I'm tired of cooking/preparing 3 meals a day. It's just the two of us but boy oh boy can that woman eat!! She stays slimish, I get fattish. It's bad enough I do everything here much less start making her one thing and me the other. At times I feel guilty when I buy her fast food cuz of the nutritional value....not to mention I eat it too.
Everyone vents from time to time. You have a lot going on. So sorry.
About your MIL. If she's getting more and more confused and has to crawl up the stairs she needs to be in an AL facility. Not living alone in a house with stairs.
I feel bad you because you've really got your hands full.
Get sis checked for a UTI
Sorry this is such a difficult and overwhelming time for you. She needs care too, not fair to depend on her son in that way. Nephew could take her to the ER, then refuse to take her home saying she needs more care than he can provide. That will also hasten the Medicaid process with help from hospital and NH staff.
1) Last night FIL in AL called , asked a strange question and abruptly hung up, he’s definitely getting more confused . Will have to step up my search for MC. The past year with dealing with him has been such a blast !
2) We are supposed to get up early and drive 4 hours on Saturday to ( divorced ) MIL . She finally agreed and made an 11:30 am appt at the credit union to have DH a signatory on her bank accounts and after that was done , we were going to speak to her again about going to elder care lawyer about getting her affairs in order (POAs) etc. But now it’s going to SNOW . I’m now positive something will happen to MIL before getting things in order….just because…….DH and I have that kind of luck . When DH speaks with her on the phone he says MIL has her days where she seems forgetful . She’s still driving which is a concern , and the last time we saw her she didn’t walk well. She refuses a walker , bear crawls up the steps. Was also going to tell her again to sell the house and get an apartment . We haven’t seen her in almost a year , so not sure how she walks now. We were supposed to go see her last Fall but hubby had cancer scare , had testing and surgery . Luckily it was a benign tumor .
3) My sister with ( most likely ) ALS . Still has one more test to take for diagnosis was delusional last night . My nephew says it was scary, he came home from work and found her delusional . In my research online it seems some ALS patients get dementia, or psychotic episodes. My nephew is dealing with this on his own , I feel so bad . I told him to call 911, but he got her to calm down and somewhat more lucid . He said he would just wait and call her primary in the morning to see what he should do . I told him to hide all the knives and sharp objects in case she thought he was a stranger in the house and got paranoid . They live over an hour away from me . I can’t get off from work ( long story) to go and help stay with them right now. Took sister months of waiting to get to see neurologist and is progressing so fast the past week . I don’t think she has that much money ( another long story , involving abusive ex husband ). Although I know my nephew doesn’t take any money from her while she has lived with him the last 8 years . She gets social security. She lives with my divorced nephew ,( her only child ) , it’s just the two of them . He’s been missing a lot of work taking her to doctor appts and testing . Even before she got to see the neurologist, my nephew took her to the ER twice in the last two months when her speech was so bad and he thought she was having a stroke . He couldn’t get her admitted . They did CT scans and sent her home with him. I’ve been trying to advise nephew from a distance . And weeks ago my sister asked me to start look for a nursing home for her and not to let my nephew know , not sure why the secret . That’s difficult to do when I don’t have financial information . Meanwhile my nephew says the last few days have been rough . The only good thing is he spoke with his boss last night and he can work from home from now on until get her placed . He did sell her car a few weeks ago and I told him to use the money to have an aide a few days a week come in help her with shower as she’s very unsteady . He did buy her a walker as well . I also told him yesterday (before he found her delusional) maybe some local churches had volunteer companions who visit the elderly . But she really needs to get placed in SNF and eventually on Medicaid . Nephew didn’t know that can be done . Poor guy thought he was going to have to drain his own retirement savings for her care . I told him absolutely not to use his retirement money . Plus he said he looked into briefly and thinks he would have had to pay a huge penalty and taxes for early withdrawal , even as a hardship withdrawal . He will have to try do ER dump again , and get social worker to help place her.
Hopefully, you will be able to sleep better tonight.
Don't even get me started on our health system!
I totally hear what you're saying. Doctors are all salary now and owned by some huge corporate medical entity. It's terrible. They are not allowed to do what's best for their patients. They are allowed to do what insurance will pay for. Then they know they have to run up the bill unnecessarily if a patient's insurance will pay for it, because they have to bring in money for the corporation and shareholders who own them.
What a crying shame it is...
I wish that I would have found this forum sooner than I did too.
Burnt,
Our parents were loyal to their doctors because they lived in a generation that believed every word they said. They didn’t question their doctors. Doctors were looked at as a ‘God’ like figure.
Our generation takes responsibility for our own healthcare. We do question doctors. We don’t hesitate to change to a new doctor if we are not satisfied.
I agree the healthcare system is broken . It is run like a corporate business . We are losing doctors and nurses because of it . I have a friend from high school . She’s a general surgeon . She is in a practice of 4 surgeons . She was the only one that voted NO when the big hospital system offered to buy the practice. The practice was bought 3 years ago . She is salary now plus gets a cut of each surgery she does. They require she schedules 36 combined hours of office visit and scheduled surgery time weekly . That doesn’t even count the hours she spends doing rounds in the hospital or emergency surgeries she does when she’s on call . Surgeons due tend to put in long hours. However at 58 yo , she doesn’t want to do 60+ hours . She would have rather the practice stayed private and she could have kept to 40-50 hours . So she is retiring early . Also she said now insurance companies are making her charge patients to come back for their post op check up visit . She says now a lot of people won’t come back after they’ve had surgery .
It’s scary . And healthcare costs are insane. So families will still be sacrificing , time away from work , money etc to care for the elderly . Hospice doesn’t even send an aide full-time , it’s left to the family figure out .
I think you're definitely onto something with doctors and nurses not following their own advice. I think they have to run up the bill so order all kinds of things that people usually don't even need. Where I live, there is no doctor who is in a private practice. They are all owned by a huge corporate health care operation. They have to run the bill up and bring in the most money otherwise they're in trouble with their bosses.
I had to get a new doctor. She was flabbergasted to hear that at my age (50) I have never done a screening for anything. I did do a Cologuard test and it was fine. I really don't think most of what is ordered is even necessary.
Thx Alva - a nice surprise! I am forever grateful.
Beatty - that's bad!!!! A robot could do better.
I was sent to a insurance contract inury Doctor once. He never looked at my face. Certainly didn't order any tests or scans. Sat looking at his computer screen firing questions & 'typed' - what looked like pretend typing at high speed with all fingers rippling over the keyboard (like a little kid would do).
Gave me a prescription for heavy pain meds despite me saying I was not even taking Paracetamol & did not require pain meds.
So very weird.
R has a decent dr and will probably be able to get me in as a patient. If not there is a clinic nearby that looks good. Several docs get together and look after a bunch of patients so you may see one or another. Sounds interesting - new concept in family medicine.
I have not been to see my GP since before covid and I'm not feeling a need to go back any time soon, they really don't do anything but take some blood so I can't see the point. But I've had my routine mammograms and I agreed to having a colonoscopy and endoscopy because I have one of the gene mutations associated with lynch syndrome.
So glad that your doctor visit went well! It’s hard not to get anxious about our health.
Your doctor sounds very nice.
Yep! How many times do we see overweight doctors and nurses who smoke like chimneys? LOL 😆
They don’t always follow their own advice!
Can't remember where I asked for prayer for upcoming drs visit. Went today and y'all must be great pray-ers. Dr comes in and asks what he can do for me. I said I don't know, you called me. He checks my files and says everything is OK. Cholesterol a little high but not to worry. So I showed him my squats and other exercises. Told him my BP last night was 117/73 and heart rate 71. He asked me what I did before I retired. I told him I taught physiology. We had a great chat about it most of which I didn't understand between his accent, his mask and my hearing, but I got enough and we both enjoyed it. He faxed my regular prescriptions to my pharmacy and that was it. Many thanks for support.
Out of this I came to realize that I get anxious over some things like drs visits. This started about 10-15 years ago when I had a series of bad experiences - my drs made mistakes. Fortunately I knew enough to catch the mistakes I went through a few drs until I settled with this one, then he made an error in my meds but I liked him so I stayed. I need to get over this.
I am learning to do deep breathing for stress management which also helps the "wired" aspect of CFS. It lowers BP, settles my stomach and generally makes me feel better I recommend it to anyone, Like squats it is something you can build into your day. Deep breathing exercises for 5 min 2x a day will lower your BP 10-15 points. It doesn't take much time or effort to do both of these and you get great benefits!