I was fascinated by the area in Ohio where the voters had passed tax Levies for elder care. They are able to keep elders at home for a cost of around 350 per month as opposed to 5 grand per month for a medicaid funded care facility. When are Americans going to quit listening to the right wing idiots who preach that government should be dismantled, that the rich shouldn't pay taxes and we need more wars and less social services? The system profiled in Oh should be universal in this country. It helps society tremendously and costs the taxpayers much less in the long run. It's outrageous that we are being strangled to death by these tea bagger idiots in government.
I watched it online last night. It was good. I googled the title, a saw that it was already posted on the website for our local pbs station. There's just so much that can be covered in an hour but for what it was -it was good.
I just watched the documentary on TIVO, and I had very mixed reactions to it. For one thing, they featured only loving families, adult children who want to be there for their parents no matter what the sacrifice. Some of the dirt and grit was shown, like the one man who lost his marriage after making his wife quit her job to take care of his mother and who then came close to committing suicide, and the conflicts over money in the same family. Still, the adult kids were very committed to their mother even in that family.
I realize the unhappiness of those of us from dysfunctional families who are roped into caregiving for lack of any better option, or whose siblings are in the wind and totally unconcerned, is a separate issue to some extent. Still, I felt the program presented too rosy a picture. Like that young woman who said with a smile that she's not saving for a house, or for a vacation, or anything for herself. She's saving for her mother's needs. And she seemed perfectly okay with that.
Also the show focused on geographic regions and employers that actually provide support for the family caregiver, such as a home health aid in the one instance. It concerns me that viewers might think these services are widely available, which they're not. I liked best what Jane Gross had to say - "your parents better have a gazillion dollars, or by the end of this they're be completely broke, and so will you."
On a related note, I had a discussion with my mother this morning in which she learned for the first time that her Medicare won't cover a nursing home for her. She had gone to a NH for rehab after knee surgery and just assumed that if she needed long term care it would be covered. This came up today because one Mom's old friends has become bedridden but can't afford home care, and my mother criticized her for taking the cheapest Medicare plan she could find. She was aghast to learn that her own Medicare wouldn't cover it either. Such is the level of awareness of the average person, even if elderly.
Didn't I see that there are 4 episodes?
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I realize the unhappiness of those of us from dysfunctional families who are roped into caregiving for lack of any better option, or whose siblings are in the wind and totally unconcerned, is a separate issue to some extent. Still, I felt the program presented too rosy a picture. Like that young woman who said with a smile that she's not saving for a house, or for a vacation, or anything for herself. She's saving for her mother's needs. And she seemed perfectly okay with that.
Also the show focused on geographic regions and employers that actually provide support for the family caregiver, such as a home health aid in the one instance. It concerns me that viewers might think these services are widely available, which they're not. I liked best what Jane Gross had to say - "your parents better have a gazillion dollars, or by the end of this they're be completely broke, and so will you."
On a related note, I had a discussion with my mother this morning in which she learned for the first time that her Medicare won't cover a nursing home for her. She had gone to a NH for rehab after knee surgery and just assumed that if she needed long term care it would be covered. This came up today because one Mom's old friends has become bedridden but can't afford home care, and my mother criticized her for taking the cheapest Medicare plan she could find. She was aghast to learn that her own Medicare wouldn't cover it either. Such is the level of awareness of the average person, even if elderly.