that need to be done on the house and the yard.
As long as one of you stays with her, as I know that my Mom feels left out when we are all there if she isn't included in what we are doing. I will come up with Richard to do this when I can.
I am afraid if you keep going and doing everything for her on a daily basis she will loose the inititave to do it herslef and that is the worst things we can do to our aging parents. Looking back my sisters and I waited too long to accept there was a problem with my mom and then we went overboard and set up for everything to be done for her, and now she doesn't do anything except read some and sleep. The eating is a problem too with her, but at this stage your mom is so much more cognizant than my mom is now.
PS there is a lot of Ensure in my mom's refrigerator(:
I have learned to accept mom as she is now and not to completely explode after the 10th+ time telling her something, I just reiterate it in many different ways. Guess what sometimes she remembers and sometimes she doesn't and that is OK.
Getting old is hell and you know why we are scared because we see them and know that there is a good chance that it will be us down the road and will our children watch out for us?
You want to know a wonderful thing..... Everyday is a new day.
Like I said, just a thought I wanted to share. Chris
3 comments:
Thanks for your comments Chris. We always appreciate a different perspective. I still agree on the Meds and she will probably need some more as soon as she sees the Orthopedic doctor Monday. I also agree on doing too much for her, but lately she's felt so bad, she doesn't feel like doing anything but sitting and/or sleeping. This very well could be due to the new medicine the Neurologist prescribed. I cleaned her house all afternoon Sunday because it's been too dirty for too long. I've been meaning to do that for a while, but that was the first opportunity. I did not get around to her room or the front bedroom, so I left the Windex and furniture polish/spray in her room to movitate her, but she, so far, has not done it due to her still feeling bad. As far as your suggestion to go by and share a dinner with her, I do that ALL the time. On weekends I always share at least two meals a day with her and go get her on Sundays when I do cook a good meal for my kids & grandkids too. Also, after the garage sale with it being so hot and Mother fussing about this and that, we did explode, but not that bad. Look, we're all human and nobody's perfect. This is going to occasionally happen even though we try for it not to. That's Life. We've all been doing something out of love for Mom for many weeks now and I am grateful what everyone has done. We're all still on the same page and I hope no one is mad at anyone. Like I said, we are all human and all have a lot of others to take care of also. This has been an extraordinarily long wait, too, for her to get in HB. tooBy the way, that's the only one in Bossier. I don't want to have to drive a long way to Shreveport to see her and take care of her needs. Shreveport has some excellent ones, but it's just too inconvenient and far from her doctors too. Again, thanks for the post and I will post some more today.
Thanks for your thoughts Chris. Having dealt with this before, do you know of any support groups for the family members? The reason that I ask is that we are all just handling this situation with Mom on a day-to-day basis, using our own judgment of what is best for Mom or not, without having any experience at it. I'm sure that somewhere there is advice or training coming from people who have 'learned the lesson the hard way' and they may have pointers on how to best handle these situations when a loved one experiences memory loss or any other medical problem.
We all need to remember that although we are there to support Mom, we cannot boss her around and demand that she do things "our way." It is her home and we are visitors. Let's be patient and try to make her BELIEVE that something is best rather than forcing her because we preach that it is good for her. I had to put in a lot of thought, effort, and time to convince her that giving up driving was the right thing to do. I know she misses the freedom terribly but she does understand and believe that it was the right thing to do.
Yes, giving up her car and "freedom" was really hard for her to do. I hear about it everyday from her. I think that's part of the reason she's been down and feeling bad lately, (at least the psychological part), but hey, I just remind her that this was the only way we could get her into HB and she finally agrees. Jerry said it possibly did her some good to hear the eye doctor say that that was a good idea for her to stop driving.
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