Do care homes usually invite families for Christmas dinner visits?

[AuntieDen]

MIL is in a home and this will be her first christmas there. FIL and BIL are stressed and missing her.

This year we are meant to see my dad, who has cancer. I would rather not dissapoint him, but whatever we do the logistics of time off work, booking flights etc, mesn I need to know where we need to be soon, otherwise we won't be with either of them.

if you have people in a standard level dementia home - do you get invited for Christmas dinner? If i can work out if they will we can plan accordingly.

(Yes I have asked BIL but he thinks he has months to think about it and the only difference is if I cook christmas lunch. He isn't really in a place to consider how bloody complicated last minute info makes our lives at the moment! )

You see your dad who desperately needs you
your partner sees his mother who desperately needs him

it is one day. Celebrate with your partner another day

My DF is in a dementia home. We take him to our home for Christmas. I know we would be welcomed if we asked to join him but don’t think they would make an invitation.

Not in the home I worked in, it's chaos at lunchtimes with those who need feeding/drink assistance let alone adding in relatives. We welcomed visitors from 10,30am to midday, then lunch was at 12.30pm for those who didn't go home to relatives and the staff all ate at the same time too. Then visitors were welcomed in from 2.30pm to 5pm. It was a jolly day, and very relaxed....staff all wore christmas jumpers rather than uniform.

Not in the care home I have experience of. It’s far too busy and there isn’t space for everyone anyway. They’d have to do about 4 sittings!!

My dad had Christmas dinner in the care home with mum. To be fair he visits over teatime and gets several meals a week! We then fetched him to the family get together on boxing day.

I wouldn't have imposed the whole family on the care home. But one partner probably ok. Sad, but the person with dementia probably won't remember.

Care home where I work allows families to have lunch with their loved one.

There is a limit on numbers that are allowed.

Thanks for the responss.

MIL wont know what month it is, let alone day. If we go the week before she will be pleased to see 'friends' and get some little gifts but she doesn't really know us or care that we're there or not, sadly. We dont want FIL to have a horrible Christmas day missing her without the rest of his closest family.

Its not an issue of 1 day without DH, I love my in-laws and want to see them, DH loves my dad, who would miss him if I went alone, and logistics mean it's not a day trip. No one will be alone or un fed on Christmas day whatever we do, Im just trying to get a plan that makes everyone happy if viable or set expectations if not.

And we definitely do not want care home lunch! Just to know if they're likely to offer to FIL

Ask the Home. The Home that my parent was in were happy to accommodate family members if they paid (it was £15 IIRC). I had lunch with them, as did other residents' family members. Other residents were taken out by their families.

I'm not clear where you usually have Christmas, are you all together or do you alternate? I think in your position, given the complications, I would probably just make a unilateral decision and tell everyone what that is.

If MIL's dementia is accelerating, by December, she may not be aware what is going on. It's going to be more about BIL managing his Father's expectations.

My parent left the table halfway through Christmas lunch as they no longer understood what Christmas was and having eaten their main course, decided it was time to go and watch TV. I ended up eating my Christmas Pudding with the other residents on our table. It was a difficult day.