Related to complaints about nursing homes I've heard arguments like "If they really loved her, they wouldn't have put her in a home. They'd take care of her themselves, nothing is more important than family."
Also, "What do you expect when you go to the cheapest possible nursing home/whatever medicare will pay for. If they really cared they'd put her in a more expensive/better nursing home".
I love my residents like they're my own family. I respect the fact that if it weren't for the elderly, I wouldn't be here. They receive lots of hugs from us, too. So I guess it depends where you work, and how you view aging.
Specializes in Dialysis. OR, cardiac tell, homecare case managem.
Until you are the caregiver ie. daughter or other family member and have experienced it for yourself please withhold judgement. There are many factors that staff at facilities and outsiders do not know. You can only know when you have been the 24hour caregiver at home. Sometimes we try to do it all as nurses. I worked third shift and my sister worked days. I never slept we tried to keep mom at home as long as possible. It worked for us until mom started having seizures grand mal type and wandering. It is called caregiver burnout. Mom went to a place that took great care of her. My sister or I was there everyday to visit, we took her home on weekends , took her to church. we tried to maintain as normal a life for her as we could. Sorry but this is the day that my mom started declining and ultimately passed so I am a bit opinionated on this. Mom went in and we paid, when the money ran out yes familycare took over, she still received the same great care. DON'T JUDGE UNTIL YOU KNOW ALL THE DETAILS, EVERYONE HAS PRIVATE PAIN THAT WE DO NOT KNOW ABOUT. SOME DAYS WITH MOM WERE WONDERFUL AND OTHERS WERE NOT. I WOULD NOT TRADE MY EXPERIENCE TAKING CARE OF MY MOM FOR ANYTHING BUT PLEASE DO NOT JUDGE THOSE WHO CHOOSE NOT TO. MY MOM WAS A WONDERFUL PERSON AND I COULD NOT! HAVE HAD A BETTER MOM, BUT EVEN DURING ALZHEIMERS SHE HAD HER MOMENTS. THE HARDEST WAS WHEN SHE FORGOT THAT I WAS HER DAUGHTER, THAT WAS A ROUGH FEW MONTHS, THEN SHE REMEMBERED . ALL I AM SAYING IS WHO KNOWS? DO NOT JUDGE, WE ALL HAVE ISSUES WE HAVE HAD TO DEAL WITH IN OUR PERSONAL LIVES AS WELL AS OUR PROFESSIONAL LIVES.
I agree that you never know what transpired within the family previously.
I also like to note that some families are not mentally able to care for families.
My grandmother is a healthy, happy go lucky 88 yo with Alzheimer's. (no meds except Tylenol)
My mother sees her daily (she does not work) and does whatever she can to help besides actually living with her. There was a time when my mom was going to take grandma to live with her. My mother unfortunately does not have the mental fortitude to see her mother decline with Alzheimer's. This is not the woman she knows as "mother". . It would break my heart to see my mother decline over her mother's decline. No need to see that happen. I would be a mess too.
It is not always about money, acuity, or how one was treated growin up.
Some people just can't handle it. I understand that. I am glad there are places for family to go when that is the case.
I love to take care of the elderly. They are my favorite type of patients. Even so I am one of those family members who do not see my grandmother and grandfather (opposite sides of the family) regularly. I see grandma when I see my mom though.
I have not seen my grandfather in quite a few years. He also has dementia and no memory of many of family members. I do not have a say in his care. (step-grandfather but the only one I know) So it is hard to see him when he can't remember and I am heart broken. He is not the same man. Neither of us benefit from the visit. (I hear that he knows he can't remember and it brings him down when he is reminded that someone is family but he can't recall.)
In writing this I feel quilty and it sounds like I am copping out but hopefully someone else understands how I feel.
I believe it is a personal choice. No one has the right to question your personal judgement. I sent my mom to a nursing home. This was I had no other choice. Being a single mom, with two handicapped kids, and working nights is a lot of stress. I did take my mom out of a really bad live in situation my sister put her into. I didn't know where she was for some time, as my sister decieded not to tell the rest of the family, out of her our personal problem of spite. Never the less, one day my sister called me and said she was worried and gave me the address. I drove 300 miles to the house, and found her weight 80 pounds, all of her belongings missing, no money, and my mom was in charge, with alzehimers and untreated diabtes of 4 other residents in the house. I was horrified, and called the police and sheriff and we effectively shut down the house and I took my mom home to live with me. I was meant to be a stop gap measure and to look for a place for her to live in a few weeks.
But, she was so sick and needed a lot of care, and was afraid of everything. We kept her and cared for her. My mom's history of being abused by my dad had only been continued in this house she had been in. So, we determined to give her pretty clothes, and give her the time of her live. We took her to stores and had her pick out furniture and bedding and get her hair done, and did as much as we possible could. She got involved in a couple of church groups, and learned to e mail, and get on yahoo. She eventlually fattened up a bit and started taking walks in the back yard, and caring for our raspberries, and blackberries. But, after a few years of happiness, alzhiemers raised it's ugly head in full force. I had to cut down on work, and my handicapped kids did blood sugars and pill police work while I was gone. But, then Mom started wandering at night. Exhusted and broke and saddened I took her to a small nursing home.
My mom understood and was fine with it, she said she was glad for the years that we shared. We still took off on day trips from the nursing home, and had good times. I remember one time we went to a new coffee shop and ordered donuts and coffee. We thought something was wrong when we saw women with their arms around each other and the staff was looking at us strangly. (I am not agains gay people) This just happened to be a gay coffee house. Finally one of the couples came up to us and said, we haven't seen many spring/winter relatinships in here before. Mom and I just look at each other and grabbed each others hands and gave each other a big kiss, right on the lips. We told them we had been together for years and loved each other very much. I couldn't believe my mom did that, and later she winked at me and said that was fun. It wasn't more than 2 months later she died.
I don't think I abandoned her, we did mange to have shared experiences even at the nursing home. I can tell you we did manage to take over the home and involve her friends and roommates into family meetings and parties. My mom felt secure both and my home and this new place.
However, being a nurse in that town for many years, I knew the CNA's from my facilites, and I knew who to not allow around my mom. I gave the DON and Adminstrators a list of CNA's who I would not allow to care for my mom. And they honored my wishes.
thinking about this, has brought back a lot of good memories, and i appreciate that trip down memory lane. my mom favorite drive was on 7 bridges road, and wanted her ashes are spread there.
Unfortunately, there have been many reports of serious physical,sexual and verbal abuse among our nation's nursing homes. I worked in many nursing homes on night shift. The nursing homes I worked in rarely had adequate staffing and rarely enough linen to even change the incontinent patients that needed changing during the night. We all complained to the head supervisors about it but still nothing was done.
So sad to see so much judgment....we tried everything to keep my grandmother at home after her sister (who was her caretaker) died suddenly. She came to live with us, and was verbally abusive to my mother, even though I watched my mother bend over backwards to take care of Grandma. My dad convinced his cousin to take her in, and five years later his wife developed cancer so she came back to us. She almost burned the house down trying to make a grilled cheese and put whiskey in my 18 month old sister's cup when she was teething. Dr said no dementia or cognitive deficit. It was just unsafe. My dad hired home health Lpns to care for her in the day time and she ran off five of them because she was verbally abusive, racist, and hateful. She outlived her only daughter and son in law, as well as three husbands, and we had no more family to help take care of her.
We put her in the nicest facility in the state, a nonprofit place with a great nurse to patient ratio. My dad paid loads of money for her to be there and we visited three times a week despite the fact that the facility was 40 miles from our house. She was soon asked to leave the facility because she was totally cognizant but also totally incontinent and refused to keep her briefs on. She was also, yet again, verbally abusive and combative with staff despite several different doctors insisting that she had no mental deficit. Finally she ended up in a stereotypical "nursing home" and we visited daily, even though she always told my mom it was my mom's fault she ended up there....she cussed my mom out and said some horrible things for no reason....and my dad told her from now on he was the only one who would be visiting because he didn't want me and my sisters to witness that scene, especially when my mother had done nothing except move heaven and earth to make my grandmother happy and comfortable...my grandmother just didn't want to be happy even though we welcomed her into our home. I have literally no positive memories of her, even before she came to live with us. Please don't judge, you really have no idea what's transpired as far as family dynamics! Don't judge someone else and put yourself up on a pedestal because you're superwoman and cared for your mother at home...I'm not religious but the scripture "let he who thinks he stands take heed lest he fall" really applies here.
I have tried, cajoled, fought to get her diet or exercise or be active. She will not do so. I have FINALLY gotten her to stop sending me huge amts of candy/baked goods that I cannot/should not eat. I cannot physically lift her if she falls. I am unmarried and live by myself. I have moderate to severe autoimmune disease. My one child, has lupus and two children, and works 40-60 hrs a week to pay for an ex and to pay debts accumulated during the marriage. My sister is completely disabled by uncontrolled bipolar disease and cannot care for herself, much less Mom.
I have to work to pay my and some of her bills. She is the youngest - her sisters are 80s and 90s and certainly can't lift her.
EXACTLY HOW DOES ONE BY ONESELF CARE FOR A 300 LB PARENT IF THEY BECOME DISABLED!
It is all well and good to say the family should handle but if they have done everything and the family member will not do anything to help them keep them home, there is little choice.
But a bigger issue. If everyone is so concerned about care in Nursing homes, why is no one mobilizing to improve it, to make it more humane for our elders?
I've seen enough patients from a home environment to know that not everyone is cut out to be a home caregiver. Severe contractures, gangrene on multiple toes and fingers, stage IV tunneled sacrals tunneled. These wounds and contractures effectively treated only during hospitalizations. Those who can do it and do it well...my hat is off to you. Some can't do it well, and it shows.
Regardless, here's another take on life in a nursing home:
I did clinicals in a nursing home, and I've seen the residents outside the dementia unit where my MIL resides. Her facility is an exceptional one. These non-dementia A/Ox3-4 residents whose bodies have given out have friends of similar abilities that they eat every meal with, that they attend activities and church with, that they converse with day in and day out. They are able to get around with their assistive devices because the facility is built to handle them. They are presented with a variety of activities tailor made to their abilities and generational memories. In good nursing homes, the elderly can be given the freedom of living in an environment well-suited to their abilities and disabilities. They see and interact with people who are just like them. They can enjoy their lives without the burden of wondering if they are burdens on their own children.
Now, imagine those same residents in the homes of their adult children. They would spend a lot of time alone because their adult children are probably working. Their own elderly friends may not be able to come see them often because it's not the elderly person's home--it's the kids' home. They are limited to the areas of their own homes that they can enter because the house wasn't built for someone who is disabled. There's no sense of community when the only people you see on a consistent basis are your own adult children.
Just another take on it...some people can thrive in a nursing home environment. I think that is often forgotten.
rainfallrx
20 Posts
Me too! Love your comment!