[Kayzee]

It can be very hard to be patient and kind to someone with dementia, but they do not know how rude their being. Does she have family who visit? So many of our elderly are just put in long term care and forgotten. How about activities in your facility? And than there are always the standby PRN's such as Ativan, but is she a fall risk taking this medication?Is she now on any drugs that may need adjustment? Try to be patient and don't take her words personally. I'm sure everyone knows your doing everything you can. That's evident just by answering her call light every 5 min.

[sunnygirl272]

Originally posted by baseline
I have always said that I would not be the sweet L.O.L. in N.A.D.
I will be the screamer yelling POLICE POLICE 911!!!!!!

i, personally aspire to be the Little ole lady letch...flashing the male residents and grabbing the workmen's dinghies.....

[tattooednursie]

Thank you guys for all your support!
I will try to put myself in her shoes tomorrow when I return to work. I have no clue about her meds, because I'm not the one who administers them . I will enquire about her meds to the nurses though, hopfully something can be done. I get frusterated and feel hopless very easily, so, because of her, on many occasions I had to step outside to cry or just calm down.

I really appriciate your advice.

[tattooednursie]

Well . . . I aspire to be the same kind of little old lady as sunnygirl. Hey! maybe we'll be in the same nursing home flashing and grabbing dingies!!! maybe in the same room! BOY! We'd be a pair.

[bagladyrn]

I've already told my son that when the day comes that I need a nursing home, he'd better warn the staff that I'm going to be the LOL in the geri chair by the nurses station, wide awake all night long (every unit has one) since I've worked my entire career on nights, we KNOW I won't be changing!

I once had a man that was very much like this person you described. He cursed the staff, hit us, kicked us, you name it, he did it. Every aspect of his care was explained prior to doing it, he FULLY understood, the only one he had fooled was his daughter that said, "Daddy would never treat anyone like this if they were not provoking him." Well that's not what his brothers and sisters said. They said he had always been an abusive alcoholic and this was his normal way of life before entering the facility. Sure, daughter would defend him, she lived over 1000 miles away and saw him 2 days 3 times a year. This very sweet man nearly broke my nose when he used the full force of his fist to slam my head against the wall, nearly breaking my nose and knocked me out, the reason, I was putting lotion on his arm. Some people just will not and in some cases cannot change but others no darned well what they are doing and love every second of it cause they know there is not a darned thing we can do but smile and duck from the punches, I just didn't duck fast enough! Good luck honey but don't take it personally.

[emily_mom]

I hope to never have to live in a NH. My 4 year old said that she wants to live with me forever, so I'm holding her to it....

[Peatness]

Mandi. you've gotten some great advice from your peers... Here's my tidbit (big bit ). What works best for me in these situations is to practice empathy to the nth degree. Put yourself into that person's shoes, imagine what it must be like for them day in and day out. They must be so frightened and angry. I learned my greatest nursing lesson before I even began school. My father was diagnosed with terminal cancer and a once strong and independent man required my assisstance 24/7. What was hardest though was when he slowly went into renal failure resulting in him quickly losing his mental functioning. I was assured the dementia was due to his pain meds (not true!) as it was later found that he had no renal fx. Throughout this ordeal I found myself dealing with psychotic episodes where he thought we were all trying to kill him, and became an expert marksman at crushing imaginary spiders that filled his room and competed with the bats for ceiling space...Needless to say it was quite difficult and on many occasions very frustrating. Perhaps it was easier for me because I loved him so much?.. I look at patients in similar situations very differently now. I make an attempt to understand them and their disease. As another member said, I too would be honored to have a nurse like you caring for me or any member of my family. You are obviously very sensitive and caring but you need to learn to not take take things personally so that you can prevent emotional burn-out. Affirm yourself each day and tell yourself what a great job you did. You deserve it! Best Wishes to you, Aniesse

[Kikumaru]

I believe that most residents in snf's have a case conferencing meeting every month. I think that it is important if family, significant others, etc. participate in these conferences with the providers. If this occurs all minds can assist in finding a common goal in assisting the resident. The goal may conclude with behavioral approaches, legal approaches or any other approach creating a long term gain for either the staff, family and/or resident

[amanda1229]

We have a resident like that. I can't do much, because I'm an aide so there's no psych consult or med change on my part. But whenever he complains or shouts, I just sit down with him or put my hand on his shoulder and say, "I know, they must have done something horrible to you! What did they do?" I just go along with his "they treat me like a dog" comments. He's constantly shouting this, but when I complain and whine and get worked up along with him, he starts to appreciate me. And since he has dementia, it's not like he's ever going to say, "And Amanda the aide agrees with me!" He calms down for a while, and you say the exact same thing sometime later. I find that when he calms down, he's a very sweet and sad man.