I was my grandmother caretaker for 16 years. The last 6 years full time. Her last year of life, the doctors told me I couldnt do it anymore, I began coming down with my own health issues from stress.
She had a daughter, who came by once a week. She lived about a mile away, but came and stayed maybe 20 minutes. Sometimes she went 8 months without coming by.
She had POA. My Gram gave it to her before she got the dementia, because she knew her daughter was uncaring, but thought she would be caring when the time was needed. She was mistaken.
My aunt told me she would not help me and that if I didnt want gram to go to a nursing home. Than I would do it on my own. So I did. While homeschooling 2 children.
We live in California. In the last year of Grams life, she had to go to a residential home cartakers home. A home where caretakers took care of her. I didnt want to send her, it broke my heart, but I was suffering emotionally and physically after so many years of being her cartaker.
Gram had a good pension from the school district, she had Social security and she had an insurance that helped pay for home care. She also owned a home
The minute I could no longer care for my Gram. My aunt moved my gram into a nice home that she and I chose out. She immediatly sold my grams home and everything in it. within a few months she began moving GRam to other homes....finding he cheapest home possible.
In the last home, I noticed that the caretaker had a horrible personality. Something shady was going on. I noticed a weird man (friend of the caretakers) hanging around. I didnt think that was appropriate at her workplace. He looked shady
I thought the caretaker had a very bad attitude, not CARING at all. She seemed BOTHERED and she didnt do a good job of hiding it.
My aunt told me that while she was there, my gram said "I have to go to the bathroom." The cartaker said in front of my aunt "I dont have time for this!" and she took my Gram to the toilet and YANKED on my Grams diaper and my Gram almost fell, Gram had to reach to hold on to the wall and bar.
When my Aunt told me this, I said "Linda, if this is how they act with her IN FRONT OF YOU, how do you think they are treating he when your not there?
meanwhile, my aunt was using the money from Grams pension, insurance, Social Security, sale of home.... to pay off her own home, and buy herself a new car and her drug addict daughter and her drug addict grandson new cars.
We get the call that Gram is in the hospital. She broke her hip. the caretakers called 911 around 4 in the morning, stating that Gram fell out of her bed. I saw grams wounds, she had wounds that did not make sense to a fall out of her bed. She had bad wounds 6 inches wide an 4 inches tall on the top front of her legs, right above her ankles. Both woulds dark black bruising...both looked exactly the same. My first thought was she fell in the shower, because there is a concrete step over thingy that she would have to step over to get in and out of the shower. But at 4 am? And they never mentioned the shower.
I talked to her surgeons and they both said that the injuries DID NOT conincide with what the caretakers said happened, unless there was a drawer or something by her bed that she could have hit when she "fell out of her bed" I said NO that there was not a drawer or anything near her bed at that level and carpet under her bed.
I saw tiny wounds that looked healed.... perfect tiny circles.....all the exact same size..... I thought possibly cigarette burns. I dont see how bedsores could all be the perfect size like that.
Gram started telling me that they are mean to here there, that they hit her and she said she tries to hit them back. She said that they laugh at her. She told me NOT to tell anyone, not her daughter, not no one, because she was scared they would hurt her more.
I told the nurses all my concerns. Hospital social workers came to speak to me. I told them what the surgeon said, what Gram said and I told them all about what my Aunt said happened while she was there, that the caretaker yelled and pulled at her diaper and almost knocked Gram down.
My Aunt was upset that I told. And in front of me,, to the social worker she said that I was lying that it never happened.
Gram died of pneumonia she caught from the broken hip. She never had a hard time breathing before that.
She spent a week in the hospital, than 2 in a nursing home, then was getting sent back to the home. I asked my Aunt and my aunt said they were sending her to another home, another home owned by the same person, but with a diferent cartaker. She said to me "The owner said she is getting older, and can no longer oversee so many homes."
I never knew what happend? Was anyone persecuted? Were files charged? What happened with the investigation? Do I have any rights to find out?
Its been three years and I am now emotionally strong enough to ask.
Do I have a right to answers? How?
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Most times I was the only one in the hospital with her...... doctors never questioned me.... I was there each time she was released from the hospital, I took her back home and cared for her. Most times I was the one who spoke to the doctors. I know she signed for me to know medical information for her at her doctors offices...
When she was well, she told me my Aunt had POA, if anything ever happened to her then me. I don't know if any of that would help me to find information
I was thinking I could start back at the hospital and go to the social workers office and give them my Grams name, birthdate and date she was there when the investigation was started.
Part of me wonders if my aunt prosecuted......sued....... I still see her and I Know she was doing some shady things....tricking the insurance, to get Gram to stay in that home.....She asked me to sign papers saying that I was the one still taking care of her and gave my name for me to say that I give her medications (during the last year that I no longer did)..... and I told my Aunt kindly that I couldn't lie about that. To please not involve me in her insurance scam.
Meaning: From what I know (which is little), 20 years before my Gram needed it, she took out insurance for when she could no longer take care of herself. I remember my Gram saying that she was upset because she accidently got the wrong insurance. She wanted insurance to pay for a nice nursing home or retirement home. But instead she had accidently signed up for "in home care"
For me it was beneficial in the last 4 months of caring for her, because I was having stress related trembling, half my face paralyzed for weeks, from stress. It wasn't just the stress of physically taking care of her while raising my children..... it was also from the emotional part of losing my Gram and seeing her suffer for so many years and being strong for her and feeling alone and having to make everything alright. Also with dementia it is a constant need for me to SOOTH her in conversation, to help her to know everything was ok. the minute we finished the conversation, she needed to have it again, because she forgot.
So, the four months before my doctor said I could no longer care for my Gram, we used her "in home care" for some reason my Aunt didn't want to use it before that, She said something to the effect that It could run out if we used it up.
But we got help to relieve me a couple of days a week. Even still, my Gram trusted only me and constantly called me throughout the nights....She was sad and missed me.
But, then when she was moved to another home.. a residential home where people lived and had caretakers, my Aunt took over.. I was no longer in charge. I even went into a depression for a long while.... because I felt like I had let my Gram down..... I could barely take knowing that my Gram was with strangers. I loved her an took care of her like I would my own children.....She raised me...she was a mother to me. I didn't want anything from her, accept for her to be well. I gave up work, everything to take care of her.
I tried to get paid the way some people do when they care for their loved one. But my Grams income was just over the limit, so I couldn't get paid and that was ok.
She owned a little duplex. She has bought it over 20 years before hand.
Im rambling.and crying now. But,
I know my aunt dealt with the insurance company. I don't even remember their name anymore. I got the idea that she was tricking them into believing Gram was living in her home....and she was taking care of Gram... That's what I THINK she was doing. Because that insurance didn't normally pay for a facility...... I believe that was what she was doing because she asked me to say that I knew all about her medication (because I use to know all her health and medication everything about her like the back of my hand).....and I said "No." Im not going to lie.
But I just don't want to later find that there was something that I could have done NOW.....
Once my Gram was out of my care..... I was depressed, tremers throughout my core, head......I went to bed and didn't get up.....I was crying all the time....I was not thinking clearly. I tried hard to pretend I was ok. But I wasn't.... when my aunt (from the other side of my family) would come to visit me once a week. I would comb out my hair and it was one huge rat, like a matted dog. I thought many times I was going to have to cut it. My husband would get the tangles out for me, I lost a lot of hair.... I put a smile on my face and never let this other aunt (no relation to my Gram) know that I had been in bed all week. Because I was ashamed for being so down..... that lasted all through Grams last year and another year after, at least...
Then my aunt (grams daughter) called and said "Gram said you have forsaken her. She said "Sandy has forsaken me"." That broke my heart. I truly thought my Gram wouldn't remember, because she never noticed when my aunt never came. I now know it was because I was taking such good care of her all those years that she never noticed.
I was seeing Gram once a week,, but I didn't think Gram knew about TIME PASSED. So I never thought she would think I forsake her
A couple years after Gram died, I talked to my cousin (grams daughters, daughter) and she told me that the reason why Gram said that was because my Aunt would take my Gram to her home on her visits occasionally (maybe for insurance people to see her there?) and on those visits my Aunt would tell my Gram "Sandy has forsaken you." And Gram would get sad......
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She didn't like having to move Gram again.
I told the social workers, please don't say anything to the family that it was "I" who told you.
I look back now and see how stupid that was. But at the time, I had been under a lot of stress caring for Gram for so many years and my aunt was cruel and uncaring and she often threatened putting Gram in a home. So I took care of Gram alone.
I knew I had no rights, My Gram signed for me to have POA if something ever happened to my Aunt. But of course my Gram put her daughter first. Because she mistakenly thought my Aunt would take care of her. But Gram lost her mind to dementia and never realized her mistake and I never told her, because I didn't want to hurt her. So I took care of her, and she never knew her daughter hadn't been by in many months, because she was kept happy.
Her happiness was my only concern.
And I knew that my Aunt didn't have to allow me to be there through all hospital discussions concerning her health. I was the one that took Gram to every doctors appointment, I was the one that knew everything about my Grams health and medical needs. And I knew that I had to pretend to my Aunt that I liked and respected her, in order to continue being an advocate for my Gram.
Im not sure this makes any sense. But its the reason why my mindset was not thinking about finding out about the investigation at the time.
At the time, I was just SO GLAD that Gram wasn't going back to that home.
And 4 weeks later she was dead from pneumonia.... Doctors called it COPD.....She never had an oxygen problem before, she never had a hard time breathing, but because of the fall an broken hip, I now realize those are causes of pneumonia......
I just hope the person who did this was prosecuted.
I initiated the investigation. I am her granddaughter 49. My Aunt came in to visit every now and then. sometimes allowing 8 months to go by. Though she lived a mile away and was retired. She said she would put gram in a home, so I took care of her.
I told the hospital staff my concerns and they told the social workers and social workers spoke with me first and then my aunt.
I don't know if my aunt was involved after that. From what I know social workers from the hospital conducted or got the ball rolling...?
No contention over assets. I was not an heir. She didn't have a whole lot. And I always knew I was not going to get anything. And never tried, or had a problem with it.
I never did get the licensing # to the home. But I think all those years ago, I gave a review of it on YELP to tell people not to take their loved one there.... So that may help me remember names.
I know where one of the homes is.
No contentions over grandmothers states.... never was and isn't now.
I told the hospital staff my concerns and they told the social workers and social workers spoke with me first and then my aunt.
I don't know if my aunt was involved after that. From what I know social workers from the hospital conducted or got the ball rolling...?
No contention over assets. I was not an heir. She didn't have a whole lot. And I always knew I was not going to get anything. And never tried, or had a problem with it.
I never did get the licensing # to the home. But I think all those years ago, I gave a review of it on YELP to tell people not to take their loved one there.... So that may help me remember names.
I know where one of the homes is.
Even if you had grounds for an elder abuse investigation, given the fact that your grandmother has passed, I don't know what could or would be done, as APS seeks to address abuse while someone is alive.
You speak of an investigation - who conducted it? Was it law enforcement authorities? This the entity you should contact, but I don't know if any report would be released to you, especially 3 years after the death. More detail needs to be provided on this investigation - who initiated it, who conducted it? That would at least give you somewhere to start, but no one can answer whether you have any rights under it as we don't know who did it, or if an investigation even was done.
If the home is closed down, you might be able to contact the licensing authorities for your state to determine if there were any reports against them. You could also call your local APS to inquire if there were any abuse reports filed with them.
I can understand your concern, but I'm wondering if there really can be any satisfaction in trying to find information 3 years later (I do understand that it was too emotional at the time), and I suspect authorities would take the same position.
You also don't mention if you were an heir, and whether or not there was any family contention over the assets in your grandmother's estate.
MY Aunts daughter (my cousin) later told me that my Aunt was mad when she found out the home was shut down and she said "Im sure Sandy will be glad about that!" She said it in anger.
For the life of me, I cannot understand why my aunt would want my Gram in an abusive home.
What can I do? Do I have any rights to know what happened during the investigations? Do I have any rights to do anything? I sometimes wonder if my greedy aunt pressed charges to get money, even though she was not helpful and was against an investigation....... any advice for me? Thank you