Show me a picture that sums up caring for elderly parents…

[Stath]

‘Mum, where’s that step with the handle that you need to use to help get in bed?’

DM currently weak as a kitten due to having a UTI and absolutely crippled with arthritis. Needs something to hold onto to mobilise and move into bed.
She’s virtually housebound unless we take her out in the car and would be absolutely buggered if she was left on her own.

Still believes she is ‘independent’ and needs no outside help.

Said mobility aid was found sporting a sock and used as a magazine rack in the kitchen.

Your poor mum, do you think posting pictures might be a bit disrespectful to our elderly vulnerable parents

With agreement I bought a swedish bath rail and when I came to install it found the existing swedish bath rail that was used to hang towels on. No photos as they've both gone now.

Oi! How about elderly parents caring for their DC and gdc?

My mum will probably piss herself laughing at the situation tbh.

An anonymous picture of an inanimate object is hardly posting private, disrespectful photos!

Finding community and support is a massive part of this forum. Having humour and shared experiences is vital in doing the job we do in supporting elderly family members whilst trying not to burn out.

At 88 year old my DM was watching Vic and Bob’s parkour video today. She sees the irony in it all.

Yes!!!

Share a picture that sums up that experience!

If my lovely DM could have a body transplant then she’d be wrestling the kids off me 😊

I don't have a picture, but if I did it would be mum's unused cane hanging off the coat stand. Despite being 81, and having fallen a few times, the cane makes her feel 'embarrassed and old'. She's worried 'what will people think?' and barely uses it when I take her out either.

We do have a giggle about it, and I think it's absolutely imperative to keep a sense of humour during what can be a bloody awful and quite lonely time.

In my very long journey dealing with my elderly parents, humour was the only thing that got me through that.
My dad, bless him, did an amazing job keeping my mum at home till the end, but the time we met them at the pub (they ate at the pub every day for 5 years) and mum was wearing her pyjamas because he never really paid any attention to what she chose to wear apart from making her take it out of the drawer not the wash basket, and then she stropped off to her normal table to eat her lunch since That Was Where They had Lunch was memorable.

This was my mum. It was the last time I ever took her to a garden centre. Her dementia worsened after this trip out and she died a few months later. She was 93 when she died.

Here she is

No picture as I mucked out my car for bin day tomorrow… but imagine a collection of empty supermarket sandwich boxes in the footwell of the passenger seat hurled there during 4 emergency / unscheduled motorway journeys up and down the country in a week.

Sounds so familiar!

God yes. I agree entirely!

My DM ‘hates old people’ 😊

@CMOTDibbler Have you been back to the pub since your DM passed away? Sometimes it’s equally reassuring yet upsetting having these ‘landmarks’ of our parents’ lives.

You never expect to find yourself admining your parents life. My dad is in a care home a few years now so the file is less, Mum is 3 years into Alzheimer’s so her file is getting more packed. I don’t have POA for either of them 🤦‍♀️ but still have to somehow get things actioned. It’s like wading through treacle, the hardest admin job ever, for no wage!

@nokitchen your DM looks so happy and such an absolutely glamorous lady.

What did she look like when she was young?

I think it’s SO important for us to connect the (sometimes difficult/unwell/fragile) elderly parent to the young, vibrant person they were.

No, I'm very glad to never have to eat there ever again! I am very grateful to them for putting up with my parents for so long, especially once mum would only eat one very specific meal (not on the menu, they even did it for her on Christmas day).
The day my parents house sold, and I knew it was likely to be the last time I ever went to that town I did think about going, but instead I went to somewhere dad would get sneaky chips from when mum still knew enough to object to his unhealthy eating

My dad was quite wobbly but wanted to be independent, and didn't think a walking stick was needed. he was only able to walk very slowly and sometimes stopped abruptly if he tried to get his bearings. I was worried that if he didn't fall himself, other people may (accidentally) barge him - or trip over him themselves! I tried to mention that the stick was a visual clue to other people to maybe give him a bit more time/space to move around. He agreed and said that was a good idea and continued to leave it at home

Stath, agree - it's so hard when you're in the middle of the memory loss, incontinence, poor mobility etc to remember the amazing, wonderful, supportive, loving people they were.

No photos but trying to declutter DDad's house in preparation for him moving in with us and he wants to keep EVERYTHING.

D’ya reckon we’ll do the same? Denial of old age until the end?

Or will our experience of caring for elderly parents make us more aware?

Or did our denying oldies also think the same?

@Stath Thank you. She looked like Deanna Durbin when she was younger. She was very conscious about what she wore right up til last year and insisted on having her roots dyed (by me, over the kitchen sink) until just before Christmas last year. She could never bear the thought of going grey. She loved M and S and always liked to buy something new to wear each time we went shopping.

@SinisterBumFacedCat

It’s never ending all this admin.

I salute you in your organisation though. You’ve inspired me to gather DM’s stuff in a file.

At the moment it’s scattered around her house and ‘filed’ in various faux Ming vases.

@nokitchen my mum hates her hair showing grey, I do her roots every few months to keep on top of it.

Until we lost my dad 7 years ago mum was very active, very independent, they were always off one place or another. Holidays. Impromptu long drives. She said having us kids late kept them younger for longer (she had me at 36 and my brother at 44). I've watched her age very quickly since my dad died. The light in her eyes just went out. They'd been together for 45 years. I do my best to keep her chipper, get her out and about, but with work and kids it's a jugging act. And I'm not my dad, and he's who she wants.

We just do our best by them the way they did their best by us.

Oh I remember that from when my dad fell and broke his back...except I had a box in the boot full of Pot Noodles and Breakfast Biscuits.

For me the pic would be of mum's hearing aids...inevitably in a little basket on the bedside table, while I shout myself hoarse trying to communicate with her.

For me it's part of the admin pile for my mum's affairs...

I may say that she at great effort because she was declining, got her things into pretty simple order before her stroke. It's not her fault it's a mess, it's mine. But I'm managing her affairs, my own, my house, selling her flat and doing a bit of parenting on the side.

For me the photo would be of a pile of pills for all her ailments (genuine prescription drugs for serious health issues, not imaginary aches and pains), boxes and boxes of painkillers, a cupboard full of small bottles of fizzy drinks so she could have one by the bed every night. Her "control centre" by her chair - tv remote, telephone, two pairs of glasses, handkerchief, pen and notebook - everything she might need within reach. The calendar by the chair with the names of the carers coming the next day. I love her and miss her but I don't miss any of the work that went with being her carer.