My mother has had memory problems since her stroke 40 years ago. She has always had trouble with short term memory. She often asked a question only to ask it a few minutes after getting an answer. To this day I have little patience to be asked a question more than one.

My mother’s long term memory remained good. Once a piece of knowledge got into her long term memory it usually stayed there.

Lately it seems none of her memory is working properly. I suspect she might be showing symptoms of Alzheimer’s which she is more prone to due to her previous brain damage.

For the last couple of months, whenever I visit my mother, she asks how my husband is. I have been divorced for 6 years. She knows this, or says she does, but insists that my ex husband and I have gotten back together.

We are not back together.

Each time she asks how he is I explain that he is doing well, I imagine but that I really don’t know. I explain that we have been divorced for a long time now, that we are friendly but are not, under any circumstance back together. She often seems sad to learn this.

I’m surprised she is sad because she didn’t like him when we really were married.

Usually it is my last husband she thinks I have remarried but on occasion she thinks it is my first husband. This is something new. This is not a memory issue we have had before. I don’t know what it means, probably nothing or at least there is nothing anyone can do about it.

My brother has just suggested that I go along with her and let her think I am still married. It’s not a half bad idea because when I tell her I am divorced she insists that I need to start dating again. Which conversation do I like having least? I don’t know, none of them, really.

What would you do? Would you let the person with memory problems just think what ever they wanted or would you correct them each time?

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I am the errand runner for my mom. My mother spends her day watching TV. She also reads the newspaper but they don’t make drugstore reading eyeglasses strong enough for her. I need to take my mother to the eye doctor to get her a new set of glasses but I dread the idea.

My mother goes through prescription glasses like water. This is why we have been buying her the drugstore reading glasses because they are relatively cheap so when she breaks them it doesn’t hurt as much to replace them. Sam’s Club sells reading glasses in packs of eight for about $20 and mom goes through them in about two months.

Her insurance will pay for one pair of eyeglass frames every two years.  So she is due for a check up and a new prescription but it still pains me to get the new glasses. I also know that when she breaks this pair, and she will, I will have to make a trip to the optometrists office to get them repaired which really means dropping them off, picking them up a few days later and bringing them out to my mother. Rinse and repeat.

We do this with jewelry too. She has been wearing her wedding ring, engagement ring and my father’s wedding band on a chain for the last few years because she has lost so much weight they don’t fit on her fingers anymore, and dad’s never did. I’ve bought so many chains for her and each one breaks within weeks. The chain I gave her for Christmas broke a few weeks ago. I haven’t rushed out to fix or replace it because I know I will just have to do it again.

I should take care of these things, it’s just more guilt if I don’t but the expense, an unnecessary expense in my book, just prevents me from rushing out and taking care of it. That alone makes me feel even worse. My mom doesn’t ask for much so it seems silly that I can’t take the time to take care of these two little things but I’ll be damned if I can’t get motivated to do so.

Does anyone else have these kinds of jobs that they just don’t want to do, because they have done them so many times and will have to do them again, that they stall on it?

I don’t know when it happens for most, but for me I have been, for lack of a better word, my mother’s mother. Obviously, our case is a little different since I have been her caretaker since I was a child but I have noticed more and more that my friends are now taking on this role for their own parents. I tend to be the go to person when they have questions because I have been caring for my mother for so long.

I don’t have any answers. I fell into my role as caretaker, never having the option to decide if I wanted to be the one to tell her what to do. Of course now that she is in a nursing home my role has been diminished considerably but she still wants me involved with all decisions she must make with regard to her medical care and finances.

Before my father died he often asked me what I thought he should do. He may have been asking because he knew I would most likely agree with most decisions he was planning on making and just wanted to know he was doing the right thing.

As a parent to a 17 year old and a 7 year old I see myself giving up responsibility to my older child. This may have more to do with being a single mom, I’m not really sure. But I worry when I ask him do to something that I have usually done if I am not aging myself by doing so.

We had a fair amount of snow last night, I hate shoveling snow and there is no reason the teenager can’t shovel the snow. It is his job. I have no plans to do the shoveling. Last night he stayed over at a friends house and was not here this morning to shovel out my car or a path to the drive way. I could have easily shoveled but instead I chose to wait for him to get home.

I’m saying all of this because I wonder how much we as children push our parents to act as if they can’t do something anymore. I have a friend whose 87 year old father still does all the maintenance on his home, a lot of work considering the live on a large piece of property. His wife recently suffered some medical problems so in addition to all the work around the house and property he is also taking care of her. His children do not live close enough to conveniently come over and take some of the load off of him. He would refuse such assistance anyway.

I wonder if by expecting my son to shovel if it is just the beginning of me slowly giving up my independence. I don’t really, but it tickles my brain sometimes. What will I do when he goes off to college? Of course I can shovel myself and at that time my 7 year old will be old enough to do the chore and it really won’t be an issue. But she will be going off to college eventually as well. I could shovel, there is no medical reason I can’t. I simply don’t want to do it.

For years before my father died I shoveled for him. I was worried that he would have a heart attack lifting all that heavy snow or that he might slip and fall. He didn’t seem particularly frail or weak but he just seemed to old to do the job. And he didn’t want to do it either.

What chores have you given up doing and why? Did you give them up because you felt as if you were too old to do them anymore or because you just don’t want to do them. What things would you never consider handing over to a child to handle?

As you might have noticed I have moved from blogspot to my own domain. It might take me a bit to get the place in order. I can already tell I am in need of new paint and some drapes. Bare with me as I get things in order. All the old posts are here but I haven’t yet unpacked my blogroll or anything like that. I have to reorganize the categories too so if you are looking for an older post just be patient please, or try google for now.

My mother does not want to come for Thanksgiving. She does not want to use the transportation service to travel to town for the holiday.

My mother lives about 35 miles from me and a service is required to get her wheelchair in the vehicle. I don’t have a vehicle that accommodates a wheelchair while someone is sitting in it and she is so frail I am afraid to move her from her wheelchair to the car and back again.

I’m happy to go and visit her on the holiday that isn’t the problem. The problem is the guilt I expect to feel then as well as the guilt I am feeling now. I’m not sure why I feel guilty, it is her decision except I know my mother and when she says something like this what she is saying is find another way to get me into town.

My mother doesn’t do much for herself. As I have mentioned here she refuses to feed herself now. She can, she just prefers having someone do it for her. She also insists on using a bedpan, again because it is just more convenient for her.

There is a part of me that is willing to let the shit falls where it may and go along with what she is saying even though I know she really wants to come for Thanksgiving. Not that she will have a good time, usually it is a disaster because she doesn’t get as much attention as she would like and because I don’t allow her to drink anymore.

The holidays are always stressful because of this situation and I wonder how other people handle it. I would really like to celebrate the holiday with me and my kids for once without worrying about my mother, putting up with her histrionics and having to try to explain it to my children.

Any suggestions?

Less than 48 hours to go! Is anyone else as excited as I am to have the new school year start?

I will soon be able to blog on a much more regular basis. In anticipation of that I wanted to post a few reminders.

If you aren’t already following me on Twitter please do. I follow back everyone who follows me. You can also follow me on Facebook too. I think it’s the right link. I was just going to type that I don’t understand how people can spend so much time on Facebook but when I went to get the URL I lost 20 minutes. Hmmm….

This here blog is now available on Kindle. Of course if you found me here I don’t know why you would want me on the Kindle too but then I don’t have one so I have no idea how the whole thing works. If you have a Kindle and you subscribe to blogs please leave a note in the comment section and let me know how you like it. I’d love to get one but I don’t commute on a bus or train, I don’t actually commute at all, I can open a book easier than a Kindle as well. The price tag alone keeps me from purchasing one but they do look cool. I’d love to be able to download a book in the middle of the night.

That’s about it for now. Starting Tuesday you can look for more regular posts on this blog as well as the others.

There is a woman I see everyday when I walk my daughter up to meet her walking line/crossing guards for school. She has five children the oldest of which has downs. This woman and I have said hello to each other but rarely have time to chat since she is usually chasing her eldest daughter around while they wait for her bus.

I often wonder to myself why this woman had more children after the first one. I don’t know how she does it. I don’t know where she finds the energy to look after five children and one with special needs. And she does a wonderful job. Her kids are all dressed nicely, they are clean, hair brushed, polite kids. My daughter, without fail, always has a stain on her clothes and short of shellacking her hair it’s always a mess.

Don’t get me wrong I am not suggesting that this woman shouldn’t have had more children, I just don’t know, and I am in awe, how she manages.

Mother’s day is this Sunday and I suspect this woman has no idea it is coming except for doing something for her own mother. She probably has that all under control.

It takes a certain kind of person to be a caregiver. Not everyone is able to handle it. Not everyone should do it. But for those who do it is a thankless job, often with few benefits at least to the outsider.

While caring for my mother I was often run down, tired, angry, overwhelmed and broke. I don’t regret having done any of it for a moment. I wish I had done it better and with more grace but I did the best I could and I am proud of that.

I had a really nice visit with my mother on Easter. A very nice visit. In fact I kept thinking to myself “it looks like mom, sounds like mom, but this is not my mother”. Not that our visits have been bad. For the last six months or so they have been much better than they were two years ago. She has calmed down. She is not angry anymore. She doesn’t lash out and say hurtful things anymore. But the visits have been the same each time. We never really talked about anything but finding her a new place to live.

She still wants to move but I don’t think that will ever change. I also know that as soon as she moves she will say she wants to move again so I don’t put much stock in it anymore. The difference with this visit was that we actually talked about the past. We chatted about people we knew years ago, what characters they were and recalled funny stories from the past. It was a really nice and enjoyable visit.

We also cleared up some business that had been put on the back burner for the last few years. Mom is still legally her own person. She makes decisions that my brother and I can not make for her. She is not of sound mind to make most of her decisions but these few that were left over weren’t worth changing unless she wanted them changed. Even though it was in her best interest to change them no one wanted to because the changes were not what she wanted.

When she told me to make the necessary changes, the way my brother and wished to make them, I was stunned. Pleased, but stunned. I don’t know if the stars are aligned right now but I’m going to ride it out.

There is an article today on MSNBC.com about how the mentally ill are causing disturbances in nursing homes, sometimes leading to the death of elderly nursing him patients. Nursing homes have been supplamenting their occupancy with the mentally ill since the elderly are healthier than in decades past and not utilizing nursing homes until much later in life. The occupancy rate of nursing homes has been falling so they make up the shortfall by allowing the mentally ill to become residents. Often the mentally ill patients are much younger, and much stronger, than the elderly residents.

The article sums up why this practice is happening more and more frequently:

Under federal law, nursing homes are barred from admitting a mentally ill patient unless the state has determined that the person needs the high level of care a nursing home can provide. States are responsible for doing the screening. Also, federal law guarantees nursing home residents the right to be free from physical abuse.

Families have sued in hopes of forcing states to change their practices and pressuring nursing homes to prevent assaults. Advocates say many mentally ill people in nursing homes could live in apartments if they got help taking their medication and managing their lives.

The problem has its roots in the 1960s, when deplorable conditions, improved drug treatments and civil rights lawsuits led officials to close many state mental hospitals. As a result, some states have come to rely largely on nursing homes to care for mentally ill people of all ages.

I find it particulary intersting that there is a law that guarantees that residents have a right to be free from abuse, but that’s discussion for another post and on another blog.

My mother is in a nursing home specifically for the mentally ill. She was in an assisted living facility prior to this home but she decided she did not like that place and got herself kicked out as she likes to tell anyone who will listen.

Like daycare, nursing homes are a necessary evil. You are putting a loved ones care in the hands of someone whom you only have known for a short time. And usually nothing bad will go wrong. However, both of these institutions have to take as many residents as possible to make a profit. The staff are paid poorly adding to the high turnover rate and questionable resume of the staff. Many of the staff in the assisted living facility were immigrants doing a job that no one else wanted to do for pay that few would find acceptable.

The ratio is often much higher than it should be for these kinds of facilities. When my daughter was in daycare the ratio of students to teacher was 8 to 1. It was lower for the littler kids and even lower still for the babies but still I can’t imagine being in charge of 8 kids all by myself. I’m not sure what the legal ratio is for a nursing home but where my mother is it is about 11-1. It isn’t profitable to have any more staff than the minimum.

I don’t know the answer except that if you must use either of these kinds of facilities then you must keep in contact with the staff and administration. You must keep yourself informed. You should also listen to the patient’s concern.

My brother and I are closing down my mother’s storage unit in the next couple of weeks. This means we have to find a home for everything that is stuffed into the unit. A home can be one of our homes, the cabin or donating it somewhere.

We got the storage unit two years ago when mom got herself kicked out of the assisted living facility she was living at. Her apartment there was large, a bedroom, living room, kitchen and a den. The nursing home she is in now is much smaller and she couldn’t bring much furniture so we have quite a lot of stuff to go through.

We should have just taken care of all of this back then but no one knew how mom was going to do at the new place. We also worried that if we dispersed or donated everything she would then decide to move to another apartment and would want her things. So we did nothing.

She hasn’t said much about her things. At first she wanted to be in a place with her stuff but we had tried that and it didn’t work. Having her things may have been comforting but it didn’t prevent her from being abusive to the staff and disruptive to the other residents. The first six months was a challenge.

She is much happier where she is now. I think she has finally decided that she is comfortable there. I’m sure for many people the decision to move to one place or another is based on their affection for the place. It must be pleasing to them in some way. Whether it is the surroundings, the architecture or just a gut feeling it is different for each person. My mother has never liked any place that she has lived in. My mother is one of those people who likes familiarity. And it takes her a while to become familiar with a new place. Often years.

Since mom is now satisfied with her living arrangements we are going to go ahead and empty out the storage unit. Some of the items, such as her microwave, dishes and everyday stuff will be saved for grandchildren who are going off to college in the next couple of years. My brother and I will choose which pieces of family furniture we want to keep and which pieces we will bring up to the lake house. Whatever is left will be donated to Goodwill or Bridges.

Of course the minute we have moved everything mom will announce that she is moving and wants all of her things. This is just the way it goes.