My dad has been in hospitals and nursing/AL facilities since last September. It was necessary to file a complaint against the nursing facility where he was and I'm on the verge of doing the same for the residential AL where he's been for the past three months (I mean, seriously, who does business and doesn't provide a contract til asked for it? And how did she manage disabled transport before he had his assessment--- but I digress.)
Care for my dad was exhausting my mom to the point where the doctors were afraid for her health. As long as she's in sight, he expects her to attend to him, even when a nurse is standing right in the room. She's gotten good at stepping out of the room and letting the staff take care of him and he goes along with it.
Question is, would he 'go along with it' if back within a familiar environment - his house of 40 years.
I keep wondering if we bring him home to a house that's had extensive changes made to the living space, and with hired caregivers there 24/7, whether the house would be unfamiliar enough to keep him from completely relaxing into his old uncooperative, demanding ways.
Has anyone done a house makeover to not only accommodate a hospital bed, nursing companion, etc. but to give the impression of a new 'facility' into which the patient is being moved? I'm not sure I'm making sense, the dementia had him lost in the house before he left anyways; sometimes he thought he was in a hotel, sometimes on board a ship. But if the house looks and feels different after he's been away for so long, how would it affect him to return to a house in which the people and some other aspects are familiar but different because new people are in and out and things aren't arranged the same. I want him home and comfortable but not so comfortable that he goes back to it's-my-house-I'll-do-what-I-want-when-I-want.
That is where your Mother comes in. She has to change her behavior too. Have her continue to leave the room if he gets too demanding or "vocal." That is why you are paying professional caregivers. Ask her to think of it as if she were visiting him in a nursing home. She wouldn't attend to him there...why do it at home?
Take her out of the house frequently so she can have a break and a sense of normalcy. There is no reason why, at her age, she should be waiting on him to the point of exhaustion.
Good luck...let us know how it goes...Lilli
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