Just been to visit dh gran in a care home, so depressing

[Wolfscarf]

Really makes you think about life

one person was tryig to escape when we arrived
must have had dementia
sayign have you seen my wife have you touched my wife
and o want to go home

then when we left another lady was trying to escape

dh gran is stuck in her v small room alotnof the time as there’s no carers
to take her downstairs then bring her back as they are short staffed all the time

the staff seem lovely but I feel so so bad for them
I don’t know how they do it

I felt exactly like this after visiting my Mum - she died in a nursing home in 2019, she had mental health issues and terminal bowel cancer and ended up in a dementia nursing home as there wasn’t anywhere else suitable. I saw things that will stay with me forever. I’d rather die at home than get like that but quite often we just don’t have a choice. Very sad.

After fire so sorry for the loss of your mum

isn’t life cruel
ive come out of there today feeling really weird and thinking of illness and death

Honestly I fully intend to off myself at the slightest hint of going down that particular road. Imagine somebody is probably paying a grand a week for the pleasure of it as well.

Mosman I wonder tho if you do get to that age and stage tho of you would actually really think that
i know I think right now that would be more humane
but perhaps when you get to that age you just wanna keep going

when I saw my Nan in one I came away with the impression that it was basically a warehouse for the elderly until the inevitable. Not so much a waiting room as a warehouse, each room stuffed with an old person basically waiting to die.

it really messed my mental health up for about a week. Utterly depressing.

I know my Nan would have happily died 20 years ago - but she’s religious so it’s not her choice she believes

I am a carer in a home for Dementia residents, I agree with you, it really us sad and absolutely makes you think. We are also constantly understaffed which means residents dont often get needs above eating, toiletting and washing attended to.

The carers I work with are fantastic, many working 12 hours a day, 4 or 5 days straight and the nature of the job means we are constantly on our feet, so it is both physically and emotionally draining.

Our alarm often goes off to alert us that a fire exit has been opened, meaning someone has tried to get out, in our home it's always the same gentleman and tbh part of me often hopes he'll make it, but his Dementia means he would be at serious risk alone in the outside world. But care homes are bloody awful, generally, save for a select few.

We try to make our residents as comfortable as possible, but that does not take away from the fact that for many, it is a lonely, undignified and depressing experience.

my dad has been in a dementia home self funding but only a couple of months worth left his home is good £1400 a week yes they are short staffed they all seem to be but the staff are good

my dad spends most of his day in the open plan lounge its great as there are coming's and goings alot and is well designed i cant imagine him being stuck in his room apart from sleeping

my dad cant really walk and cant feed himself but i often feed him and i enjoy it the staff are so grateful as it frees them up for other resident,my only concern is if he will be able to stay once his self funding stops thats on my to do list this coming week

This sounds awful but when my dad had a stroke (he had been previously fit and healthy albeit in his 70s), it was almost a relief when he passed away peacefully in hospital. He would have hated living in a care home with limited capability to do anything (a full recovery was sadly never on the cards, best case scenario was help with day to day tasks and unable to walk or eat etc). I do feel selfish as I would have also hated seeing him like that. I do miss him terribly and of course part of me does wish he was still here, in any capacity, but yes my rationale brain is thakful he isn't.

To add, without intending to turn this into a political debate, I have always believed in Euthanasia, and working in a care home has absolutely cemented that view.

It's interesting that places are understaffed but I bet the owners charge the same and simply make a bigger profit. Whilst the elderly less care because the staff cant cope for the same cost.

Similar situation with my Nan. She was in a home but they said her dementia meant she couldn’t stay in that home. We’ve now secured funding / or the council have agreed she needs specialist care. Issue is there are no homes so she’s now in hospital. Her needs are too complex for our family - we’ve tried carers in her home- we’ve tried family staying with her but she keeps attacking people.

my mum said that my Nan said a few months ago she wishes there was just a way to die now.

100% my Nan has no quality of life now.

If the staff were paid more then more people would want to work in care homes and things wouldn't be so shit.

DF is currently in a dementia care home and he is one of the more ‘with it’ ones. Some of them are just sitting rocking and dribbling, or chatting about the same thing over and over on a 2 minute loop. DF has tried to escape. He always said if he ever starts losing it he would do away with himself, problem is he didn’t realise he was getting forgetful. He no longer recognises my DH & thinks my adult DC are little and asks me if I’m collecting them from school when I leave.

Both DGM died in nursing homes. Both ended up with dementia but one initially was in due to mobility issues and being unable to care for herself. We wouldn’t keep animals alive longer than necessary to live like this, modern medicine is keeping us all alive too long.

I’ve just completed this so that if I am unfortunate enough to need a home I won’t be kept alive longer by having every UTI, chest infection or bout of pneumonia treated with antibiotics. They can give me painkillers to keep me comfortable but I don’t want to be kept alive in misery longer!

mydecisions.org.uk

Me too.

hassletassle, I'm not sure whether this is actually true. The pay isn't great, but we have high staff turnover mostly due to the nature of the job. It's not easy work and requires a string stomach and plenty of compassionand patience which some people simply do not have.

One of my friends was unemployed years ago and the job centre were so far up her arse trying to get her to find work (which she was actively doing), I suggested care work to her. She said she had been a cleaner in a care home as her first ever job when she was younger and would never consider it as she just doesnt have the patience or stomach to deal with the smell and various bodily fluids.

Trouble is although it used to be a lucrative money spinner, margins are pretty tight now. Its not just about staffing anymore but it's not worth the effort for many and so a lot have closed or have failed inspections which forces their hand. Kind of like private nurseries I suppose, the demand is often there but there's not the appetite for business owners to go for it. The whole sector needs looking at to be honest, the way its funded is wild as well.

Cuppasoupmonster, I honestly believe that it will never be legal, because there's too much money to be made from care for the elderly. As depressing a concept as that is.

Having seen my gran gradually deteriorate with dementia I am all about quality of life over quantity and pro-euthanasia.

Guitarbar, our home has just been acquired only last week, from a small company who own 17 others, so presumably there's still money to be made.

We were called to a meeting last week and one thing that was mentioned was that food budgets should be kept to a disgustingly low level figure, so ultimately it's the residents who suffer. They've also change provider of pads I noticed, and quite frankly they're shit in comparison to the old ones, so costs have been cut there too.

They'd probably just employ less staff

They've approved euthanasia where we live and I intend to go that route if I become incapacitated

Coldymccold, they do, which creates a viscous cycle of heavier workload for those remaining, which then often leave because they've had enough.

My mum was at home until she died with carers looking after her. She was in her bed staring at the ceiling and talking to invisible relatives. Dementia is sad wherever you are. I felt horribly guilty when she was left alone for a few hours, but she didn't know as she slept most of the time. It's just how it is