Elder care, and my apology for slow response yimes

[coyote]

I'm going to make a public apology for being slow communication wise.

Over the last 2 years my wife and I have spent 3 nights a week with her parents. FIL has had 2 strokes and brain surgery, he is 88 years old. MIL is 85 and showing beginning signs of dementia. She should not drive. I might get 4 calls in 10 minutes asking me to add toilet paper to the shopping list.

If I have promised you pictures or to search for an item, I'll be slow. I have to have my act together, and be home and the same time. That's less frequent than I would like it to be.

If you are taking care of loved ones share the experience. This shit can be hard. I know I'm not the only knuckle dragger that frequents this board doing this.

MCB is sort of my happy place, so male me happy!

[pintbuster]

That's rough man. My wife started to get sick at the age of 28, doctors had no idea what it was, or how to treat it.
Her condition kept getting worse despite trips to the Mayo clinic, and specialists up and down the eastern seaboard for years.
Confined to a wheelchair, catheters, drugs, pain, surgeries, stimulators, job loss, career change, location change, very dark times for us.
Eventually her condition got so bad that they started taking shots in the dark with tests, and got a hit.
Degenerative neurological disorder, terminal, but treatable at the front end.
She can walk now, drive short distances, garden, shoot guns, enjoy herself.
It took a 10 years, but our lives are great now and we make the most of our time together.
Hang in there man, your wife needs you.
Make sure to take care of yourself too and talk to people, it can get lonely.

[Twisted G]

this always makes me laugh and happy .

[BigRed]

You'll get no grief from us. Family first! We can all happily wait for when life works for you. Don't forget to look after yourselves too...your wife and you that is. Aging parents is tuff.

[Twisted G]

You'll get no grief from us. Family first! We can all happily wait for when life works for you. Don't forget to look after yourselves too...your wife and you that is. Aging parents is tuff.

Amen BigRed! Family is the only thing besides god and love that matters. Forget about us for awhile and go deal with whats important! .

[Daltech]

How you treat your loved ones will be all you remember. Give them the extra night, take an extra day off for them. I’d give anything to have one more day. The times I missed I regret. You’re the head honcho now, be worthy of it. The most irritating, little things, or stuff you just don’t want to do, you’ll be proud of looking back. Stay strong brother this time won’t last. When I reminisce about my family experiences it gives me strength and I’ve gone further than I ever imagined. Turn that pain into gas.

[BrendanB]

Praying for you bud, that sounds tough. Hang in there, sounds like you’re a really good dude. I supposed it could be one of us that needs the help one day.

[Cdn_Cuda]

We’re going through some similar issues
my wife’s grandmother. We’re just helping and not doing full time care and it can be brutal at times.

Grandpa passed away two Christmas ago. Grandma now lives alone in a large 3 story house. She can barely walk anymore, used a walker and can’t go up stairs. There are no bathing facilities on the main floor, and the only tub they have is a deep jacuzzi tub which is gets stuck in. We tried hard to put a walk-in tube when grandpa was still
alive, but grandma refuses to spend any money on such things. Always ends up in a big fight. She should not be allowed to live on her own, but be damned if anyone can tell her that and another family member is going to have to deal with that can of worms.

To make the stubbornness worse, she also had signs of dementia. She has a real chip on her shoulder again men and often causes various men in the family of stealing from her or victimizing her in some way. Most of the time it’s her not understanding people trying to help her.

I caught the brunt of it once after she asked me to sell her car (she can’t drive and hasn’t driven in 20+ years.). She calls me a few times and asks if I sold her car. I try to explain I need to look at it first, see the mileage and be able to determine how much it was worth. Long story short, she accuses me of trying to rip her off and steal her money/car and insists the dealership will give her more money as the salesperson was Finnish, like she was. I’ve experienced dementia family members before and this was a clear cut case of it. Unfortunately it was
all in front of my young kids who are old enough to understand grandma being mean, but not why. We ended up just leaving and I see very little of grandma now.

So this is why Canadians has a tradition method dealing with seniors:

https://youtu.be/7ZE0TuKTpo4

So keep up the difficult and exhausting work, but try to find pleasure and humour in the little things and take a break, a nice dinner or drink even when you get a chance.

[coyote]

Paranoia and Dementia are evil sisters.

My grandma was sweet demure country girl who never uttered a profanity. When the Alzheimer's arrived she could out cudd a drill sergeant.

[Axel]

Don't even worry about paintball. Focus on what's important and don't mind us.

Of course a diversion now and then is good for the soul...

MCB is sort of my happy place, so male me happy!

...be careful what you wish for...

[coyote]

Mayo, Miracle whip, Axel grease...
Not sure any of that is good for the soul, but happy is happy!

[THE_Incredible_Hulk]

About 3 1/2 years ago I let Mom and Brother and 3 cats move in with me. Mom is retired and the rising health care cost was not doing her any favors. He is on disability. They choose to sleep a lot and almost a year after moving in Mom's health declined to where I had to put her in a home. She currently uses a wheelchair to move around. The nursing home is working with her for using a walker and I asked them to get her good with stairs. My house has a lot of stairs. If she gets good on stairs and isn't a fall risk she could visit. She has dementia, too. And Brother's sleeping habits doesn't do him any favors either. He's also a hypochondriac and for awhile he went to the ER every other week whether he really needed to go or not. I started keeping a spreadsheet when he'd go to the ER. One of the cats has epilepsy. I give her one medicine twice a day and another medicine three times a day.