The second new shiny 2019 thread ...

[MereDintofPandiculation]

... for anyone caring for elderly parents. Come and join us to ask for, or to give, sympathy, ask for advice, or have a good rant.

minty it sounds to me as if your mum is panicking, your dad is not doing too well and she doesnt know what to do? I second what everyone else has said about not jumping straight to a care home, which could be financially catastrophic for all of you, and not what they actually want at all.

what dint said above is right : if they choose care home then you dont actually have to be available or do anything bar visit when it suits you or you are actually able mentally/physically to do it.

cockroach = in one of my mum's unsuccessful forays into care, they had a 'visiting animal' day or something, and she was asked to name this small animal with a hard back - which she couldnt do. My DB, unhelpfully but amusingly, suggested 'cockroach' and it has become our toast to all those struggling with the sheer hell on earth that is coping with our elderlies.

minty would respite care for a short period to give them a flavour if it be helpful? Or age uk type conversations? It is so hard but I also echo the warnings re deprivation of assets.
yolo how is it going? How is your dh?
cockroach everyone!

sandwich thank you for asking. treatment finished mon/tues, he feels absolutely bloody awful at the moment but I suppose that is because it's like the peak of 5 weeks of chemo/radio, and that in a week or so he should start to feel better (I hope). MRI end of April, then surgery to follow.
cockroach to all

Yolo glad to hear MrYolo has finished his treatment. What's next re treatment? Can you manage a holiday together or anything this Spring?

Minty i get it re finances. I've been a bit financially enmeshed with my parents with us all working for the greater good and trying to build assets for me later and then my kids after that. I've taken very little for myself (family business) but that's been very unwise as a fair amount of their pot is morally at least mine. I should have done more for my nuclear family rather than m&d financially but we're all too far along the road now.

Suspect there may well be pockets in shrouds, contrary to popular belief.

thigh I think we will have to leave ti til after the MRI (end April) and then surgery (soon after?) So might wait til early Sept when we can take the DDs and DD2's boyf. He is certainly not well enough at the mo to plan anything... your finances sound complicated, hope you can get them sorted.

In other news I have been gardening like a mad thing the last few days. Very satisfying but I am covered in mud and still masses more to do. Weasel fuckwit solicitor and his PA have been unavailable all week, DB finally got through today and kicked some arse to discover that the vital HMRC form - which has been with them some 4 weeks - was finally 'posted today'. First off, who the fuck posts things to HMRC in this day and age? Second off, is there a kind of trip advisor for solicitors??

just a quick note to say OMD HOW CAN THIS ELDERLY PARENT THING BE SO DEPRESSING.

BECAUSE IT BLOODY WELL IS!!! I hear you grace cockroach and breathe

Have a cockroach from me too folks!

Turned out my mum is worrying herself silly about a million and one tiny, solvable things and the care home suggestion was her kneejerk reaction.

I sat down with her yesterday, made a note of all the issues and 'solved' most of them.

We need to duplicate some of the things dad needs on the regular he has an upstairs and a downstairs set; get the extension/conversion quote hurried along, and she needs to be doing less laundry - dad used to re-wear an outfit 2 days running but mum/carer have got in the habit of putting everything in the wash daily which isn't necessary on the whole and just making a load more work.

She's confirmed that she feels fine about managing her own cleaning and their meds which are delivered and she sorts into pill organisers. She has her food shopping delivered and uses a fair bit of pre-prepped food as she's never liked cooking so that's not an issue. Have suggested she gets a dishwasher now dad isn't able to stand long enough to do the washing up!

There are some bigger house/garden jobs which I'll help her sort over the Easter hols, along with my best mate, who's a gardener.

Also going to look at me taking dad out to give her a break and hopefully improve his MH.

In other news I've had a proposal from work re my phased return following a month signed off with stress. It bears very little resemblance to suggestion we received from occupational health so not entirely sure where to go with that.

thigh I'm sorry you're in that situation...sounds even more complicated than mine, and I think you're right about pockets in shrouds!

Yolo hope yoir husband is feeling stronger soon, sounds like you're really going through it

yolo sorry to hear your dh is feeling so rough and the weasel is not doing his stuff....
minty glad to hear you have some plans to help sort your dps- but the wisdom from others on here is do what only you can do, outsource and put in place stuff. Hope work works out.
grace I hear you..... cockroachto everyone.

First off, who the fuck posts things to HMRC in this day and age? I do!

Shhh, careful there Dint!

Yolo has a trug and a trowel and she's not afraid to use them.

dint I can hardly believe I am saying this, to you of all people, but you disappoint me!! thigh yes and I have a ride on mower too - need to get petrol for it before we all brexshit etc. I am on a garden mission at the moment - was on the same this time last year then it all went tits up with mum, determined 2019 will not beat me!

Dad would have been so disappointed with Brexit, it's a good job he's batshit gaga now.

I reassured him yesterday that the abolition of hanging was still in place. He asked me whether I'd like to have more children with my son and calls my sister by my dog's name.

oh my lovely thigh that's so hard and I do feel for you. I am so relieved mum went when she did, she was batshit and terrified. Batshit on its own maybe ok (although hard for those of you listening) but the fear mum went through...I wouldnt wish it on anyone, not even bloody Teresa May!

PS I frequently call my children by the dog's name... or the dog by the childrens' names...

Yolo has a trug and a trowel and she's not afraid to use them. Ah, but I have a scythe, and I know how to use it!

I'm planning a garden day today. Such a luxury nowadays. Though in response to determined 2019 will not beat me I would remind yolo that every year, about May, I think "it's really going well, this year I've cracked it", and every year in June I have to admit that the growth spurt has been overwhelming and the garden has got away from me again.

I know it's not the same as sending things to HMRC by post, but it's related ... "According to the survey of 3,000 consumers, three-quarters (74%) of those aged 55-plus never use mobile-banking apps, while the figure for low-income earners was 57%." "The review ... with more than 80% of people in Britain saying they pay taxi drivers, newspaper sellers, window cleaners and gardeners with notes and coins." It's a world away from MN!

thigh ach, I feel for you and your dad.

minty glad that went well.

Dint you have a SCYTHE? Anyone else thinking what I'm thinking?!

okay, I have some stuff to say and it probably won't make a huge amount of sense....following my post on here about how it's all so depressing, I managed to burst into tears for no reason again while at mum's. She is not stupid; she knows this isn't about dad any more. And she looked at me sadly and said "the problem is me, isn't it?"

of course I said it wasn't.

it's not terrible every visit. Some visits are fine. I suppose it depends how I find her, and her mood, and I've said before that she radiates sadness sometimes in spite of trying to be cheerful for me.

I just can't work out the best way forward. There is no rhyme or reason to feeling terrible and when or why it happens. I was trying to figure it out last night and I realise that to a large extent, because I was there a lot less before dad got ill, I just didn't notice the general depressing tone of the place. He himself commented about getting older and how depressing the conversations with friends in his age group can be.

Also, some of it is definitely me - I didn't want to get married and have children, I've never been interested in being close to someone. Some of the conversations mum has are absolutely just normal chit chat that you'd have daily with people - I used to put earphones in at work to avoid these sorts of conversations!

I need to learn to be more tolerant but I don't know how.

Also some days, like yesterday - I arrived feeling perfectly cheerful and as soon as I step in the door I feel depressed.

we ran a bunch of errands yesterday and mum sent me on ahead saying "you will get xyz done in a third of the time, so I will meet you back at so and so".

Agree, and that's fine. But it makes me stop and think OMD please don't let me get that old. I feel as if this situation is massively ageing me. I try not to think about her when I'm not there, but in some ways I think that makes it worse - like I arrive there, it's another planet and a planet I don't want to be on.

that was a long selfish rant, sorry. I just didn't think I could share this with anyone else. I also can't believe that my relationship with my lovely mother now feels like such a burden.

Had a 4 page letter from our local trust, in relation to mum's treatment/death. It is quite a remarkable fudge - lots of apologies, but very little recognition of some actual facts. And a blame-passing! Eg, mum was moved to a women's health ward when they thought she had noro, and a private room was available there but not on orthopaedics ward. The staff on that ward told me she should be on the previous ward "as that's where the doctors are" and that they couldnt call a different consultant to discuss pain/hideous aspect of her arm when her consultant was out of the place as not etiquette. This apparently all the fault of the nurses on the ward... who couldnt be expected to cope with a broken humerus because they are a gynae ward. Need to photocopy it and go through with fine toothcomb before sending to DB (who is shit hot on this kind of stuff), but honestly, the amount of backcovering going on is not hidden by all the condolences they express. Apparently we can meet with nursing staff or take it to the health care ombudsman next. Meeting with nursing staff would be useless I think, we'd get more cover ups and DB would explode which would potentially be very nasty. And in all the four pages, not a mention that no one told us she had bronchopneumonia (official cause of death). TBF they weren't expecting her to die, but even with DH cancer if I'd known she had that I would have gone and sat with her - she was so bloody frail the slightest breeze could have taken her away. As it is none of us was there for the last 3 weeks or so before she died which makes me feel bad... DB was back in Devon, I was dealing with DH and kids' reaction etc, and she was so demented and frightened I didnt think me going made her any better. Had I known though, I would have gone and done the right thing.

God sorry grace crossposted. Let me go back and read yours.

and sorry about no bloody paragraphs in mine!!

And she looked at me sadly and said "the problem is me, isn't it?"

The thing is, it's not her, it's not you, it's the situation. She's lost her husband, you've lost your dad. They are completely different relationships and no one gives you a map on how to negotiate them, or how to negotiate between the two if you see what I mean.

It also sounds to me as if you are a solitary, independent person, while your mum has always relied on your dad and is now looking to you (even if she's trying hard not to I think it will be in the back of her mind that grace is always there). So reconciling those two is always going to be a difficult thing.

To me, you sound as if you are always doing your absolute best for your mum - which is bloody exhausting and you can't be expected to carry everything for ever. I'm sure you've said before, but does she have friends/church/social activities etc? I know you've done brilliantly with the practicalities, but the emotional side is a toughie.

Hugs and , not sure if I'm making sense as so pissed off with hospital letter but taking Ddog out to beach now which will clear my brain - just didnt want you to feel you were unheard.

Piper welcome along, someone with more brains that I have will be along to help soon, I’m sure!

Yolo – I am not an expert by any stretch, but the fact that no one mentioned the bronchopneumonia suggests to me that maybe they never knew she had it? Is there any chance your mum had it without showing any symptoms? I don’t know what the difference is but when I had regular pneumonia, the doctor mentioned to me that lots of people don’t realise they have it, or it takes weeks before they realise something is wrong and get to the doc at all.

Thank you for your kind words. You are right…there is no road map for this but that’s what I find frustrating and upsetting. I – perhaps stupidly – never thought about the emotional road map of my life having to include someone else. Yes, life throws curve balls but normally it's just me, catching the ball for me, and deciding how I will cope with it and it doesn't affect anyone else. How I miss that life!

Re socialising, my mum is doing this but she’s not enjoying it. I think she mostly does it because she is aware that she must have people other than me who can help out in future if she needs it. Interestingly I think her personality might be more like mine – but because she followed dad’s social life for 60 years, her introversion didn’t really come out, or she didn’t mind going out because she was with him, maybe.

She is also managing the practicalities quite well now.
I wish I could work out why some visits are fine and some aren’t.

Grace - I feel a similar burden, and it's so Hotel California. What has helped a bit for me and my DM is ... scrabble! My mum and I were never that close and the conversation doesn't flow (plus she's deaf and has cognitive decline so...) but she loves a good game of scrabble. That's our regular thing now. Once a week I go round, make lunch, do a bit of cleaning, and we have a nice game of scrabble with coffee and biscuits. Then I see her one other evening (unless she's poorly, which is often 😱.
We both enjoy it. That's my boundary - twice a week. I'm not going there every day, I couldn't.

Welcome Pipersouth I so recognise that feeling of wanting to help but not finding the right way to do so.

One of the most frustrating things I find dealing with my, or rather out elderlies, is that they routinely reject suggestions which seem pretty routine to me and yet, for reasons that remain unfathomable, are just not acceptable to the elderlies.

I have trained myself to suggest anything only once during any one visit and do anything they ask for. It also seems to help if you can warm up everyone who interacts to make the same suggestions.

Sometimes they pick up on a suggestion , just when I have finally given up.

Sorry if that isn't the sort of answer you were looking for. For me, it helps to know that it's them, not us. Hope it works for you, too.