MIL has been battling the flu, but she was going downhill even before she got it. She’s been elevated to the most-needy level at her AL facility, because she doesn’t do anything for herself anymore unless she absolutely has to. Staffing is a big issue, and nursing is being handled by an agency now. The consistency of care is an issue, so hospice was proposed to my SIL today. MIL qualifies, and the hospice they suggested offers really good services. SIL called H to see if he is okay with it, and he told her yes. Their only experience with hospice has been when death is around the corner, but they realize that it can be helpful on a longer term basis. She doesn’t do much beyond acknowledge her D from her bed when she visits, and she doesn’t want us to visit (doesn’t want us to “see me like this”). We’ll give her a couple weeks to recover from her bout of flu, but we’re going to visit in a couple weeks, anyway. The really hard part is starting, and we need to buckle up.
How is everyone doing? We successfully got an automatic backup generator installed at my parents with a minimum of drama (they had a manual one – you know, you have to go and connect/start it yourself) .
Got my mom into assisted living yesterday. I highly recommend The Greenhouse Project, which is a not for profit model for dementia patients that is different than “regular” assisted living. Worth looking into if you have someone with Alzheimer’s or another dementia and are looking to place them.
I read a lot about the Greenhouse Project Green House Project - Revolutionizing Senior Care to Empower Lives (thegreenhouseproject.org) and contacted a facility. Sadly they would not accept my mother due to her colostomy, as I remember. @cinnamon1212 hope to hear more!
I remember why I dropped off this thread when my dad was sick. CC is a place I go to escape reality, not relive it.
Friday, my mom fell in the kitchen making coffee, hit her head and went to the ER. She went to ICU and started to come out of it Saturday. Steady improvement but a long road ahead.
Oh no! I am so sorry about your mom’s fall and hospitalization. Wishing her a positive outcome.
@Youdon_tsay did she have a brain bleed?
Two
Hoping for a good recovery. Did docs decide against surgery due to age or was surgery not needed? Will she need rehab? (Have been there, but with a kid…) Falls like that are a shock. Take care if you can.
We just lost my husband’s mother in similar circumstances, though she was only 78. I felt she’d had zero quality of life for at least a year. A broken hip started her downhill, and she died within a month. I am so relieved her suffering is over.
My sister’s husband flew up to Indiana from Texas a few days ago. His parents, around 90, refuse to move out of their house. They have to call 911 for help when they fall every few days, literally. The arrangement has barely worked because the husband can cook while the wife can’t. And the wife can sometimes get her husband off the floor. This week, though, the husband was hurt badly enough he’s in the hospital, so my BIL has to take care of his mom. It’s not a sustainable situation, so I’m not sure what’s going to happen. BIL has a sibling who lives near their parents, but she’s a piece of work and can’t/won’t help. At least BIL can work remotely. It’s going to be a lengthy stay, I’m afraid.
IMHO your BIL needs to move the mother into some place, and when the dad gets out of the hospital, he can move there too. Have him get the area aging people involved if he can - it is an unsafe situation and perhaps ‘other people’ need to be the bad guys. As you say it is not a sustainable situation - and the number of calls the EMS people have to come to get his father off the floor is some documentation of an unsafe situation.
However this is so tough with many offspring - but it gets to a point where they have to do what is clearly uncomfortable for them to do. “I don’t want my parents to go where they don’t want to go”. You need to handle things like you are their parent - do what is best for them.
Thanks for your thoughts. I agree with you. I just found the link for the agency in his parents’ area and forwarded it to my sister. I can’t do much more, I’m afraid. My BIL dislikes confrontation intensely. I’m afraid he won’t stand up to his folks. But if he contacts the agency, maybe they will do something.
No surgery suggested, and we have made a decision not to allow her to get anesthesia after her mastectomy several years ago and it did a number on her.
She qualified for acute rehab when I was there, but since I left things have gone downhill. I don’t have eyes on the situation so I have to trust what my sister says. The first night I wasn’t with her and my sister was they put her in restraints. I didn’t know that was even legal anymore but apparently it is with a doctor’s approval. The next night was better but yesterday she toppled over going to the bathroom and then last night they restrained her again.
My brother will do the overnights Friday and Saturday, then Sunday I’m up again for a few days.
In our state restraints are not allowed. My mother had delirium in the hospital and kept trying to pull tubes out etc. The hospital hired 24 hour supervision with an aide stationed by her bed at all times! I ma sorry your mother is being restrained and hope things improve. This sounds like a very tough situation.
I passed along your thoughts to my sister. She said she has said the same thing to her husband MANY times. It started causing friction in their marriage so she backed off. She’s hoping the current facility her FIL is in will realize he can’t live independently and step in. I hope so. 
Getting elderly parents into a safe living situation is so difficult (in every way). You negotiate what they need vs what they want vs what is covered vs what is available. Plus, throw in siblings and it must be exhausting. I do not look forward to doing this but at least Preferred Sibling , Local Sibling and I are all on the same page.
If my parents had a Home Instead service where they live, that would be perfect for my folks – but there isn’t. It would make my mother furious, but I am beyond caring too much about that.
The social workers at the hospital can offer options on ‘placement’, however family can typically override. For example, the hospital says a person needs rehab – if the patient is fully cognizant and tells their family to take them home…one such patient fell immediately after trying to stand up out of the car at home and then came to rehab. We had a lady in rehab (maybe 88 years, weak in body but strong in mind) who didn’t even stay for evaluations. She spoke with her son from rehab, and he called his sister to come and get her --of course the sister was not onboard with the ‘plan’ for her to be at her home for some days instead of in rehab getting OT/PT – therapy to help the elderly mom be more capable/able for ambulating, however with her mom’s strong will her mom may actually make a lot more effort at home than at rehab she didn’t want to be in. However many who do not have abilities anymore - stubbornness/resistance just make the situation so difficult. I spoke with the son on the phone “I don’t want my mom to be anywhere she doesn’t want her to be”. He didn’t understand that rehab should be considered like hospitalization – he wouldn’t pull her out of the hospital against medical advice, but he just didn’t see rehab as necessary for her care plan.
Maybe your BIL will ‘figure things out’ in due time. If his parents belong to a church/faith community, maybe there is someone from there that they ‘connect with’ who can assist BIL and his parents. Hospitals often have chaplains there that can assist handling needs of this nature, giving emotional/spiritual support to any that reach out to them.
At least everyone seems to be on board that he will need rehab.
I can tell my sister is frustrated beyond words. It’s not fair to her for her husband to be gone for extended periods of time with no end in sight.
With my MIL, the end was in sight, but DH made repeated drives (800 miles each way) - and spent the first 3 months of his ‘retirement’ first there when father went into hospital (from skilled care) with Covid (he died about a week later after the father agreed to “Comfort Care” sold to him by Hospitalist w/o family there at bedside) and DH then also doing live in help for his mother. When she got a UTI and needed to go into the hospital, he would get a ‘reprieve’ and drive home. She only was in skilled care for less than 2 weeks - which she could not ambulate even a few steps but thought DH could live at ‘home’ with her 24/7 as the solution to remain at home. At skilled care, she did really well the first week, but her hypertensive heart disease really kicked in – her body had a big decline, and she stopped eating a few days before she died in her sleep. Both parents were 92 when they died.