Well I went to see dad this afternoon, to find him asleep.
Talking to the staff nurse, he refused to go to bed last night, when they finally did get him to bed, he kept trying to get up
Finally he became aggressive...

This is common Bernie.
I remember my Granny from first in the hospital when I visited her after her first stroke.
Go away she said.
Then she was moved to a short-term home.
I visited her there and the same thing.
Go away she said.

Id like to add my 2 cents to this forum.
I know what its like when you father doesn't know who you are. It was temporary, But it still sucked. He passed from Parkinsons in 2008, At home where he wanted to die.
Ive posted this on my team forum, But my mom came close to passing at the end of April. Congestive heart disease and COPD. It wont get better. The Dr. told her she cant live alone and she cant live with my sister. Oxygen needs are to great for that. So mom is in an assisted living place. She was bummed at first. Having to give up her apartment. But she likes where she is now, And likes the staff.
So, We as the kids to our aging parents, Id say don't beat your self up over choices you have no control over.
I know its not easy.
Just my 2 cents worth.

---

[/quote]

Old James

I've been fortunate in that my mum is generally in good physical health, so there are no serious medical issues that fall on my shoulders to address. I have no idea how well I'd manage having to keep her attached to and using oxygen for example... *fail to suppress wicked anniet* although superglue springs to mind... *ashamed blink* ... ;) She is supposed to use an asthma pump for occasional breathing "difficulties" but behaves like she's being evilly experimented on by Josef Mengele herself. I've come to not worry too much about persisting with it as I now know her "wheezing" is more about doing something she doesn't want to do rather than an actual medical problem., and distraction will also cure it instantaneously :)

It's obviously very sad that your mom's health is declining, James, but it is comforting to know that she's adapted so well to her new environment :) I'm so glad. I don't doubt for a moment that her quality of life and the length of time you will continue to be able to share with her, has been improved and extended :)

When I spoke of a "rapid slope downhill" I was referring to memory retrieval and cognitive awareness having the potential to erode at a faster rate than might happen at home, as that has been my experience. But it will still happen at home, and a complication such as with the heart, as in Bernie's dad's case is a complicating factor I have not been forced to consider with my mum.

My other half isn't doing too brilliantly following the operation he had to have today :( He wasn't doing too brilliantly before either, but I'd sort of hoped the op would help fix that a bit. The good news though, is that hanging around near the phone all day so as not to miss any calls from the hospital finally paid off a little while ago - saving me the frustration of trying to get through only to listen to the phone ring for ages before my call got cut off.

Exhausting day.

I got a call at 6:15 am from a woman doctor with an accent so strong I had to tell her I couldn't understand her.

Her male college wasn't much better, but I did glean that dad had had a bad night and they wanted me to approve a Do Not Resuscitate. I was a bit taken aback as I had never really considered it.

However knowing how he had been on Saturday I agreed. He said I should come in and see the day staff.

So I went in only to find dad sitting up in bed with the consultant having a chat with him (it was probably a bit one sided as I discovered dad had neither hearing aid in!!)

So the consultant spoke to me and said that dad had a chest infection and they would start treating it and unless there are complications he should be out next week.

To say I was surprised was an understatement, so I asked about the DNR and he said that in most cases of someone of my dads age and medical history coupled with the dementia a DNR is considered best.

So it was a bit of an emotional roller coaster. Dad seems physically a lot better than he was over the weekend, he doesn't know who I am as he called me Harold (his older brother) and when I asked him where he was he didn't answer. When the phlebotomist came to take a blood sample her standard questions were "can you tell me your name and DOB. He couldn't tell her his name, and DOB not a hope.

I had a long chat with the staff nurse and she said she would refer dad to the "memory" department for an assessment and pass my details onto social services to see what help they can provide.

I can cope with dad as he was but in his present state I know I cannot be there 24/7.

So shall have to see where this leads. Hopefully for a better outcome for dad than I thought on Saturday.

the "memory" department

My mother often times in the middle of the night, or any random time really, would start reciting her email address, my full name, including my middle name, my old phone number, her exact street address where she lived as a kid, and various other things her brain was apparently trying to keep intact. It was quite fascinating to me, really.

---

The mind is a weird and mysterious place

My stepmom has a living will type document. It is on file at several hospitals. It states that if she goes there and is basically in a vegatative condition and zero hope is the outcome. She has a DNR order already on file. This is her wish. Not mine. Hers. Not sure if my Dad has one. Will have to ask him.

---

Oh Annie, I am so very sorry to hear that your other half is still so poorly I really am. And with so many members of your family in far flung parts of the world. I can only send you my heartfelt thoughts and feelings.

+1

I wish ... Annie, Bernie and all of you caring for love ones ..... the best,
with Lots of Hugs,
Byron

I can only say to Bernie that from what he is telling us, there has been a significant turn in events. With mum we never had the DNR situation facing us, and I am glad that we didn't. How can you ask a child to agree to that for a parent?? But what we did have was in some ways worse.

When she had the second stroke, she was transferred to the hospital from the Home. Dad use to go in every day, spend 3 hours with her beside the bed holding her hand. Most days she didn't know he was there or who he was. Then came the day when my brother and I went to see the Matron and asked to be told what the prognosis was. She sat us down and said there is nothing medically we can do any more for your mum, she has had two strokes which have pretty much paralysed her down both sides. We can keep her alive for maybe a couple more months at most on drips and tube feeding etc, but we will lose her at some point.

She went on, we can't do anything more for your mum, but we can do something for your dad. The poor man comes in each day, spends hours, and leaves in tears, neither has any quality of life. The considered medical decision is that we are going to put her on a saline drip only and gently let her go. She died peacefully in her sleep some days later. Dad accepted it as the effect of the strokes.

The day I walked out of that hospital I felt I had almost signed her death warrant, and I've never entirely forgiven myself for that 17 years later, it's a personal burden I still carry. So I can understand what a request for a DNR or to turn off life support would mean to someone. Until you have been in that position you can never know what it is like.

I wish Bernie and Annie all the best.

I have been there. Back in 1990. My second wife was in a car wreck. Sever brain damage, Coupled whit brain swelling. They had a drain tube to relive the pressure. But that increased the risk of infection after 7 days.
ever since we had know each other, She had harped upon me about she didn't want to be on life support. I don't want to be a vegetable. They did a scan and found out her brain was still swelling and was shutting down.
I signed the DNR. She still lived 6 more days.
Chris I can relate to how you felt. I still feel the same way after 27 years. In my case, I take comfort in knowing I abided by her wishes also.

Back in April mon was still in the hospital and still very ill, When she called a family meeting. She informed us that she had signed a DNR. Her reasoning is she will only get worse, So when she goes she wants to go. She dosent want to be brought back, Because she is afraid of being brain damaged from lack of oxygen. Or being in a coma to never wake up from. She looked at me and said. You know what its like.
And after she was asked questions by us kids. I have to agree with her choice.

Bernie, Best wishes for you and your Dad.

---

[/quote]

Old James

*scatter full range of retroactively applied, and right through to now hugs around thread*

Well this is not turning out the way I expected at all.

Dads chest infection has apparently cleared up and the medical team are happy to discharge him.

However his dementia is much more unpredictable, yesterday morning he started throwing things around and threw a full water jug over one of the health care assistants.

He told me and the next door neighbour the same convoluted almost horror story that supposedly happened to him after I left on Tuesday night.

He also is very weak and from what I saw tonight unable to get out of bed unaided.

And incontinent, often because he cannot tell someone he wants to go to the toilet, as he has forgotten the right words!

His ramblings are often meaningless to others but are important to him and he gets upset when people cannot understand what he is saying.

So I have made contact with the social services team at the hospital, and they have assessed him and I have been offered home care, this comes in "packages" 1,2,3 or 4 visits per day.

Unfortunately I cannot wait till he gets home to see what I need, I have to choose the package now, if he leaves hospital without a package in place, to get one I then have to contact the council social services and start the whole process again! So I have chosen the 2 visits package morning and bedtime, as initially I feel this is when I will need help.

Visiting him twice a day for 2 hours each is exhausting as I am trying hard to understand what he is saying and what he wants. The social services and others want to talk to me and I have to leave him, after which he gets upset. So I have tried to explain that he is not as well as he was before and I am not sure I can cope on my own and so I am trying to arrange help.

He says he understands.

Because I am not sure I can cope when he returns home even with the help, I am having sleepless nights and feel totally drained.

Hopefully things wont be as bad as I fear, or of course they could be worse.

Because I am not sure I can cope when he returns home even with the help, I am having sleepless nights and feel totally drained.

You will cope with it. Trust me. I've always considered myself to be a very weak person psychologically, but I got through it. If I could do it, I am very confident you can.

I can totally relate to your exhaustion over everything. In my case, it would have stressed me out even further dealing with outside help. I never wanted strangers looming around, plus I knew it would muddy the water with mother's foggy mental state. It just wasn't right for us. With the exception of physical therapy here at home, which my mother hated, and I stopped due to that, I never accepted any other offers of help. Even though it was hard, I wanted to do all the 24/7 caring on my own. Bathing my mother by myself, along with all the other corollary physical things that were necessary to keep her healthy and safe and happy throughout her final years at home was an experience that drained me, for sure, but I had to do it that way just because I guess I'm a control-freak only child, and partly because I was able to do it, and the payoff was that I saw my mother live as well as possible for the rest of her life.

Bottom line is though, you've got to do things your own way to stay sane for yourself, otherwise, you're not going to be successful in your goal of taking the best care of your loved one.

---

The mind is a weird and mysterious place

Because I am not sure I can cope when he returns home even with the help, I am having sleepless nights and feel totally drained.

Hopefully things wont be as bad as I fear, or of course they could be worse.

:(( ... and there will be no way of knowing that until he comes home. You've done absolutely the right thing in getting a package in place before he does though, Bernie. They're a lot easier to upgrade if necessary than initiate from home. Or that's been my experience anyway. It's not uncommon that an assessment in familiar surroundings, because they are at home, will play up to your dad's strengths and mask some underlying weaknesses - which ultimately become your problem to try to solve.

I was in such a hurry to bring my mum home to me (after my sister put her into a care home) that I allowed the slow process of trying to sort out assistance across county lines put me off even trying to get any in place beforehand - because I felt it might takes months and the decline in her had already been so marked since I'd last had her in my care. Then once she was, there was the prevarication of her not having been resident in my borough for long enough etc, so there is still nothing. Why? Because trying to organise it now is one extra draining thing to do in a day, and I'm not managing the ones that I'm already dealing with very well.

I'm not surprised you're exhausted and worried. It can become a defining feature of every day, so have you a timeframe from which to work some rest in for yourself before he is discharged? Try find some if you can .

the same convoluted almost horror story that supposedly happened to him after I left on Tuesday night

My mum was vehemently adamant she'd been tortured and then abandoned for hours tied to a table with her head imprisoned "in a vice it was... a vice!" by "many evil, vicious people who were planning to do experiments" on her ... the same one who'd kindly helped her from the MRI room - less than three minutes after they'd got her into the machine and realised there was no way they were going to be able to scan her this side of ever...

To somewhat relive the stress and down beat state of my posts, I can now tell the story of what happened last Saturday.

Now that I am once again a law abiding citizen.

Knowing that dad would likely be in hospital a while and may have different needs on his return home, I decided to give his room a clean and check over.

In a drawer I found this.



Now I knew about the P.Beretta 92 FS CO2 powered target pistol.

However I had no idea about the other gun. It turns out to be a BBM Olympic 38 starting pistol.



As I picked it up, I saw it was cocked and before I knew what had happened it went off, now unless you have fired a starting pistol in a small room you have no idea of the effects.

I was totally deaf for about half an hour and the ringing in the ears and frequency shifts have only really started to get better in the last couple of days.

However it gets worse, I looked it up online and found

http://www.scda.org.uk/forms/Olympic380BBMRevolverAdvice.pdf

I was holding in my hands an illegal firearm, the amnesty finished in 2010 and I suspect the gun had been in my dads drawer since before then.

When I read:

Acpo has launched an amnesty which will run until 4 June and will allow anyone to take an Olympic BBM to their local police station without fear of prosecution. After this date, anyone caught in possession of one could face a five-year prison sentence.

I started to worry.

Of course the Isle of Wight has only one real police station in Newport, I tried phoning but was "in a queue" for so long I gave up.

Now dad has stabilised a bit, I did my civic duty today and went to the police station in Newport and handed it in.

No problems and now I am legal again.

You were lucky. Even though not as effective as live ammo, blanks, within range can seriously injure or kill.

When my father passed away, I and my brother found lot's of 9mm cartridges in his flat.
He was an officer in the Royal Navy so it's not so weird.
I wonder if my brother went to the police station with them....

After my dad died. Mom found a bag of at least 50 rounds of green moldy looking .38 special rounds. They were green even with the cases being nickel plated.
Mom gave them to me knowing I have a .38 special pistol. There was no way I was going to shoot those things. I took them to the local police department. They took them and said they would send them to the county's ballistic lab where they would test them. I always wondered if any fired.

---

[/quote]

Old James

When my grandmother passed, her daughters found a whole huge jar of her toenails in her drawer. They didn't go off when found, but it was perceived as gross.

Steve

---

Warning, addicted to SETI crunching!
Crunching as a member of GPU Users Group.
GPUUG Website

Another aside.

One year ago today I lost my cat Spitty after 17 years.

You can see her in my avatar.

It makes all that is happening a little bit harder.