Cockroach cafe 🪳 Spring 2022 🪳

[MereDintofPandiculation]

Welcome! Those of you who have been before will notice the Bad Daughters’ Room is now called the Kumquat Room, and there are a couple of fine kumquats in the Conservatory.

Check also the Stationery cupboard with, among other things, the 🪳emoticon ready to cut and paste.

Anyway, come in when you want to share good news, or to rant, or to ask a small question that doesn't warrant its own thread. Or just to hang out with others who understand what you're going through.

For newbies: why cockroach? Previous long term resident of "Elderly Parents" Yolo's DM attended a 'small animal event' in a nursing home, and was presented with a "small animal with a hard back" the name of which species she couldn't remember. Her ever helpful DB suggested cockroach, and it has become a toast on here. So 🪳 mes amis/amies, and may you all live to fight another day.

I seem to remember that Goldentits was encouraging your DM to get that house, so maybe she can help facilitate making it habitable?

Sounds like your DM's paperwork is going to be a nightmare to sort with 3 properties in her name.

@Fantasea Did you have a previous user name when you posted about Goldentits. Goldentits has legendary status on this board 🤣

@Mum5net I changed my username about two years ago but it wasn't Goldentits. A good friend of mine named my sister this and it has stuck!

GoldenTits is a great name for an entitled sister.

May I have a small whine/whinge/rant? Quick background - mum lived with us and paid the utility bills as her contribution to the household expenses. She constantly had the heating on, electric blanket all night every night etc. She went into hospital and into a home and dementia has well and truly taken hold.
We have been transferring money into her account to cover the bills as the energy supplier would not communicate with us.

At the beginning of August we switched our energy and broadband account to Utility Warehouse meaning the account would be in our name. They said that they would deal with the original suppliers. BT which was in our name and paid from our account gave us a refund. We heard nothing from EON but as the account was in my mum's name I didn't expect to hear from them directly but expected at some point there would be a final balance taken from mum's account or put back in. Today I have checked her account and they have taken nearly £ 400 today - the usual direct debit.

UW can't help - they don't understand why they have taken the direct debit when it has been a month since they were notified that the provider had changed. EON won't speak to me so currently we are having to pay twice - the account in our name and the account in my mother's. I have emailed EON and asked them to send an explanation to my mother at our address. We wait with baited breath to see if they do. I have cancelled the direct debit from mum's account but I worry that it will affect our credit rating. Such stress!

@IthinkIsawahairbrushbackthere we had the same problem with Eon - after my ma moved they were informed of the date etc but still took her dd as normal. We challenged and they eventually repaid but it seems to be a regular thing with them. Having said that, they did repay fairly promptly after we complained so I would hope they do the same for you.

Well that sounds reasonably hopeful - I can't afford to pay two lots of energy bills for the same house! Thank you.

It won’t affect your credit rating, only your Mum’s. You can ask Eon to correct the record if they register a default, and if they won’t, you can add an explanation. In theory, that is - I’ve never had to do this!

We have had a development. There is a human being in the EON customer service who emailed me yesterday. At her request I sent her photographic evidence of our meter readings when we switched suppliers and she has confirmed that my mum has overpaid and is due a refund. The refund has to be issued by cheque to her current address which is fair enough. It is a pain because I only visit once a week so I will collect the cheque from the home on my next visit after it arrives and then I'll have to get a bus to the next town to the bank but at least I will no longer be paying £ 400 a month for the energy bill!

@IthinkIsawahairbrushbackthere I'm pleased you've made some progress and a refund is on its way, what a relief for you. You can post the cheque with a paying in slip to your mum's bank and they will process it as soon as it arrives. I did this a couple of times in lockdown, one time my mum had given both me and DD a cheque each so I posted both cheques with a paying in slip each in the same envelope and just put a post-it on the top of my one asking them to pay them in.

@IthinkIsawahairbrushbackthere Before you hike to town, check whether you can pay the cheque in at the post office. I know there aren't as many around as there used to be but they are still more common than banks.

Yes, my husband suggested that. We are so used to transferring money between accounts that it has been ages since mum received a cheque. We'll see if we can do it in the Post Office and if not DH can use his bus pass on his day off and do it for me! If I go into town it will cost a lot more than the bus fare - a look round the shops and a cuppa at least!

How things have changed in my lifetime! When I first had a bank account, In theory you could still use a cheque almost like a bank note, eg pass a cheque made out to you to someone else to pay into their account. So if you posted a cheque, for safety you wrote A/C payee only across it, so that no-one could help themselves to it in transit. And now cheques are incredibly difficult to pay in, often only with a bar-coded paying in slip, and I imagine there are many people who have neither written nor received a cheque.

Our bank has a branch in our town but mum's doesn't. I don't know when she last needed a cheque to be paid in - definitely pre pandemic.

I have to say that the Lloyds app is fantastic for cheques. I’m named on DM’s account and do all her banking and simply scan cheques in on my phone. I don’t know if any other banks do it.

Morning cockroaches. Budge up I'm reclaiming my spot on the bad daughter's bench. I've been lurking and supporting you all quietly.
My own DF has had a cancer diagnosis, not curable but treatable. Due to start chemo soon. As you can imagine there has been appointments too many to count and I have taken him to every one despite a complete lack of thanks. Unless you count the time he phoned me in a panic with excruciating pain and feeling dizzy and I dropped everything to stay with him while he refused all other suggestions of help and he told me I'd done perfectly adequate. Anyhow, he is at least acknowledging that our dream holiday, booked for 2020 but happening next month should go ahead. I have cousins who will step in and make sure he gets to appointments.
The new dilemma is FIL who also still lives alone but an hour away. He is getting frailer and small medical niggles that need attention and help from DH. tbh I've had very little to do with it, we've both concentrated on our own DF. I've put a lot of FIL's behaviour down to attention seeking. His own DM ran my MIL absolutely ragged, outliving her by 6 years but was at her most needy when there was other big events eg birth of our children, when MIL needed op. Anyway, I digress the amount of help require by FIL is ramping up. DH has just had a call about an upset tummy (and the associated mess), this will be third call in four days. We've already started ball rolling for moving him closer to us and put a key safe outside his flat. He is in a retirement complex without any wardens or carers but there is a caretaker who is worth her weight in gold who has directed us to a couple of agencies who might provide support. I think I finally realised last night how worn down DH is by it all, I really want to make sure we get away and let him have a break.
Sorry that's long but my question is this, is two weeks long enough to find a temporary place for FIL, a holiday for him while we are on holiday? I don't think he needs a care home as such but somewhere that will keep him safe and clean and facilitate any medical appointments. Does such a place exist? Are we looking at £££ (he can afford it). or do we look for someone who we can pay to pop in once or twice everyday, be the opposite of in loco parentis? Are there agencies we should approach?

God that's long, apologies.
TLDR: where can we source care for increasingly frail needy FIL while we are on holiday next month

Yes, there will be care homes that offer short term respite, ie 1 or 2 weeks 'holiday'
The medical appointments would probably have to be facilitated by someone else though unless it's listed as a service they offer. (Obviously emergency medical care is part of the arrangement, just not routine appointments.)

Other than that, care agencies often do short term contracts like you describe, ask around his local area and ring them.

Both of these options would need to be paid for by him. Depending on how frail he is, it's sometimes better to look at the respite option as he'd still be alone between carer visits and someone still has to be a contact for anything that may occur in-between times.

The only thing you may struggle with is if FIL decides he doesn't want to go/doesn't want carers as it's still his decision to make and from experience they can be bloody minded at times like this!!

For respite care I rang around and asked about vacancies. Ask them what they do about escorts for medical visits, MIL is in residential care and they organise hospital transport and provide an escort for £10 an hour. Once of the local care agencies does medical appointments as part of their service.

Whether it's residential respite or at home care is going to depend on what FIL will agree to, there's nothing stopping him cancelling either service the minute your flight takes off.

Hi first post on this thread but I feel I belong here! DF has Parkinson's, he's in a bad way with lack of mobility, delusions etc. DM needs a hip replacement, it was due to be done about three weeks ago but was cancelled at the last minute. She's obviously really upset and it was made worse because she had found respite care for DF and was looking forward to a few weeks off the full time caring she was having to do.

They are both at home now waiting for her re-scheduled appointment in a few weeks and he will go back into the home for respite care. My sibling and I managed to convince her to have carers in for half an hour in the morning to help get DF up, showered and dressed. ( We have been trying for nearly a year, even before the appointment for her op came through). But according to DM they aren't right. They don't come on time, they talk too much, DF is sitting in his pyjamas waiting for them to come, she doesn't think they are charging her correctly etc etc.

I've just come off the phone after she has been complaining about them again and I just want to bang my head on my desk. She admits she can't physically do it but she doesn't think they are worth it. I pointed out it's not long until her operation so can she bare with it until then but she didn't really reply to me. TBH I think she just likes to have something to moan about. Sorry for the rant but I'm all out of sympathy at the moment.

I felt better once I realised that mum wanted to moan but didn't want anything to change. I spent hours researching solutions to the problems she spent hours talking about and then had my feelings hurt when she dismissed my ideas without any thought. She didn't want a solution, she wanted an audience.

@Tupperwarelid let it all wash over you. If she was that upset she would have cancelled the carers. I wouldn't be happy having strangers come in my house at unpredictable times and I'd want to moan about it too. Sometimes we all have to do things we'd rather not do, it's part of being an adult. We don't have to like it, we just have to get it done. If you want to stop the conversation, ask her what she thinks the alternative is, pause and change the subject. I have once resorted to "Oh no, not this again, do we have to go through it now?" but it's not always a good idea to say what you're thinking.

Today I've been grabbed by yet another neighbour wanting me to sell to them privately and save on the estate agent's fees. Yes, it would be a quick sale but seeing as I've already had approaches from four of them, it's going to sell quickly anyway. At long last I'm about ready to have the board go up and sell it. I'm nearly 60 and have never sold a house, I can't say that I'm looking forward to it at all.

I posted earlier on this thread under another name… I live overseas and my Mum had a stroke and has been in hospital nearly three weeks now. I dashed back to see her (third trip back this summer due to her ending up in hospital).

I’ve decided not to go back until she has been discharged as I will be more use once she is home. I know she is bored in hospital and has had no visitors since I went back, but at least she is being cared for and has people to talk to. Her speech (thankfully the only thing that was affected) is coming back, which is making things easier for her. She is bored because she won’t pay to watch the telly above her bed (she is not short of cash), and didn’t bring her glasses with her so can’t read. I couldn’t find her glasses anywhere when I went back, so goodness knows where she has put them.

One plus about this stroke is that she is at least being pleasant to me, but I don’t think that’s going to last.

She hasn’t had any visitors as all of her friends, except one, are dead, and her one surviving brother lives too far away to visit.

@Tupperwarelid welcome! @Knot has it spot on with the fact that they don't want a solution, just an audience, it's so draining. I too have spent hours researching solutions for my DM, only to have them rejected for no particular reason and it feels very personal and hurtful when you are genuinely trying to help. If mine is on the phone moaning, I often do the washing up, fold washing, knit, anything to not have to listen except for the occasional 'oh no, how awful'. I know that is a bad way of managing the situation but I literally cannot bear it, mine gets really angry and if the moan is in person, will bang her fist and shout and point at me.

It’s normal, isn’t it, wanting sympathy rather than a solution. The Mars vs Venus thing made a great deal of women wanting and offering sympathy whereas men offer solutions, allegedly. If you’re offered a solution when you want sympathy/acknowledgment it can feel awfully like “it’s your own fault, if only you did this you’d have no problem”

Trouble is, when parents become dependent, we spend so much time finding solutions that we can forget it’s not always needed.

Try “yes, it must be so difficult for you” or have a bit of fun “you’re a saint, putting up with all this without complaining “. @Fantasea has the right approach