Thursday, July 8, 2004
You can't pay people to do what fully engaged caregivers do...
...literally. Something very interesting happened today. While we were at the lab waiting to have Mom's blood drawn for her "as needed" CBC I noticed, along the top of the obligatory aquarium, a row of brochures advertising several agencies who provide, for a price, a variety of services aimed at either the elderly living at home alone, caregivers to the elderly or those seeking assisted living. Once again, this morning, Mom and I had gone through a horrible hour and a half of me trying to get her up while she resisted despite our conversation last night. I was ready, by the time I finally got her out of bed, because her urine had begun to overflow the plastic sheet onto the floor and I was very harsh with her about not only laying stubbornly in her urine but peeing through her soaked layers of paper underwear to the point where it was splashing onto the floor, to throw in the towel; in point of fact, the three towels I'd been using to sop up the urine leaking from her throughout our hour and a half Get-Up-No argument. We spent most of the morning, as I bathed her, as she took her breathing treatment, ate and as I prepared her to go and took her to the lab having a not very congenial conversation about the possibility that it was time for someone else to take over her care. The conversation was more my distressed monologue peppered with pointed questions than a conversation of course, and being the strong willed woman that she is, Mom refused to participate in it by refusing to answer my pointed questions.
When I saw the brochures it occurred to me that maybe I could hire someone to do the two most unpleasant, distressing chores I have, thus take care of the problem: Waking her up in the morning by giving her a reason to get out of bed (or, at least, participating in the pitched Get-Up-No battles on my behalf and maybe do it with more finesse that I've lately been displaying) and hovering over her to drink the liquids I give her in order to keep her minimally hydrated. The brochures displayed an amazing number of chores that you can hire someone to do. Aside from the obvious chores you can, for instance, hire someone to rent and watch videos with your charge. You can hire someone to go through your cupboards and refrigerator on a regular basis and get rid of expired (in both senses) food; organize your mail; pay bills; play cards/board games with your charge; take walks with your charge; set up a "secure" bath (although not actually help the charge bathe); accompany you on appointments and take notes; talk about "the old times"; talk about "current events"... The lists went on and on and ended with an enticing invitation to call if the chore you needed done wasn't listed. So I called all five agencies, two of which were local franchises of national companies, three of which were locally based. Although I doubted that I could hire someone to perform water torture for me I considered it possible that I could hire someone to wake her up and coax her to sit up on the edge of the bed for me. These are the only two services that I really feel I could use help accomplishing. If they were done by someone else they would relieve me of two major sources of stress in my life, the first being major because it sets the tone of my mother's day.
No one wants to do these two things. Not even for money. Not even for a lot of money. One woman bluntly responded, "Honey, when you're at the place where you want to hire someone to do those things, you should consider a nursing home."
That's all Mom needs: A 24 hour saline drip and a burly CNA picking her up out bed in the morning, scrubbing her down and sitting her in a wheelchair. It's funny, after I discovered that the sources of my personal caregiver stress are chores only "volunteer" caregivers like me will do, I told Mom what I'd learned and told her what the one woman said to me.
Mom's response was, "No, I'm not ready for that. I've seen that. I'm not there, yet."
She has seen "that", with both her mother and her sister. And, she's right, she's "not there yet...not ready for that".
There isn't an item on any of the lists that causes me stress and that I'd consider paying someone to do on my behalf. When stress surrounds any, yes, any of the items listed, it isn't over the chores, it's over the limited amount of time I have when so much of it is devoted to intense vigilance and companionship. In fact, all the items listed are chores I wouldn't want to slip away from my grasp, neither mental nor physical. I wouldn't mind if someone would come over, someone whose company she enjoyed, and "play" with her. She'd probably enjoy this, too. When we have the money again I'm considering doing this since I have a hard time getting her to go to places where she would meet these people and indulge in these activities. I prefer, though, to keep my eyes and mind on everything else, even if I slip occasionally. As well, the last thing I'd do is hand her medical care over to the watchful eye of someone else; if the highest educated and experienced professionals can't manage it well I certainly haven't got confidence in the less well educated and experienced professionals.
You see, that's the thing about caregiving, whether it be of children, the infirm or the elderly. We as a society don't value the events that really matter enough to spot the caregiver in those areas, like giving someone a reason to get out of bed when an overly familiar face no longer holds enough to charm to engender the desire to wake up to it. We don't acknowledge that it might be a good idea for everyone involved if we didn't leave all those hidden chores to one person. For god sakes, we don't even acknowledge that parenthood isn't necessarily a good idea when only one or two "parents" are doing it. A large segment of this Westernized society has way too much at stake emotionally in the "I did it myself" game; so much that we regularly endanger all those around us who need care, including ourselves, without considering that those who need care are in danger; or shrugging our shoulders and saying, "Well, that's life." That's life if you accept it as life. Remember Hillary Clinton's' so-famous-it-now-sounds-trite citation: "It takes a village to raise a child"? Well, it takes a village to care for everyone. Absolutely everyone. Not a state. Not a government agency. Not the law. A village. When are we going to understand this, act on it, and finally, finally, give everyone in our society, caregivers and charges alike, a break? We don't need more laws, more agencies, more hired help. We need more people who care, about their relatives, their friends, their neighbors, enough to fit these people into their lives and stand up to the rest of society and say, "I am doing something important. I am one of many who is helping to care for one of the many."
This next paragraph is a note to myself and you, the reader. The real news in this journal is happening over at Mom's Daily Tests & Meds right now. You're missing out if you don't visit and scan the developments every once in awhile. I'll cover it in brief later. For the record, though, very interesting changes are taking place in Mom's body. I think I know what is going on but I'm giving it a good trial period before announcing what I think I will be announcing in a bit. In any event, all the hard evidence is piling up over there. Ignore it if you wish and wait for the final summary which may appear here, then again, it may appear there. All I wish to say, at this point, is that I think I've finally cracked the code despite Mom's doctors. I'm very excited. I now look forward more to posting over there than posting over here.
It's late. I need sleep. Later.
When I saw the brochures it occurred to me that maybe I could hire someone to do the two most unpleasant, distressing chores I have, thus take care of the problem: Waking her up in the morning by giving her a reason to get out of bed (or, at least, participating in the pitched Get-Up-No battles on my behalf and maybe do it with more finesse that I've lately been displaying) and hovering over her to drink the liquids I give her in order to keep her minimally hydrated. The brochures displayed an amazing number of chores that you can hire someone to do. Aside from the obvious chores you can, for instance, hire someone to rent and watch videos with your charge. You can hire someone to go through your cupboards and refrigerator on a regular basis and get rid of expired (in both senses) food; organize your mail; pay bills; play cards/board games with your charge; take walks with your charge; set up a "secure" bath (although not actually help the charge bathe); accompany you on appointments and take notes; talk about "the old times"; talk about "current events"... The lists went on and on and ended with an enticing invitation to call if the chore you needed done wasn't listed. So I called all five agencies, two of which were local franchises of national companies, three of which were locally based. Although I doubted that I could hire someone to perform water torture for me I considered it possible that I could hire someone to wake her up and coax her to sit up on the edge of the bed for me. These are the only two services that I really feel I could use help accomplishing. If they were done by someone else they would relieve me of two major sources of stress in my life, the first being major because it sets the tone of my mother's day.
No one wants to do these two things. Not even for money. Not even for a lot of money. One woman bluntly responded, "Honey, when you're at the place where you want to hire someone to do those things, you should consider a nursing home."
That's all Mom needs: A 24 hour saline drip and a burly CNA picking her up out bed in the morning, scrubbing her down and sitting her in a wheelchair. It's funny, after I discovered that the sources of my personal caregiver stress are chores only "volunteer" caregivers like me will do, I told Mom what I'd learned and told her what the one woman said to me.
Mom's response was, "No, I'm not ready for that. I've seen that. I'm not there, yet."
She has seen "that", with both her mother and her sister. And, she's right, she's "not there yet...not ready for that".
There isn't an item on any of the lists that causes me stress and that I'd consider paying someone to do on my behalf. When stress surrounds any, yes, any of the items listed, it isn't over the chores, it's over the limited amount of time I have when so much of it is devoted to intense vigilance and companionship. In fact, all the items listed are chores I wouldn't want to slip away from my grasp, neither mental nor physical. I wouldn't mind if someone would come over, someone whose company she enjoyed, and "play" with her. She'd probably enjoy this, too. When we have the money again I'm considering doing this since I have a hard time getting her to go to places where she would meet these people and indulge in these activities. I prefer, though, to keep my eyes and mind on everything else, even if I slip occasionally. As well, the last thing I'd do is hand her medical care over to the watchful eye of someone else; if the highest educated and experienced professionals can't manage it well I certainly haven't got confidence in the less well educated and experienced professionals.
You see, that's the thing about caregiving, whether it be of children, the infirm or the elderly. We as a society don't value the events that really matter enough to spot the caregiver in those areas, like giving someone a reason to get out of bed when an overly familiar face no longer holds enough to charm to engender the desire to wake up to it. We don't acknowledge that it might be a good idea for everyone involved if we didn't leave all those hidden chores to one person. For god sakes, we don't even acknowledge that parenthood isn't necessarily a good idea when only one or two "parents" are doing it. A large segment of this Westernized society has way too much at stake emotionally in the "I did it myself" game; so much that we regularly endanger all those around us who need care, including ourselves, without considering that those who need care are in danger; or shrugging our shoulders and saying, "Well, that's life." That's life if you accept it as life. Remember Hillary Clinton's' so-famous-it-now-sounds-trite citation: "It takes a village to raise a child"? Well, it takes a village to care for everyone. Absolutely everyone. Not a state. Not a government agency. Not the law. A village. When are we going to understand this, act on it, and finally, finally, give everyone in our society, caregivers and charges alike, a break? We don't need more laws, more agencies, more hired help. We need more people who care, about their relatives, their friends, their neighbors, enough to fit these people into their lives and stand up to the rest of society and say, "I am doing something important. I am one of many who is helping to care for one of the many."
This next paragraph is a note to myself and you, the reader. The real news in this journal is happening over at Mom's Daily Tests & Meds right now. You're missing out if you don't visit and scan the developments every once in awhile. I'll cover it in brief later. For the record, though, very interesting changes are taking place in Mom's body. I think I know what is going on but I'm giving it a good trial period before announcing what I think I will be announcing in a bit. In any event, all the hard evidence is piling up over there. Ignore it if you wish and wait for the final summary which may appear here, then again, it may appear there. All I wish to say, at this point, is that I think I've finally cracked the code despite Mom's doctors. I'm very excited. I now look forward more to posting over there than posting over here.
It's late. I need sleep. Later.
