So, I left you last time just as I had moved my mother down
south. Got her settled into her new little apartment – across from Santa – and left
her to make friends and embrace her new life! (Record screech…..) Yeah, not
happenin’!
After multiple daily phone calls and too many trips a week
to her apartment I had to have that “come to Jesus” meeting with her. Yep, the same kind you used to have with your
teenage child, the one where this is your life, you are blessed, stop whining,
get over yourself and try and be happy!
I seriously get ulcers over these kinds of conversations. But, she
actually took it very well and began to straighten herself up! She made a
friend!! A lovely southern lady that is an absolute hoot!! I’m pretty sure they
spent their meals plotting how they would get back at the dining staff for
ignoring their table empty of food upon their first 5 minutes of arrival in the
dining room! She began going to some activities and getting to know other residents.
I was committed to seeing her twice a week. Once a week I would get her out for
lunch or shopping and then once a week I would go there and we would play games
with her friends. All was just as it should be……for 5 days!!! We were hitting
that euphoric top of the hill. Where you are excited and scared all at the same
time? Then it began…..the drop off. The one that sends you into the loopty
loops….and the spiraling of health issues.
Five weeks after moving to SC she got pneumonia. Remember,
she has COPD and CHF, so this is not uncommon. So, now it’s off to hospital.
She’d laid on her back for 5 days! Do you know what that does to an 82 year old
woman??? Enough to send her to rehab! Yep, another “new” place.
I don’t want to bore you with all the details, but let’s
just say it takes elderly people a long time to adjust to something new. So,
here we go again……for 48 days!!! 48 days of daily physical and occupational
therapy. 48 days to get back to a point where she could go back to her apartment.
48 days of a new lifestyle, people waiting on her, coming to get her for
things, coming to her and having conversations, people….coming to her. The
climb…..back to the top!
Then, back to her apartment we go……resettled in…..home
health care prescribed. Back to her
being on her own……no one coming to her……her having to walk out to meals and
activities again. Four days in she’s getting back to her routine. Day 5…..BAM….
she can’t get out of bed, she only wants to sleep. BAM……back to the ER we go…….BAM…….back
down that horrible, scary hill!!!
Short hospital stay, back to rehab center, hoping for a
short stint to get her back on her feet. 45 days into it…..I’m having to make
more decisions. She’s declining, she can
no longer live in an independent facility, so back to searching. She has less
than a week left for Medicare to pay for the rehab, so this has to be done
quickly. Not just a decision made, but
all her stuff moved. So we settle on a location, we get her moved and she is to
be under a level of care that will help transport her to the restroom and to
meals as well as checking on her every 2 hours.
Well, she’s hardly able to get out of the bed when we move her in there,
so having to trust in this system to work was grueling and stressful…and for justifiable
reasons. They didn’t do it!! We sat
there 6 hours the first day and NO ONE checked on her! What if I wasn’t there? How long would she
have laid there? In all honesty, this is a pretty good facility, so I can’t
imagine the bad ones!! At this point I feel like I’m stuck in the perpetual
loopty loop of the rollercoaster. No up
and down, no resting area, just looping and looping……
But in the midst of loopty looping, we’re climbing the
forever hill of financials….being jostled by the tracks of a broken system…..but
that’s for next time! So until then, try and keep your stomach steady
throughout the ride!
