Cockroach cafe 🪳 Spring 2022 🪳

I’m new to this thread, my DF 83 has been showing signs of confusion occasionally for around a year but has suddenly really deteriorated, DM kept insisting she was coping and he was ok until Sunday when I popped over to see them and she shouted at me to take him away and never bring him back.

He stayed the night at my house, I was woken by him ringing my doorbell at 2am when he was having a wander, all the lights were on but I realised in the morning he had switched the boiler off so we had no hot water 🙄.

I’m just starting sorting out ASC assessment and applying for attendance allowance and my world seems to have changed overnight, my DM has let him come back home but I have agreed to have him every weekend until we get more support in place, I work full time so not sure this is a long term solution.

MIL paid extra for the fall detector pendant which then lived on the shelf. I'd take the shopping round and she'd be without a pendant, much good it would do her on the shelf when she was on the floor. She was often found on the floor by the carers coming in, even after she'd spent the night on the floor she still didn't wear the pendant. She did think to press it when she couldn't shut the freezer door so I suppose there's that. At the time I thought she was just being bloody minded but knowing what came after I suspect it was cognitive issues.

Mum could get herself up from the floor right up until her last few months and called me only if she thought she'd injured herself.

Oh Minty I got that all the time when mum first had her lifeline. Then she had trouble with the smoke alarm (batteries were running down) and every time it went off she pressed the lifeline pendant but never answered their calls so they would call me.
The one time she did fall, in the garden, she forgot to press the pendant button and eventually crawled up the garden path after lying there for an hour and didn’t tell me until the next day.
She has a falls detector one now but has reverted to the little pendant button as it is ‘’Too bulky”.

Tbh when I got the call this morning I had just started unwrapping a new book freshly delivered from Amazon and my first thought was 'FFS is she psychic?' 😳

Oh hairbrush that's really, really lovely. What a wonderful experience and memory to have.

That would make me cry with anger and frustration and the pent up anxiety of not knowing what you would find when you got there.

Tbh I barely bat an eyelid these days. I know she often doesn't wear her hearing aids when she's alone and certainly doesn't put them in as soon as she gets up.

As soon as I pull into the road I can see her house and whether the curtains are open...if I'd got there and they weren't it would've been more concerning, or if I'd got a call halfway through the day. Late at night or early morning I know the odds are she's just not heard the phone.

It'll come as massive shock when I'm proved wrong at some point because tbh at this stage I'm pretty convinced she'll go on forever, if not outlive me.

Oh Minty! That would make me cry with anger and frustration and the pent up anxiety of not knowing what you would find when you got there.

I had a lovely visit with my aunt yesterday. She is my dad's youngest sister - a 16 year age gap. She was saying that aside from our other sister my mum is the person who has been in her life the longest and how when she was a young girl my mum was her idol - exotic and glamourous - not an image I have ever had of her! Mum was so pleased to see her. She kept saying over and over "I don't believe your here. Are you really here?" They looked at old photos that she had put on the ipad and mum actually volunteered a story about the first time she and my aunt had met.

We were both a bit tearful on the way home but she said that if that is to be her last memory of my mum she is happy that mum knew her and remembered her and it was a lovely memory to have.

How's everyone doing?

I just had a call from the Lifeline people...mum's bracelet had gone off and they called her twice on the house phone and twice on her mobile and got no answer.

Went straight round to discover that as predicted she'd knocked it getting out of bed and didn't have her hearing aids in 🙄!

Someone I knew used to say "Your own problems are the best ones for you" and it's true. I read posts on here and always realise others cope with far more than I did.

When I saw mum last week she was so much better than she has been for a long while - happy and smiling and even remembered some of our jokes. I'm going to see her with my aunt today - aunt hasn't seen her for three years and I have no idea whether mum will know her or not.

Thanks for the idea, we normally seperate them, but in this instance it's a mid week appointment and only my sister is close enough to actually take him. DM now seems to have filled his head with all sorts of rubbish including that he won't cope with fasting for 6 hours so we don't know what's happening.

@Lightuptheroom I asked DH what he would do in this situation - he said that if he felt the appointment was in his DF's best interests, he would distract his mum eg bring a plate to break in the kitchen or something he knows would divert his mum. Meanwhile his sister and her husband would whisk DF out of the house to the appointment. I can see that working in their family, not sure if it would in yours, but that's one approach!

So sorry about your situation @MereDintofPandiculation. Hope we can be that bit of the help to you which you've been to some of us.
And hearing about everyone's current woes is a reminder to me to count my blessings - mum is difficult but she's ok living alone, still able to phone and mostly lucid. I'm living the dream.

• Also remember that cockroaches are tough, tough enough to withstand an apocalypse, apparently. We live on!

Could you talk to the GP / hospital? Unless she has a healthcare power of attorney for him they shouldn't be accepting the instruction to cancel from her in any event, so if what she's telling you is true they're not dealing properly with their patient. The GP won't tell you anything, but you could tell him or her what you've said here and ask for it to be noted.

Wondering if any of you can help... DF is due to have a fast track procedure done, DM keeps ringing hospital and cancelling the appointments... She's decided he doesn't need it done, can't possibly fast for 6 hours, has told the hospital he is 'nearly diabetic' and goes 'dolally' if he doesn't eat at set times (he isn't and doesn't') then tells us she wants 'nothing to do with it' then whispering to me that she's phoned the hospital and cancelled the appointment but I'm not allowed to tell anyone else!!!! He's profoundly deaf so GP etc can't speak to him on the phone and he's scared about the procedure, though doesn't know that she keeps cancelling it.. What on earth do we do?

Sorry to hear about your husband Meredint I hope you manage to have some good times together.

I think most of us on here have multiple and varied burdens to deal with, so I really didn't want to start a woe-is-me top trumps situation...

I suppose when I list things it sounds pretty bad, but I have plenty of good things in my life too, and I know I have it a lot easier than many people: I have decent health, no major money worries, good friends, a supportive long-distance DP, the ability to run away and spend time in beautiful countryside to decompress etc.

I am very sorry to hear about your husband, MereDint. I hope you can enjoy every day you have together.

@MereDintofPandiculation sorry to read your news. You have supported so many of us.

@thesandwich all good wishes x

@MereDintofPandiculation so sorry to hear your news x

@MintyCedricRidesAgain thank you. I'm rather enjoying the weekends "off" from mum! I'm sorry your mum has returned to form:(

Been told today mums "6 week colonoscopy" appointment due next week won't be until the autumn.

@MereDintofPandiculation I'm so sorry about your DH and I hope you have as long and as happy a time with him as possible.

I've been relieved to not have to deal with XH throughout the last few years, but losing Dad has made me realise that perhaps it would be nice to have someone to turn to when things go to shit after all. I've had a few dates over the last year which have been fine but not quite right. I'm not ready to commit to trying to meet someone atm but it's nice to think it may be something for the future, which I didn't expect when I got divorced.

Re the car...it would be such a faff to keep re-taxing it I think it'll be easier to look for something with cheap tax and just insure it for a month or two at a time when needed.

Anyway, she's going on mum's insurance for now and hopefully won't have to think about until after she's passed her test.

Good luck with the remaining treatment @thesandwich

@ChiswickFlo hope you get a bit of a break over the weekend.

Cockroach all...with a side serving of kumquats!

@MereDintofPandiculation i am so sorry to read about your dh. There are no words that can make a difference. Thinking of you🌺🌺
@exexpat sending hugs.

God I'm exhausted
Love to all x

@MereDintofPandiculation and @exexpat If words could help I'd say them, or at least try to but you both have so much else on your plate other than care for older relatives. We trudge on a day at a time because we have no choice and the only way out of it is through it. I never thought I'd see a time again where I was happy but it is out there for me and for you too.

She has a decent job with hybrid working (mostly from home) so a curfew wouldn't necessarily be an issue. She also gets funding for travel from the college due to me being a single parent on CA/UC which would cover a fair chunk of the running costs...but it needs not to be silly money.

All going well she'll be going to London for uni so definitely won't need a car then but there's a lot of holiday. Ideally we'd probably keep it taxed and just insure it as and when she's home, but after the first year maybe consider selling it.