Cockroach Café 🪳 🪳 🪳New Year 2025

[MereDintofPandiculation]

Welcome in to the Cockroach Café Bad Daughters’ Room, the rugs and cushions all fresh and clean for the new season.
Good daughters, find your way to the small room behind the stairs. Sorry it’s not as equipped as here, but it doesn’t get much use.
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 more savoury, so for the moment it stays.

It’s put me in bed for three days! Sleeping mostly.
DB just phoned and has been in to the hospital to see DM. She is furious apparently. Why did she have to get Covid? Why can’t she go home? DB said ‘Well you need to get up and on your feet first’ At which point, she demanded the walker, got up and shuffled down the ward to the loo and back!

I have a call from OT tomorrow, they are pushing for her to come home with carers 4 times a day and the community physio. We want her to go to the local community hospital reablement ward so we may have a battle on our hands.

What happens overnight if she needs the toilet? She certainly won’t stay put in between and I’m not convinced she strong enough to get out of bed and to a commode yet. What time would the carers put her to bed?

Thank you @BestIsWest. It is, as you say, very hard. I think if my Dad had been a lovely, wonderful, darling man all his life it would still be hard but I wouldn't feel quite so angry. As it is, he had never been fun, he's always been an emotional vampire and now he spends a lot of his time being unkind to my Mum, or paranoid or ruminating on a lifetime of perceived injustices (which is bollocks, he has a lovely life with no responsibility and plenty of nice things in his retirement).

All excellent questions - write them down as you think of them ahead of the phonecall. Otherwise you'll kick yourself if you forget one.

That makes it even harder @LynnThese4reSEXPEOPLE , my mum is lovely and I still feel angry at times. Do you think he will agree to an assessment by the memory clinic?

He had one 2.5 years ago which was "fine". I'm not sure what it would achieve at the moment - he's agreed not to drive at night or with anyone else in the car and the DVLA guidelines don't exclude him as things stand. If he needed more care then it would be worth it but he probably doesn't meet the threshold ATM

Not old relatedly I could quite happily murder DH at the moment. He came home with a cold last week and passed it on to me. It's not a bad cold in many ways but my nose has been streaming and I aren't be more than any arms length from.a supply of tissues. Needless to say I didn't sleep well Sunday night. DH had used all the Night Nurse do said he'd get some more since he could get to the shops easily today, would have been an 8 mile each way trip to town for me. I only realised at bedtime that he'd bought sudafed max which has caffeine so that's a double dose of stimulant! Fine for daytime but I've been awake since before 1 absolutely wired, I don't normally drink tea or coffee after lunch because it gives me trouble sleeping. Gave up and came downstairs at 4.45.

@countrygirl99 i hope you feel better soon. The caffeine-loaded pills might be useful today.

@BestIsWest parts of your story sound so familiar, all I can do is wish you luck and hope a rehab place comes up soon, we had similar with MiL and it helped give us time to get things organised, eventually leading to care visits at home, although we had about three different OTs and yes Covid too (2 years ago now) but they failed to tell us she was still positive and came home with a horrid cough.... some OTs are great though.

Back from two days with parents, DH's face when we were offered a biscuit for lunch and told we had to sit in the kitchen until the plumber turned up to fix a broken loo (DF even rang to ask where we were and what time we would arrive, DD cancelled a physio appointment to get there for lunch). We sat indoors for 4 hours - the useless plumber is always late. So had all the conversations, multiples questions from DM most of which I wouldn't know the answer to (about nieces soon to be MiL whom I have never met, why a certain friend is downsizing, when I only see her once a year, etc). Questions got worse when she asked about DD's boyfriend's parents - they have been together 2 years and I have told DM several times that his DM died when he was young - why wouldn't she remember something like that? Then three days in a row she asked the same three questions about DS and how he met his girlfriend - its exhausting, because I know it won't change and she will likely ask all over again, BUT no one in the family, DF included, seem to be concerned about it. DF collapsed when out for a walk, his 10 minutes locally and made it to a neighbours garden where they spotted him and got him up - he later told DH and I that at one point his BP was 200/80 prior to cataract Op. At least this is recorded and he has a visit from a falls specialist lined up.... the slightly worrying conversations came round to how loads of his friends children get paid by the government to be their carers (we live over 2 hours away and I am one of 3) to which I said yes a bargain carers allowance of £81 a week. Later he suggested we move to be near to them when we downsize in a few years. 😩. Made it clear that won't happen. It isn't so much they want us near to see more of us, it is that he is worrying about the cost of care, yet he says multiple times every day, I have so much money I don't know what to do with it.... I suggested deliveries again for food staples, but no they don't want that either. I sent a link about excercises to help with falls and he thought it was for DM who never goes out on her own and has a falls alarm in the house. They are 86 and 87! I spent yesterday anxious and trying to find solutions, and arranging to visit again soon but not with DH - he is very good and makes them laugh, but I can see him getting more and more fed up - added to which the TV is on at 70 so next time we will wear ear plugs...... bit worried about DF having another fall, this is actually his third in about 6 months, two out and about and one at home - DM still insists on using him as her walking stick/support when out and about! She can be very difficult and stubborn about such things, I offered multiple times and each time she calls out to DF to come and help her instead - infuriating

Got me through my hair appointment. Now I need to do some admin for mum that I've been putting off.

FIL has been messing about with the times of visits for MIL and himself. DH has sorted it out. Again. Am wondering if FIL has some sort of cognitive impairment, not memory, just ability to actually process sensible thought. Was clicking his fingers earlier because number 1 job is to sort out why 2 of his BILs don’t ring the third one. Couldn’t possibly be because #3 is a pot-stirring bore.

Started the day with an ambulance up the drive for MIL. PIL’s carers called it because she fell, but are not insured to tend or lift her in the interim. Coincidentally, the supervisor for her carers (different agency to FIL’s) came out to browbeat FIL into not changing the times back to what MIL needs (but they find difficult to support), but the ambulance boxed her in so DH got to read her the riot act. MIL is fine.

Selfishly, I am full of a cold, my head is banging, and FIL is being a complete jerk now for the rest of the day. DH has had to go onsite for a meeting- he really does need to go in, it’s unavoidable. I just want this (FIL) to stop. Why does it have to be like this.

Sympathies @SockFluffInTheBath @Juneday.

DM is still in hospital, no sign of a move to reablement but I live in hope. She was in a foul mood today, insist that she wants to go home and can cope alone.

I had to help her to the toilet yesterday, clean her up after she soiled her self, wash her from head to toe, unblock the toilet after her incontinence pad fell down there and she flushed it, wash the bathroom down then take all her clothes home to wash.

And this is when she is IN hospital.

DB phoned me after his visit tonight to say she was the same to him, he found a note she’d written saying we’d broken her heart, she can afford to pay for carers, she can’t believe we can be so cruel.

Her short term memory is non existent. Every day I explain what’s happened, what we’re waiting and hoping for and within 5 minutes she’s forgotten. Everytime I mention the hydrocephalus it’s brand new to her. She remembered the woman in the next door bed whose son lived next door to her 20 years ago though.

I’m thoroughly depressed tonight. Am I doing the right thing?

@BestIsWest the right thing changes from day to day, and certainly with the benefit of hindsight, or the blur of rose-tinted glasses. All we can do is what seems right at the time.

The toilets and double incontinence do me. I don’t want to live like that, though FIL revels in messing himself and sitting in it so that he has to be cleaned. And I miss my MIL. She swore at one of the paramedics this morning, which he laughed at, so she scowled like a child. Not funny, but funny.

Placemarking really... Things are stable. Trying not to look into the future. Thinking of all those in the extreme phases.

Glad to hear you’re in a lull @PermanentTemporary fill your glass while you can.

We’ve just had one of those phone calls where they get no answer so immediately call back again and again… and you have 5 missed calls in 3 minutes and imagine the worst (we were manhandling a muddy dog out the back and didn’t hear it). Rang back expecting MIL has fallen again. No (thankfully). The timer for the heating could do with being knocked back 15 mins in the morning, needs doing NOW.

🙄

🍷

Spoke to my Dad's GP this week. She wants to see him and look at assessing his cognitive impairment. Mum is going to field that conversation. Coward though I am, he has been so unkind to her recently that I can't tolerate being around him very much. Fully have the ick.

Has anyone switched to working in a compressed hours pattern at work? I'm considering applying for a nine day fortnight pattern. I already work the hours anyway (just minus the day off!).

Beginning to feel like everyone is demanding things from me and I don't have any time at all to do anything else.

I wouldn't tell my elderlies I'd acquired a
day off once a fortnight!

Some of it might be the dementia, but whatever the cause, it doesn't change the behaviour:(

Went down to see my oldie and got a decent amount of stuff done. Made a date for 2 weeks time ...so hopefully this means I can safely plan for the days in-between.

It's said that depression in the elderly is woefully under treated and I think that's so true. More likely to be sick or bereaved and, living alone without the necessity of a job to get you up and out every day. You can see how it happens.

@EmotionalBlackmail a friend did and it definitely worked for her. And no, I would see no need to mention it ...

True, he's never been particularly nice but she won't leave. Agree re: depression, I got my dad on to antidepressants which has helped a bit with some of the moods.

Someone once described their elderly parent as "a beloved older member of my family". Wish I felt that way about my Dad

@EmotionalBlackmail I would definitely apply for such a role if that was a possible option. I wouldn't mention it to the "oldies", surely all they need to know is the number of hours that you work, they are unlikely to understand what it means anyway.

Yes, I did it a couple of years ago and it worked well but then I moved to a new job and returned to a normal mon-Fri pattern. I found it difficult and thought I would struggle fitting everything in to four days again so this time I requested a drop in hours so now work 30 hours a week. I use the “day off” to do mum stuff and still have a weekend.

I’m fortunate to be able to afford to do so and view it as the first step in the road to retirement.

I did the same as @funnelfan. I had Wednesdays off which was great as ou get a chance to recharge midweek. And I didn’t tell anyone. I retired 2 years ago this week and regret telling anyone about that too.

Great advice here, thank you! Ideally I'd want to have a Wednesday off every other week, so spreading ten days' work over nine, which I think is feasible.

I can't afford to reduce my hours - I'm the breadwinner and got a mortgage to pay plus children at primary school. That's really why I don't get any time to myself as I'm either at work, running around after children or being moaned at by elderlies for not doing enough. DH is wonderful and pulls his weight re house and children but they're not his elderlies!

I'd really like to have time to go for a walk or an exercise class or swimming. Maybe even a coffee with a friend. Managed that coffee once last year which makes me feel my priorities are wrong.

I had Monday's off and mil expected me around theirs by about 10.30 every Monday .
I once dared to hang out my washing as it was such a lovely day before getting to her and was told off for being late !
I ended up having to work most Monday's ( 😉 ) so could only ' make it ' now and again.