Cockroach cafe 🪳 Summer 2023 🪳

@countrygirl99 I hope you get to hear what the hospital visit was about, I am a bit surprised she came home at 3.20 am. She must have been exhausted - assume they wanted to keep beds free? Waiting to hear what anti depressants MiL will be given and if it even helps 🤞. Fab senior nurse is going on holiday for a week or two, well deserved break but will miss her being around and keeping us in touch.

@RuthTopp I mean to write my wishes and they will include, visit but don’t be my Carers…. Besides my DC likely won’t have their own families for a while yet so will be busy caring for them.

On the subject of getting old ( well on the way ! )
I'm conscious that although I looked after my mum until she passed , my dcs are over 250 miles away so no help for me when it's eventually needed.
Also not sure I'd want them to have that obligation anyway.

My dear father always said there was nothing good about growing old. It really is crap, isn’t it. For the elderly. For their children feeling stressed. It’d be interesting to know if other nationalities/cultures do it better. A multigenerational household would also be stressful just in a different way.

MIL got back to the care home at 3.20 this morning! They are going to give DH a proper update later this morning.

We have no idea what's happening with MIL who was taken to hospital in the middle of the night on Sunday. She's not back at the care home so assume she's been admitted. DH and hos youngest brother both have jobs that make it difficult to keep phoning until they get through during the day. I was at mum's in the evening and when I got hone DH said they'd both tried phoning A&E a couple of times but no one was picking up so he's assuming someone would phone if it was bad. Aaagh, head in the sand again. So I'm going to phone main switchboard to track her down today. I can at least have my phone beside me and keep trying while I work.
Mum's kitchen bin was a nightmare. It stank the whole house out and mum couldn't smell.a thing. She's decided bin liners are hideously expensive so she's stopped using them but is clearly not checking everything has come out when she empties it. There was a 3 inch layer of god knows what mouldering in the bottom that made me gag as I walked in. So that was a nice job for me while despite my attempts at changing the subject she left coming back to her constant topics of "how I met your dad" and "it would have been our wedding anniversary a couple of days ago". Anniversary was mid June. Still, flu jab is on her calendar, broken light bulb is changed and off milk was disposed of before it went in my tea.

Although my parents are in their 80s I suspect a few years before I find myself in similar situation, and I appreciate we have been lucky with MiL in that SW found a nursing home. But my mother has already invented a family who are going to move into her house and she move into an annexe. This amazing family will provide 24 hour a day care in return for living rent free. This is based on something similar that my aunt had, with her carer living in upstairs flat for free that my aunt owned BUT there came a point where it was too much for the carer and my aunt went into a care home relatively happily. I have gently suggested my to my mother that she might not find such a family but for now I can’t worry about it. My father thinks he is the same age as his children and can’t even think about such things but he is beginning to resent my mother needing more help. I don’t have much sympathy with him for complex historical reasons, whereas my sister does sympathise. I have given them info on falls alarms but they haven’t pursued it! They are 2 1/2 hours drive and neither have mobile phones that they turn on, so not much we can do, my father fell last week and DM had to call 999, he didn’t need hospital thankfully.

I think being in denial about age and age related issues is quite common but potentially dangerous and hard to navigate. Dreading it with my parents, still got MiL worries even though she is in a caring nursing home.

The social worker thought my mum had capacity until she told him that the ladies in the hospital ward had had a party for her but she hadn't joined in because they couldn't find her! She couldn't say where she had been or why they had had a party but they had definitely been sorry she hadn't been there!

My cousin and I knew she was hallucinating and imagining things but his face as she told him about it all was hilarious!

@Lightuptheroom they certainly get some very strange ideas. My ILs had a very small 4 room bungalow. MILs equipment meant FIL needed a separate bedroom. The living room was tiny and there were just 2 small (and uncomfortable) armchairs as needed space to move the wheelchair around and access to kitchen. He was utterly convinced that SS would provide a live in carer for them (at the time he had no care needs himself, just not used to preparing his own meals and doing laundry). When SS said no he thought it was perfectly reasonable that we should do it instead despite working full time and living an hour away.

@countrygirl99 my mum keeps trying to give my dad away! The house (housing association) is fully adapted for his extensive physical disability needs so that's not happening!

@Lightuptheroom without POA you are really stuck. If your parents are anything like mine they will pull every last mental resource together to put on a show of coping for the SW. Dad would never tell the SW about any of mum's problems, just sit agreeing with her.
FIL was the same wuth telling SW he was coping fine, then he would moan to us about not getting some type of help that he would never realistically get anyway having turned turned down perfectly reasonable offers of respite. Then he would lie to us about what had been offered by SW to try and get one of us to move in to look after them even though that would mean the carer had to sleep in the very small living room that the kitchen was accessed through.
And people used to tell us we were lucky to have all 4 parents still alive at 80+.

@countrygirl99 we never know when the assessments are taking place, impossible to attend from 3 hours away at short notice as working full time. I did try to 'accidently' be there but my mum stated that she had visitors and it was time for me to leave!

Luckily we've been there for social services assessments as mum can seem quite with it in the moment and will happily tell the SW that she manages her own finances using her tablet. It hasn't worked for about a year, she's never used online banking in her life and she can't even manage her paper bill. The newsagent has been sending it to DB who does a transfer from mum's account since the beginning of the year when they threatened to stop delivering it hadn't been paid for so long.

@Lightuptheroom what a nightmare and whilst I do understand the time and staffing constraints of the services involved I find the GP system is failing. The joke is medical
school places to continue to be oversubscribed but bright keen potential doctors who are turned away. (But that’s another story). Whilst elderly medical and mental health needs must be a huge NHS issue I am not convinced enough training is given.

At one point when we were going through frustrations with care for MiL I wrote to my MP who is fantastic, often seen in Parliament, kind and keen and replies to every email - eventually. I would add your MP to your contacts and ask their advice too.

The other major issue we have is dad views social services with extreme suspicion and that any involvement from them will result in him being 'put in a home' , so he often blocks anything they are trying to put in place almost through fear. It doesn't matter how many times anyone tells him it isn't so. Probably because he knows that if they did remove mum he would struggle to cope alone. This has meant that for care assessments he tells blatant lies, like he makes his own dinner etc.
We can't stop this as they both ban us all from any appointments, other than with consultants he's under for the health needs, so we only ever hear their very twisted side of the story
Social services will only put certain things in place, mum doesn't meet threshold for a day centre, dad won't attend a day centre , so they're literally left with mum flinging verbal insults and fists at him 24/7. Mum's argument is that she's the only one who looks after him, and in a strange way she's right.

Thanks all
Dad is a very obstinate man. He won't pay for respite (has the means to do so) has never in living memory paid for a holiday. My mum doesn't have the means to pay for a holiday for herself. His view is that holidays are an expensive waste of time.
Dad gets problems with catheter blockages, recently paramedics were called, they immediately raised yet another safeguarding as my mum thought it was hilarious that dad was screaming in pain. None of us are close enough to 'be there" in any situation, and because they both apparently have full capacity then the professionals won't discuss the situation with us.
The district nurses who visit my dad twice a week don't think my mum has capacity, yet every referral they've made has been bounced back to social services (even when my mum smacked him over the head in front of the district nurse)
We've been told that the SW is arranging an MDT, this was at the end of June.
She's never seen by the GP as during 'normal' periods she rings and cancels any appointments, the GP doesn't follow this up at all despite repeated requests to do so. She has no insight at all into her current behaviours and thinks everyone else is delusional or in the wrong.
The standard response from the SW is 'what do you want us to do' how the hell do we know what they need to do? She may have dementia, she might not, but how can they continue to be in one place without intervention. It feels like we're sitting on a ticking bomb with everyone refusing to hold on to it in case it explodes in their face !

@Lightuptheroom . I would put concerns in full in writing to their GP so they have that on record and same to head of social services, and look up to see if your LA has a dementia nurse service and whether you can contact them. Ours did and although they don’t have many powers they know how things work and who to contact. Your mother needs to be assessed and I expect she has depression, but from what you say would refuse an assessment and medication. I can’t understand your SW, if this was a mother and child situation surely they would act!?

Could you call 999 for an ambulance?, I know it isn’t strictly needed but we were forced to call them twice by DN and GP. The paramedics were so knowledgeable and also had influence on MiLs care and got her visits extended. I believe everything they see is recorded and passed on to the GP? So again it builds a picture.

I agree with others some sort of respite is needed as a start.

MiL very agitated and screaming and being difficult at nursing home, we have been advised GP will prescribe anti depressants. BiL visited and described her as 2% lucid, recognised him but then was screaming help me, take me out, etc etc. We were advised not to visit after that. DH says the heat will have affected her sleep and this will be part of the cause …. BiL hadn’t seen her like that before, he didn’t realise how many times I have - including in her home and when the neighbours called me. I am not sure what triggers it - rather hoped the many assessments she is having would conclude - but if anti depressants calm her that will be good news all round. 🤞🤞

That should be late July, not last July

@Lightuptheroom that sounds a nightmare. Does your LA have a complaints procedure?

MIL is back at the hospital having been discharged back to the care home Friday evening. Different problem this time. Last night she was complaining of pains in her arms so paramedics called, ecg fine but they've taken her in for tests so she might be back at the home today. This is the 4th time since last July. 2 have been admissions for about a week and one back same day.

No idea how you get another ‘opinion’ from an independent SW, but your SW appears to be out of their depth and absolutely blocking process.
There are a handful of posters here who might have specific knowledge about what happens in this instance.
This has been relentless for your poor DF and you. Shame your DM doesn’t take herself off for a holiday somewhere and let everyone else regroup. 💐

Oh God @Lightuptheroom how awful.

Your Dad is clearly a vulnerable adult. I think the focus should be on him as the victim here of domestic violence. I can't suggest anything though except to keep reporting it to everyone- your dad's GP, police, adult safeguarding.

Would your dad agree to respite care for a bit?

Things with my parents are getting worse. I wrote to the GP and social worker last week as my dad told me that my mum had repeatedly punched him and pinched his nose until he couldn't breath (he has lung disease so this is very bad) The response from the GP to the email last Monday is to make my mum an appointment face to face tomorrow with a GP that she is very vocal about disliking (she tells anyone who will listen that he kills people) so that's a disaster waiting to happen.

Only contact to the family from the GP was to tell us to raise safety concerns with the social worker. We've done this and heard nothing at all, not even an acknowledgement. The social worker has previously stated that she doesn't have my parents consent to discuss them with myself or my siblings (so whats the point of raising yet another safeguarding concern?)

This will be the third time my mum has hit my dad. The previous 2 times social worker called the police. The police interviewed both of my parents in the same house and my mum found it hilarious that they told her to stop assaulting him. The police then left each time leaving him alone with her.

My dad is physically disabled, catheter, cancer, lung disease , getting increasingly frail , social worker says he has no care needs

Social services put in 2 care visits a day because of my mum's behaviour, but my parents don't allow the carers to do anything other than make them a cup of tea

In between extremely angry, aggressive outbursts, my mum stays upstairs in their house and sleeps most of the day.
She still drives and will go and get 'lunch' which is fish and chips everyday. My dad also has a swallowing problem and has been told to eat a soft diet. He gags on his food and is sick every time.

This week, my mum reversed her car into the gate post, she's refusing to contact her insurance company as she has decided they will write off the car, repairs are going to be expensive as she's destroyed the back bumper.

Neither my mum or dad will even talk about POA.

What do we do next? Just wait until she does something really bad?

Oops, missed a bit. I should have said that I needed someone who knew both mum and me as I was doing my LPA at the same time as mum's.

@MereDintofPandiculation I needed someone who knew both mum and me so I didn't have a massive group to choose from. I have a friend who has known my parents for as long as she's known me and she was willing to do it. I witnessed her will at the same time. The further complication is that mum didn't want anyone knowing her business so that knocked her neighbours out. It doesn't need to be a professional so I could have provided the neighbour with a bit of paper explaining what they needed to do but then they would have known and that was unacceptable.

Neither of my sons have children so we don't have that option. The partner of the one that lives in the UK can't have children and the other lives abroad. If his wife got pregnant today I'd be 83 by the time they are 18 as well.