Saturday, August 25, 2007
my father, etc.
Welp. I got a call from my father on Friday which I am now interpreting as a plea for help. Not just venting. He can't pack up the apartment. He is also not sleeping and is just spinning out of control. He even told me he peed the bed the night before and that worried him. I am going to call his doc on Monday and see if he can take xanax or a sleeping pill. He will go down before I can even get him moved if he doesn't sleep.
He is still singing the same song about assisted living vs. independent living. I don't know. It is hard to tell. I think that once they get there they could stabilize. My gut tells me independent living . At least for a while. If they do assisted living (two rooms but no kitchen, three meals a day, people pretty bad off as their neighbors) they will be stuck. There won't be any going back. But if in a month they can't do independent living and have to move to assisted living that will mean we lose 45,ooo. It is complicated. But again, it is about their comfort at this point. And I really think they will enjoy having the patio home at least for a while.
I have decided that I need to take control. Luckily I am feeling so much better with so much more energy. Not 100 percent but lots better. And quite frankly I have more energy and am more organized than most people so even not at my best, I figure I can do this.
So, I am going to try and move their stuff within two weeks. So that my mother can move directly from the nursing home to the retirement community. As I told my father, if I have them both underfoot while trying to pack the apt, I will have a nervous breakdown. Between him and my mother's dementia. No way.
This truly is a leap of faith that they can do independent living. A nurse came from Glen Meadows to the nursing home and cleared my mother. The caveat in that is that my father can do the majority of things that need to be done. He keeps saying how he is failing both physically and mentally. The wonderful thing is that there is homecare available and in as small increments as a half hour. If you get homecare at home there is often a 4 hour minimum. I keep telling my father that paying for some care in independent living, even the max 8 hours, is cheaper than being in assisted living. And they have a home, not two rooms. But EVERDAY I have to hear how he is not sure what do to.
I told him on Friday that he doesn't have to do what I suggest, but he can't poo poo everything I say. Which he did when he brought up seeing a lawyer and I said I knew an eldercare lawyer and when he heard $500 for the consult, he flipped saying he is going to use the guy he knows from the VFW. ahhhhhhhh.
So then I called the social worker at the nursing home but she was out on Friday. I will call her on Monday as well as the surgeon to find out what they are thinking about discharge. Oh, in case I didn't mention it, she is off the wound vac. Just doing wound care now. And she is discharged from PT. So the minute they say her wound is healed, she will be out of there.
Hence the urgency. I don't want her in the apt. And I want them both out ASAP. I can pack them for the movers in a day or two I think. My cousins have offered help and I think I will take them up on it.
So I need to go into fast forward mode.
Of course school starts on Monday with new schedules and a kid going to high school and buying stuff and ahhhhhhhhhhhh!
Oh yeah, work. I just need to get the kids and my parents settled. That is the priority. But so is moving on with my life.
But in a way, getting them moved sooner than later will stabilize them so I can focus on my life.
I hated being an only child as a kid. Being adopted, I didn't even care if the kid was a biological kid. I remember asking my mother at some point if she could still have a kid and she said, well, yeah but since she was 40 when I was adopted and had never even been able to get pregnant, not so likely. At that point she was probably heading into menopause. I also begged them to get foster kids. I was always acutely aware of how much I had and that it shoudl be shared. My mother years ago agreed they should have done another kid. Oh well. They said they wanted to give a kid everything, so I have continued to take everything they have. :)
Most of my adulthood I liked it. Thinking I would get all the money and also not have to consult with a sibling about any decisions. Especially since I have seen even when there are siblings it often falls on one child and often a woman. Well. Who knew when I moved back here from NYC in 1987 to be their support that 20 years later I would finally get called into service. And who knew that I might be wishing I had someone else to share the work with. I was going to say burden but that isn't fair. My parents have done so much for me. This is what children are supposed to do.
It is just a shame that the planners that they are ... they didn't plan for this. And now decisions are being made in crisis mode instead of as a plan.
I tried to support them in their choices. When they brought up Oakcrest 10 years ago I supported it. Then they decided instead of that or a condo, that an apt was the answer. Fine. When my ex moved out over five years ago I offered putting an addition on the house. The laughed at me.
My father said yesterday that he just never thought it would come to this. Invincible. That is what both my parents think they are. And for the most part they are. I can't believe my mother has come through these last two injuries. Her dementia is bad. It sucks. I am sad. I will do what I can.
And so it goes.
He is still singing the same song about assisted living vs. independent living. I don't know. It is hard to tell. I think that once they get there they could stabilize. My gut tells me independent living . At least for a while. If they do assisted living (two rooms but no kitchen, three meals a day, people pretty bad off as their neighbors) they will be stuck. There won't be any going back. But if in a month they can't do independent living and have to move to assisted living that will mean we lose 45,ooo. It is complicated. But again, it is about their comfort at this point. And I really think they will enjoy having the patio home at least for a while.
I have decided that I need to take control. Luckily I am feeling so much better with so much more energy. Not 100 percent but lots better. And quite frankly I have more energy and am more organized than most people so even not at my best, I figure I can do this.
So, I am going to try and move their stuff within two weeks. So that my mother can move directly from the nursing home to the retirement community. As I told my father, if I have them both underfoot while trying to pack the apt, I will have a nervous breakdown. Between him and my mother's dementia. No way.
This truly is a leap of faith that they can do independent living. A nurse came from Glen Meadows to the nursing home and cleared my mother. The caveat in that is that my father can do the majority of things that need to be done. He keeps saying how he is failing both physically and mentally. The wonderful thing is that there is homecare available and in as small increments as a half hour. If you get homecare at home there is often a 4 hour minimum. I keep telling my father that paying for some care in independent living, even the max 8 hours, is cheaper than being in assisted living. And they have a home, not two rooms. But EVERDAY I have to hear how he is not sure what do to.
I told him on Friday that he doesn't have to do what I suggest, but he can't poo poo everything I say. Which he did when he brought up seeing a lawyer and I said I knew an eldercare lawyer and when he heard $500 for the consult, he flipped saying he is going to use the guy he knows from the VFW. ahhhhhhhh.
So then I called the social worker at the nursing home but she was out on Friday. I will call her on Monday as well as the surgeon to find out what they are thinking about discharge. Oh, in case I didn't mention it, she is off the wound vac. Just doing wound care now. And she is discharged from PT. So the minute they say her wound is healed, she will be out of there.
Hence the urgency. I don't want her in the apt. And I want them both out ASAP. I can pack them for the movers in a day or two I think. My cousins have offered help and I think I will take them up on it.
So I need to go into fast forward mode.
Of course school starts on Monday with new schedules and a kid going to high school and buying stuff and ahhhhhhhhhhhh!
Oh yeah, work. I just need to get the kids and my parents settled. That is the priority. But so is moving on with my life.
But in a way, getting them moved sooner than later will stabilize them so I can focus on my life.
I hated being an only child as a kid. Being adopted, I didn't even care if the kid was a biological kid. I remember asking my mother at some point if she could still have a kid and she said, well, yeah but since she was 40 when I was adopted and had never even been able to get pregnant, not so likely. At that point she was probably heading into menopause. I also begged them to get foster kids. I was always acutely aware of how much I had and that it shoudl be shared. My mother years ago agreed they should have done another kid. Oh well. They said they wanted to give a kid everything, so I have continued to take everything they have. :)
Most of my adulthood I liked it. Thinking I would get all the money and also not have to consult with a sibling about any decisions. Especially since I have seen even when there are siblings it often falls on one child and often a woman. Well. Who knew when I moved back here from NYC in 1987 to be their support that 20 years later I would finally get called into service. And who knew that I might be wishing I had someone else to share the work with. I was going to say burden but that isn't fair. My parents have done so much for me. This is what children are supposed to do.
It is just a shame that the planners that they are ... they didn't plan for this. And now decisions are being made in crisis mode instead of as a plan.
I tried to support them in their choices. When they brought up Oakcrest 10 years ago I supported it. Then they decided instead of that or a condo, that an apt was the answer. Fine. When my ex moved out over five years ago I offered putting an addition on the house. The laughed at me.
My father said yesterday that he just never thought it would come to this. Invincible. That is what both my parents think they are. And for the most part they are. I can't believe my mother has come through these last two injuries. Her dementia is bad. It sucks. I am sad. I will do what I can.
And so it goes.
