Caring while pregnant

[Mitzington]

Hi all,

I’m looking for a bit of advice to help me make some sensible but hard decisions around my due date and when the latest is you’d travel?

My mum has dementia and has had 4 hospitalisations this year due to falls or severe confusion. I live 4 hours away and normally drop everything and run to be there with her whenever she’s ill and stay until she’s better. She lives alone and hasn’t got much of a network (one helpful friend in his 80s and her cleaner) so I’m her primary carer, despite the distance.

I know there’s going to come a time when that’s just not safe for me to do and need a back-up plan, but I’m not sure at how many weeks to draw that line? When would you not feel safe to be travelling that distance?

Also, how likely am I going to be to want to host her for a few days at Christmas, with a 10th December due date? I’ve never left her alone for Christmas before and my husband has offered to drive to get her and bring her to ours for a few days, but it’ll be far from restful as I’ll have a newborn and mum to care for.

Any advice?

Hi OP, sorry this is a really difficult one. How do you travel there can I ask? Is it a 4 hour drive or 4 hours on public transport where you can get up & walk around etc?

For me it depends. When I was pregnant with my daughter (only 16 months old, so remember it well) I drew the line for long travel at 37 weeks-ish, I wasn’t comfortable travelling too far at that point. That was a low risk pregnancy, I felt pretty good in myself generally and I just checked where the local hospitals were incase needed but I didn’t feel it was particularly risky. Currently pregnant with my second, high risk this time and wouldn’t travel that far beyond 36 weeks probably.

From a safety perspective it’s probably fine if it’s trains etc where you could stretch your legs and assuming there is a hospital where you’re going. It’s not really that it’s unsafe, just that there would be a chance of having the baby there which wouldn’t be ideal.

Christmas wise honestly I think it’s impossible to say especially if it’s your first baby. I didn’t think I’d want visitors but actually ended up really appreciating having family around me asap but as you’d need to care for your mum it is a bit different. X

can you move your mom closer? Would she sell and move closer?
Has she given you power-of-attorney? My aunt refused to give us power-of-attorney when she had early dementia and to access her funds, to keep her safely at home and pay her private care team we had to apply to the court to assign my brother as power of attorney. This was in Ireland, but the law is similar here. It cost e20,000 in legal fees. So would ask you to do this if she still has some capacity. The first steps were to contact her solicitor and the GP.
Are you in contact with adult social care? Does she need a care team?
Congratulations on your pregnancy, I would say now is a good time to investigate the best options for care for your mom, as newborn babies are infamous for not sleeping and you don’t want to be driving four hours away on very little sleep.

Oh OP, I have such sympathy for your dilemma. I'm about 33 weeks and honestly couldn't do such a trip, let alone be a carer anymore. It's hard enough caring for my toddler. I think it would be better to put some kind of alternate care into place now. You really never know what will happen in pregnancy or how long you'll be capable of certain things.

And doing all that with a newborn won't be feasible at all, so your mum will need other care very soon anyway.

Might it be time to move her nearer to you?

I understand how you feel OP, its very hard.
My mum is housebound with limited/no mobility. She has no neurological issues but its just she isnt able to do anything for herself because she isnt mobile.
She lives alot closer to me than yours does though.
She has carers who go in 3 times a day to do her meals and empty the commode. They put her clothes on to wash and thats it. They do absolutely nothing else for her.
We visit once a week and spend pretty much the entire time cleaning her home, doing jobs for her and sorting through all the food shopping so that we minimise the risk of the carers giving her food poisoning again from serving out of date meals.

Im in late stages of pregnancy and I now dread going over there because of all the chores I need to do which is exhausting.
Ive broached the subject of getting a cleaner but she wont and is literally relying on me.
I have pointed out that once baby is here, we wont be visiting anywhere near as much and she needs to put something else in place.

If I were in your situation I would be looking at either carers to go in and help or more of a residental care option if she will allow that.
You cant do everything when pregnant or with a newborn, however much you want to.
With christmas I have the same issue. We normally have christmas day at mums and this year I cant see how logistically it will be possible.
Thats something i will have to worry about nearer the time.

@Mrsttcno1 Thank you so much for this, that’s really helpful as a guide. It’s by car and we can add in stops, but I’m having visions of being caught out and giving birth in a motorway services!

That sounds really tough @Mitzington .

You might find it helpful to look at the Elderly Parents board to see what kind of options for additional care are available.

Four hospitalisations in the last year is a lot. Even if you weren't pregnant, that suggests that sadly your mum isn't really managing with the amount of support she currently has in place.

Would it be worth booking a GP appointment for her and attending with her to discuss options for additional support - carers / supported living / care home. Her dementia isn't going to get any better. And pregnancy isn't a temporary interruption to your support - you won't be able to drop everything and go to care for her when you have a newborn/baby/toddler either!