🪳 Cockroach Cafe 🪳 Autumn 2023

Your sister has a real nerve complaining. Maybe she'd like to come over fir a while. You have a right to your own life.

if anyone likes piano music this was in my pianist magazine this month which is going to be on the music stand for Friday afternoon along with some other Christmas Jazz. It's too gorgeous for words. A moment of beautiful calm in our busy lives

Mum is going off fir her break tomorrow. The home seemed really nice, lots of staff who were v friendly and we met several very friendly ladies that were sitting in the conservatory. There were two chefs making lunch which smelt delicious. Bedroom very pretty and decorated like my fashionable-fir-the-older-lady MILs house.
so after 3 nights abd 5 days here I will finally get to have good sleep on Friday !

When the nurse asked if he had any support at home he said "no" !

This is so much like my mum who'll happily tell nursing staff that she has no local help whilst I'm sat next to her at appointments!

I'm currently being guilt tripped due to working away. I now won't see my parents until early Dec but of course mum doesn't understand self employed working and I'm getting complaints from my sister who lives overseas. I wouldn't mind but I still phone mum almost every day even when I'm working in Europe.

Well Dad is a couple of Naproxen down and expressed he felt "fighting fit" 😂 I did suggest maybe not getting complacent quite so soon.
while mum is on her " spa break" as we refer to it, we are going to do a bit of spring cleaning, shampoo the carpets that he's been wanting to do since he treated himself to a fancy shampooer last year and fill and touch up the woodwork & paintwork that's got knocked about with the wheelchair. I know dad was very proud of their home and it bugs him that it's looking a bit unkempt so I think a good clean and the rest will do him the power of good.

Good point - the microwave is a good brand (Panasonic) and only a couple of years old so I’d hope the electrics would be ok. I think it doesn’t help that sometimes the door isn’t shut properly so the light stays on and that can get quite hot. It did smell of the food mum likes though, but gone off. Bit like when the food scraps bin isn’t emptied often enough.

@funnelfan are the electrics/ plug on the microwave ok? Just thinking sometimes how electricity can have a fishy smell? Hope that doesn’t sound totally bonkers!

@StiffyByngsDogBartholomew glad your DF’s seen the light.

Result. Hopefully he will see the light

Result @StiffyByngsDogBartholomew !

🍾🍾🍾🍾🍾🍾🍾🍾🍾
"she needs to go into respite asap so I can have a break"

mum is sanguine about it and I think she realised yesterday the toll it has taken on dads health. So hopefully a couple of weeks will give him some time to recuperate, nurse has issued medication which he has taken already so hopefully things looking up now here.
plus home has a lovely looking dog so Dd will be delighted to go. Dad will be able to eat there with mum, I'm sure he will take advantage of this

@MereDintofPandiculation ha, yes, that is good advice and I should try to let it go over my head.
Re the local councillor, for many years it was my DF and DM was one herself, even Town Mayor one year - the chap who took over from DF is a good family friend and she’s not averse to phoning him - she’s even phoned our MP on occasion.
Anyway it transpires the car belongs to my nephew and he’s left it there temporarily as DB does not have enough room on his drive. (I had to go to DB for this piece of info).

The carers prepare all mums food and so are the ones using the microwave, so I’m afraid I don’t feel it’s unreasonable for them to give it a quick wipe if there’s been some spattering. They’d wipe the work surface if there had been a spill there and they wash up mums plate and cup for her. In fact the kitchen is usually very tidy. I make sure there’s loads of cleaning products, wipes, etc they can use if they need.

i cleaned the microwave so it’s hygienic now, if it continues to smell then there’s not a lot else I can do. The house is already full of little notices and signs explaining what things are so I try to avoid adding more unless it’s really essential.

Calls from 2 rellies today. One I provide moral support for, the other, will be staying overnight in a few weeks. Luckily nobody at death's door, as it turns out the shitty cold which kept me up all night is COVID.

Thank the Lord they all have capacity! Please let the braincells hang on in there...

At least my mum gets out without me. It's something I'm very grateful for. I know she tells me she has been to activities when she hasn't some weeks but 🤷‍♀️. I have her best friends number and speak to her occasionally to check if she has any concerns and back in the summer she said there was no line dancing for 3 weeks as the person who runs it was away. Ditto there was no church lunch club in August due to holidays. I asked mum what she'd been up to recently she still said line dancing/lunch club so I'm never really certain what she's done.

@BestIsWest my DM doesn't go out either unless I take her, a tbh it's a physical struggle for me to do that. It means pushing her in a wheelchair, and although she's not a large person it is still hard work. I have 2 hernias along a major scar from abdominal surgery and I am being assessed next week to see if more surgery plus hernia repair is necessary. I shouldn't be lifting/pushing etc but if I don't do it no one else will.

DM lives with my sister who has adult children also living at home, and it just makes me especially annoyed because none of them has ever taken my mum for even 10 minutes round the park which is right across the road from their house. It's strange, isn't it, how some people can feel the burden of guilt while others carry on feeling nothing.

I had a moment yesterday because it’s the younger members of the family that are causing me worries - long term health issues for my DD and job worries for my DS. Both are having a tough time and I’m worried sick about them.

DM went on and on about a car that is parked outside her house. Why is it there? Who does it belong to? How long will it be there? What if someone needs to park there to take her out? I. Don’t. Care.

She has form for this. When DD was hospitalised with Covid in the first few months of the pandemic she went on and on about someone stealing the plastics recycling bag from outside her house. Who would do that to her? I’m afraid I lost it.

I’m also maintaining the minimum standards at the moment - she doesn’t get out unless I take her and I know that’s not great for her mental health but it’s not great for mine either. Of course I feel guilty.

It’s hard. I had a bit of a moment last weekend because I traced the source of a funky smell in the kitchen to the microwave, where the carers haven’t been wiping up food spatters over a period of time. Mum likes eating fish in sauce so you can imagine.

it’s the relatively little things like that that bring me down and think that no one else can care for mum like me or DB. But it doesn’t mean that at all, it just means that the carers needed a rocket up their arses a gentle reminder to do the basics of what they’re there for.

Oh believe me dad wouldn't have been saying it to try and get support. He has already cancelled half of the career visits he's entitled to and won't take any assistance he has been offered. He already feels he has caused enough of a nuisance. When I said that the carers need to get mum up not him he said "but they need a double up and they don't have the staff". He can't see that their lack of staff is not his problem and if an 80year old man can get her out of bed alone, so can a 25 year old ! The carers have confirmed they only need 1 person anyway.

we have had a good morning though, nursing home near us has space for respite care, is well reviewed and we are going to view it in the morning. It's just 5 minutes up the road and dad is actually quite positive about it

@EmmaEmerald Job done. Game on.
You've found your way forward, and, while it won't necessarily be perfect everyday, you'll soon only have half the property baggage that was weighing you down.