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.
Mallory, our parents can be trying. My mother is a controlling person. One reason I wouldn't take money from her even if she offered is I would have no power at all. If she was paying me, she would own me in her mind. Not being paid actually gives a little control back to me. I wondered why your mother has so many doctor appointments. Mine used to, but I put my foot down about going to so many.
dee, I was trying to imagine what to say to someone who thinks someone is chasing her with guns. I guess all we can do is assure them they are gone. I hope the water bottle wasn't glass. We never know what is going to happen next.
Wiping butt every hour and cleaning
I have 2 brothers who feel too uncomfortable to assist one bro is a nurse LOL
When they visit I want to slap them
I am so very tierd
Running back and forth to the CPA... Dad forgetting this 1099 and that 1099 finally I decided to scan instead of hand deliver to the accountant... then back to the CPA to pick up the finished 1040... then going over to my parents house to get my parents [who are in their mid-90's] to sign the paper work, write out all the checks, and get the envelopes to the post office as it was already April 15... HELLO, last minute, folks.... and trying to keep Dad from previewing the whole packet of paperwork before siging knowing he would lose the paperwork in the house. Very stressful week as my OCD kicks in when it comes to this stuff.
Yesterday evening told my parents I was out sick... they kept calling to see how I was... they tend to become helicopter parents... oh what if something happens to me?.... is there anything they can do to help [like what?]... etc.
Well, I went to work today, was tired afterwards.... called my parents at my usual 8pm time and now Dad has a long list of things he needs at various stores. Guess the blades on that helicopter broke :P
I will try the knubby balls for my foot, thanks!!
I don't keep any special clothing anymore, because I don't go anywhere special, unless I'm going to visit my son. The grocery store is like an exotic vacation. I keep a set of decent black clothing because funerals have become so frequent in our family over the past few years. That's just sad, but it's part of life.
The new Facebook feature "on this day", which gives you a quick recap of posts you made over the past 5-10 years is quickly becoming my *least* favorite feature. All I see are posts of happier times, when I was still close with my kids and all of them were still speaking to me, when I could travel with them and do things with them, when my posts in the morning were happy, chirpy and joyful - what a marked difference to today. Now I rarely post anything at all, and if I do, it's not usually chirpy or cheerful. I don't post a bunch of depressing stuff - I just don't post much of anything. Why post what's going on in my life? Got up today. Cleaned up pee off the floor in the living room and bathroom. Changed Mom's bedding. Changed Mom's chair pad. Started laundry. Got Mom to the bathroom. Reminded her to change underwear and incontinence pad. Started working. Stopped to get Mom to bathroom again. Reminded her to change underwear and incontinence pad. Got Mom's breakfast. Tried to start working again. Stopped to get Mom to bathroom again. Cleaned up pee on the floor again. Changed chair pad again. Who wants to read all that all the time? (I know, we read it here all the time. But at least here, people understand!)
Now for cleaning the floor:
this iste would seem best for you: bedwettingstore
Mallory, I'm sorry you're dealing with that money issue with your mom. If she has dementia, she simply doesn't see things the way we do.
Today is going to be one of "those" days - I can see it already. Mom leaks urine on the floor and leaves it there - and doesn't see that as a problem. I got up this morning to find a puddle of urine on the hardwood floor in front of her bed. The newly-refinished hardwood floor, might I add. With footprints dragged through it and all over the floor. When I mentioned (calmly - go me!) that there was a puddle there, she looked kind of blank and then said, "Oh - yeah, I had an accident." (ya think?) I'm starting to think one of these days I'm just going to find a hole in the floor where her urine has eaten through it. She's reached the point where she doesn't even try to clean up after herself, because her memory is getting so bad that she just forgets she even did something that needs cleaning up. Some days are worse than others.
Daughter went back to her husband yesterday morning. What a fiasco that was. I told her I will always be here for her if she needs me, as I always have been, but if she needs to come here again because she's leaving him, it needs to be because she's leaving him permanently - not because she can't make up her mind - because this side of the family went through a lot of hassle to get everything ready for her over here, only to have her turn right around and go back to him a few days after she got here. I told her if she comes back here again, she has to make it a permanent move, get a job, learn to drive and get a car - and then be out on her own within about 8 months. I suspect that, given those conditions, she won't be back, because she is happier sponging off someone else. (And that's why I made the conditions known.) I guess I should be happy the financial hit was only a few hundred dollars this time.
IT'S SPRING! Finally. Our grass is finally greening up, and our yard is a mess. Neighbor offered to de-thatch and roll the yard for me - but I haven't had time to get out there and even pick up the sticks and branches that fell over the course of the winter (not to mention the shingles that came off the roof in the wind). I'm hoping maybe this weekend I can get to it. Then I need to call our lawn guy and see what his plans are for this year. I'm sure he'll love the fact that he has to mow around a big ol' camper sitting in the yard now (thanks a lot, daughter dear).
Time to get rolling and kick my butt into gear for the day. Mom's doing her usual "wake me when it's time to eat" already this morning. Looks like a lovely day ahead. :-/
He now lives with my husband and I. He has alzheimers. Difficult and frustrating. To renew ourselves, we have 2 chairs in our bedroom on 2nd floor. We shut the door with a bit of vino hold hands and block it all out for a few minutes. Then he calls up to us about breakfast at midnight saying good morning. Gotta laugh to beat back the tears.
My mother also has selective and altered memories of our childhood. It is important to her to always be the one in the good light, so anything that wasn't good was someone else's fault. I know what you mean about being the one left out. Money seemed to always disappear before I got any of it. One year I even wore my brother's shirts to school because I had no nice-enough clothes of my own. My brothers got cars. I wasn't even taught to drive. My brothers had their college paid for. I got grants and worked my way through. But you know something? I am mighty proud of it. Even now I don't get anything for staying here. I see all the ugly and my brothers get the good side.
I see all this ugly and lopsided treatment that I know is wrong. Much of it is because of how my mother views women other than herself. All we can do is shrug it off, knowing we most likely aren't going to change them.
I guess what you could have said to your mother is "Mom, I have a better idea. You pay me and I'll buy you a burger this time. I'll let you get the next one."
Can I make a small suggestion? Do you eat a lot of wheat products? Bread and such? If so, maybe try cutting WAY back on those for a week or so, and see how you feel. I've found that since I hit about 40, I just can't tolerate wheat anymore. (That doesn't mean I don't eat it now and then, but I pay the price when I do!) Eating wheat or anything containing MSG will cause my hands and feet to swell, my joints to ache and a general overall "ick" feeling. Just don't feel well at all. If I avoid wheat as much as possible, those symptoms don't show up.
Will this spell with your mother eventually die down a bit?
Also, do you think maybe a therapist would help? It helped me greatly.
So my mom agreed to pay me $15/hour (about half of what the other CG is paid)(large metro area here, usual rate is $29 hr for 3-hour min). I gave her one bill for 18.5 hours of care, and she paid it.
Then today, after 3.5 hours of doctor stuff, she says, "how about we go to McDonald's, and I'll buy you a hamburger, instead of paying you?".
I about flipped out right there. How does a $5 happy meal cover the same as $15 x 3.5 hours???????
Earlier in our conversations in waiting room, she was mis-remembering things about our family, like who got college paid for, and who didn't. Out of 5 kids, 2 got college, then came the lower 3 kids-- #3's college was paid, #4's college paid 2 years but he dropped out, and me #5, got the raw end of the deal, because when #3 graduated (same yr as #4 dropped out), the college said I didn't need any financial aid. So I didn't get my college paid by parents, as all the others did, I had to work my way thru college. It changed the course of my Life!
So fast forward to today, mom is trying to tell me, that they woulnd' t pay my college because I wanted too much spending money......really weird. She cannot remember the whole deal with the college financial aid office telling them, I was not eligible. I told her, I had to pay all my own college, and she said no, it was that I wanted too much spending money (?). This sounds like crazy talk! I didn't have hardly any money, because the only money I had, was all going to tuition, dorm room, books, etc. And I worked full time summer jobs to make about $900 towards my tuition.
Anyhow. It just really makes me MAD that she would think I would accept a hamburger, instead of what she said she would do, pay me half the rate of her other CG.
I am so upset, I am thinking, I do not want to do anything for her--I am so sick & tired of being woken up with her phone calls, being her personal Geriatric "Manager", I am the one who has to oversee everything!!! She cannot even make a phone call (except to me), I deliver all her food, she can't get out of the car by herself, and I don't think she is bathing anymore except for a sponge bath. Her other caregiver washes her hair for her.
I dont' know if I want to go the Asst Living route, because I would still be on the hook for all the "Management".....keeping track of her doctor appointments, driving her there (she needs assistance getting in & out, buckle seat belt, she cannot ride one of those large vans!!).
I feel insulted that after all I have done, for years & years, and she offered to pay half of what the going rate is, and now she want to buy me a HAMBURGER?
And if I did manage to move her to AL, well then she would be saying that she couldn't afford to pay anyone to take her to the doctor!!!!!
ARGH......I am ready to run away!
C. difficile bacteria are found throughout the environment — in soil, air, water, human and animal feces, and food products, such as processed meats.
(If I could highlight "AIR", I would! I always thought this was probably airborne.)
In hospitals and nursing homes, C. difficile spreads mainly on hands from person to person, but also on cart handles, bedrails, bedside tables, toilets, sinks, stethoscopes, thermometers — even telephones and remote controls.
The bacteria produce spores that can persist in a room for weeks or months. If you touch a surface contaminated with C. difficile, you may then unknowingly swallow the bacteria.
Older age is also a risk factor for C. difficile infection. In one study, the risk of becoming infected with C. difficile was 10 times greater for people age 65 and older compared with younger people.
Very glad I called off our visit.
I think you're probably better off without him, sounds like. :-)