#dementia stuff

[loracarol]

My mum has memory issues, has been for a while, and her dad had Alzheimer's, you know? So we've been keeping an eye out, and it's always hard to tell, is this normal memory problems? Is this A Sign?

And after my parent's divorced, it ended up being my dad moving out, and all three of us kids moving in because the economy is in shambles, so it's the four of us. Except my brothers are out of the country working right now, which to be clear, I'm happy for them! They're doing something they love and making money and they're happy except I'm the only one home alone with mom now, and I've ended up taking over a lot of running the household; making sure the bills are paid, handling her doctors and stuff.

We had an argument the other day because she has "beliefs incongruent with reality" (my aunt phrased it like that) because I asked her if she'd gotten her social security yet this month so she could contribute to her share of the bills and she just straight up said that she's paid bills for 30 years and it's not fair that she has to pay bills and it's like!

In a perfect world, yes!! In a perfect world, you wouldn't have to pay bills!! I would have a well paying job!! My brother would be able to get a job in the field he's been trying to break into and get paid well!! My other brother wouldn't have his body wrecked before fucking THIRTY by doing well paying but body destroying manual labor!! I wish we lived in that world but we don't!! And because it's the four of us, the bills are split four ways!!

But she kept insisting that she already paid bills for thirty years and she was just going to stop!! And I pointed out that her parents paid when they went to senior housing, and her older brothers pay even though they're retired, and she just kept insisting!! And she won't talk to me because I Am A Child but ALSO she keeps throwing thirty years around which is how old my brothers and I are and it's like, YOU CHOSE TO HAVE KIDS. Which I DID NOT SAY to her to be clear!! But she's been paying for us for thirty years because she wanted kids!

I'M DRIVING FOR FUCKING INSTACART! I'm TRYING to get jobs, I swear!! But we can't afford this! You don't get to just arbitrarily decide that you're not going to pay bills any more! Not in America because it fucking sucks! And I FUCKING WISH it did but it doesn't!

And also according to my brother (who's in charge of the billing account), she hasn't actually been paying for six months!

This is fine.

It's fine.

Almost a month back, I asked her if she could drop me off somewhere then take my car to be serviced and she forgot and drove straight home. She forgot in the time it took to get in my car again after dropping me off.

I might need to see about getting control of her finances which I fucking hate

Also I applied for food stamps and then sent in the documents they asked for and then emailed a follow up and then called them and they never responded so. That's fun. And now I get to start all over. And my health plan changed, and I know I'm fucking lucky to HAVE a health plan, but I might have to change doctors which sucks - I filled out the document requesting that I don't change & my doc is going to follow up. Apparently I lost 60lb with him in the last year; IDK I don't look at the scale, but the doc asked if I wanted to know, so he's going to really lean into that in his request that I stick with him.

I called my uncle (mom's oldest brother) to ask him for advice and I ended up crying on the phone which was V. Embarrassing and I didn't mean to, but my aunt thinks I should see a therapist for myself so I should do that probably, except I don't know yet if my insurance is going to be the same or change.

And I know I need to be patient with my mom and her dementia because it's probably really fucking scary but also I am scared too! But I'm NOT going to bring it up with her!! because that's not fair!! She kept talking about how she wanted to save her money because she has a school reunion coming up, and part of me was hit with, "but what if you can't go because you don't remember?" WHICH I ALSO DID NOT SAY OUT LOUD.

I called her doctor & her neurologist and left messages to see if they can connect me with anyone, social workers or w/e. Because I'm Not Doing As Well As I Thought I Was apparently.

And my brothers are back in the states in a month.

And I've updated all her siblings.

AND THEN ON TOP OF ALL OF THAT IS EVERYTHING ELSE HAPPENING.

I'm just.

Surviving, I guess?

Fuck I'm so tired.

[eiliakins]

Don’t give electric candles to elderly people with dementia

So yes. My grandma has dementia. Like REALLY bad dementia. She currently lives at a retirement home and my dad visits her every now and then. At one point he brought her some random decorations from her old home to make her room more homely. These included a small electric candle. 

The problem is that apparently she didn’t remember what an electric candle was and at one point when she was alone, she tried to turn the thing off... by submerging it in a glass of milk. I can only assume she thought it was a real candle that wouldn’t go out when she tried to blow it and as a last resort put it in a milk glass, assuming a liquid would put out the fire.

But then she forgot the candle was in the milk glass... and she drunk the milk... along with the tiny electric candle... “Crunch” went the candle and she threw up the whole concoction. 

She wasn’t allowed to have small items to fiddle with after that as the caretakers feared she might try to eat them too.

(Moral of the story? Don’t give small electric candles to someone who might think it’s a real fire. They might try to turn it off with water.)