🪳 Cockroach Café Spring 2024 🪳 🪳

[MereDintofPandiculation]

I’ve had a good clean of the place, replenished supplies, and brought in pots of snowdrops and daffodils to remind us Spring is just around the corner.

Come in when you want to share good news, or to rant, or just to hang out with others who understand what you're going through. The way MN works, hopefully this thread won’t appear in any featured lists, and the only people wandering in will be those who understand what it’s all about.

If you have a BIG question, it might be worth giving it its own thread, so as not to swamp this one.

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. My recent enquiries suggested more people wanted to keep the well known name than wanted to change it to something mor savoury, so for the moment it stays.

@MereDintofPandiculation i wish they would take note but my DM won’t admit she has a hearing problem, it is the phone and the tv not her! DF won’t wear his because ‘they don’t work for his type of hearing loss’. Which, sorry about the language, is absolute bollocks! Also of course when he has tried them DM has volume on TV so loud it is painful! I have explained he needs to wear them every day whilst his brain adjusts. I will try again on my next visit.

It would help if they had a GP who appeared to understand and maybe have a more holistic view. They seem to get referred to the nurse or the in house paramedic (?). I would someone at their surgery might ask DF if he is wearing his and someone else notice my mother needs a hearing test; together with a scan or referral for her unexplained mobility problems inc regular nighttime cramp in her ankles. DM also gets nasty mouth ulcers, when she saw her GP about these she was told ‘what do you expect me to do, go and see a dentist …’. . No blood tests organised or causes explored. (My daughter is coeliac so I know that ulcers can be a sign of vit deficiency or other issues). After that and the paramedic telling DM she had bruised her shoulder when she had fractured it, she isn’t keen on going to the GP - although she got a good number of prescriptions for oramorph for the pain for her shoulder! When she finished the last course she told she had a thing called Cold Turkey and it wasn’t very nice. 😮.

back from another trip to take things to charity. Lovely people in BHF.

To add to the new phrases I give you "learned helplessness" and "weaponised incompetence"

My mother 85, sharp as a tack and fully able will feign incompetence when it suits her depending on the audience.

Also had the buying of clothes many sizes too big as a nasty jibe. Being overweight in her eyes is the worst thing a woman can do. Her and my father love to commentate on women's weight, mum cackles as dad refers to " fat birds" on the TV, He has three daughters.

I fear it will never end, my friends 101 year old father is being buried today. It could go on for another 15 years.

@Lexy70 fabulous new phrases. I say fabulous because they help me make some sense of the nonsense. I also think your two great ones can be interwoven as well for ‘weaponised helplessness’ and ‘learned incompetence’. I am far from perfect but the past few years with our parents has take its toll physically and mentally so I am not as toned as I was. Goodness me I get the up and down look of disgust every time I turn up. Usually knackered having shopped in 4 supermarkets to get what she likes with decent dates on. I actually shuddered when I read about your friends father at 101. I have contemplated the fact out mother has zero health issues, apart from being awful. If she lives that long I will be just shy of 78. Doesn’t bear thinking about. Oh and yes ‘fat’ well anything over a size 10 is deplorable, lazy and slovenly. My sister andI both sailed incredibly close to ED just so we didn’t shame our parents by being the ‘fat’ girls. They never intervened but if we had gotten fat I bet they would have done.

My mother's family live for ever provided they are alcoholics and apart from.the dementia mum is very fit. The thought of another 10 to 15 years fills me with dread.

MIL is 104. DH is 75, BIL is 72. I really think she's going to outlive them both as they're both stressed to the eyeballs. I said to our vicar a little while ago that I have a despairing vision of being on my own deathbed (I am 52) and worrying about leaving DD to cope with MIL.

Hope you're continuing on the mend, MereDintofPandiculation.

I’m continuing to improve, thanks! Mind is alert and eager to do things, just waiting for body to catch up.

DF outliving DH is my fear too. DF’s fear is that he’s not doing as well as his mother, who is apparently still going strong at about 134 and being looked after by DH.

@Juneday Went through the hearing thing with my DF too, to no avail. Now he understands almost nothing I say. Covid was dreadful, I wrote letters, he gave me monologues by phone, and we had no actual conversation for a year. Now his hearing is so bad I think I’ve already had my last conversation. I miss him.

doesn't everyone want a GP with a holistic view? DH was under 6 separate hospital teams, who regarded all the other bits of him as nuisance sort of conjoined twins who sometimes took their bit to appointments etc at inconvenient times. We desperately need a project manager, but they seem to think DH is doing that. I’m thinking of starting a spreadsheet

New thread is ready to go, I was thinking of filling this one up a little before announcing it. But @funnelfan is already tucked up on the sofa so come and join us!

https://www.mumsnet.com/talk/elderly_parents/5141580-cockroach-cafe-late-summer-2024

My dad had a ruder version of the "blackest cat". He once said of someone. " If you said that you'd been to the moon,and had a shit there,he'd have built the shithouse".
It's surprising how many people I come across,that dad's saying applies too.

@Feckedupbundle 😅

Glad you’re over the worst @MereDintofPandiculation

we’ve all gone to the

New thread!New thread!New thread!New thread!New thread!

Hello All Just checking in really to say 'hello'. This thread and others were a lifeline for which I will be forever grateful. My mum died in March. It was honestly such a relief. But then the whole probate thing started and having thought that I'd done my grieving over the many years she took to die, I've realised I hadn't and I just want some time. To think about her, deal with my quite complex feelings. Give her the respect of sadness.
But I can't because everything is about probate and IHT and beneficiaries and the fact that tax has to be paid within 6 months of death, even though probate may well take way more than 6 months, and in the meantime you can't sell anything to pay the tax that's due.
Yet again I'm left thinking that we just deal with every single aspect of elderly care through to death and beyond so badly.
Feels like I moved seamlessly from pestering doctors, nurses, carers, the 'system' generally to pestering accountants, lawyers, valuers. Probably my diamond shoes are too tight, because almost none of this would be as it is if there weren't money. But somehow it's all so inhumane.
The battle to keep mum at home, to respect her wishes, and now to try to deal with her will as she'd have wanted. And just no time for grieving ever.
Just needed to vent really!

I agree @SeriouslyAgain my Aunt died less than 2 weeks ago and the whole stressful next phase has already started with probate already while I am still organising the funeral because of the six month deadline. I haven't had time to grieve. Come over and join us on the new thread.

https://www.mumsnet.com/talk/elderly_parents/5141580-cockroach-cafe-late-summer-2024?page=1