I got the flu, RSV, and last COVID vaccination the same day. I was happy to do it. I saw what RSV did to my baby. Maybe it wouldn’t affect me like that, but why chance it?
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I got the rsv vax. Next day, got flu vax. A bit later, we got our 7th covid shot. No regrets—not much other than slightly sore shoulder at injection site. H was under weather for 24-48 hours from the shots but happy to be protected.
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Please move on from the general vaccine discussion please. Unless it directly relates to caregiving, it’s off topic.
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No, there were not–nonsmoker, healthy weight, physically active.
Just like Covid–some of us lost the long Covid lottery.
To keep it on-topic, her husband has Parkinsons, lives in a facility with full-time aide, and was hospitalized at the same time with pneumonia.
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Apologies for starting some unintended debate on vaccines. I just knew this group had a lot of experience with elderly relatives / nursing home risks.
New topic. Paperwork preparedness. Things vary a bit from state to state, but I found this booklet for NY guidance helpful (long but nice format)
For healthcare paperwork, I keep needing refresher on terminology. In particular, the following info (screenshots) was helpful.
Note: You can have both a Health Care Proxy (Who has authority to make decisions if patient unable to) and a Living Will (general patient preferences)
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Got a text at 12:59 a.m. from bff that her mom has passed.
Oh sheesh. Got a call last night from my mom, who, as she was going to sit on the couch, heard/felt a loud crack in her hip. No fall, just an awkward movement. So this morning, over the phone, I arranged for an ambulance to take her to the ER, where she is now. Ugh. Still waiting to hear on the results of the X-ray.
And when I say I got a call, I mean I’m not at my 2-mile-away home, I’m at my 850-mile-away beach house. So we’re quickly packing up to head home tomorrow. Luckily, her aide was there this morning to assist with her while I handled making the phone calls.
So sorry for the hip problem… and the timing. When Dad fractured his hip last month, it wasn’t on the stairs as we’ve dreaded. It was a fall when getting up from a low-ish swivel chair. Since his claim is that he fell on the other side from injury, I’ve wondered if the break instigated the fall. I’ve heard that can happen.
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YDS, sorry for your BFF. Did you know her mom? Sometimes that loss is as close as our own practically.
@JustaMom5465 You can’t stay home and wait. It would have been easier to organize from 2 miles, but still, you were able to organize.
Hope she is better before you get there!
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Thank you. I’ve been with her a few times, including a lovely lunch with the mom and her brother, but I mainly have been deep in this with my friend for my friend. And now there’s a chance of freezing precip so I might not make it to the service! Ugh. I hate that.
It’s tough when you have to miss a service for someone a good friend lost. H had that happen a couple days after Christmas because he had Covid. He felt like he was letting his friend down. Of course, he understood - but friends want to support friends.
Perhaps the service will be live-streamed and/or recorded? That is becoming common here, even though Covid has (mostly) subsided.
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Plenty of people may be at the service, but the important part is being there next week,and the week after, and the week after that. I hope you are able to make the service, though.
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I’m sure the friend would enjoy an invitation when the weather clears, to go out for a meal or something and debrief or just chat about things you like, common events you shared, silly things going on in your life and more. Sometimes people have initial outpouring of sympathy and then everyone disappears and goes about their lives.
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Update on mom and her hip. Yes, it’s fractured in 2 places but small enough fractures that they are not recommending surgery. She hasn’t been admitted to the hospital but is still in an observation room. We drove home yesterday and I’ll go to pick her up later this morning. Obviously since she wasn’t admitted there is no rehab stay in the cards. We’ll increase her caretaker hours and I’ll stay overnight for a few days. PT and nursing visits will be at her home. Ugh. It’s 8:30am and I’m already looking forward to a glass of wine.
I talked to her last night around 8:30 (after our 15 hour drive home) and let me tell you, hospital- induced delirium IS REAL.
I have a question. Was your mom on osteoporosis meds? I ask because I am gathering as much anecdotal evidence as possible in order to make my own decision regarding meds.
My parents are supposedly moving to a retirement community…but we are going on nearly a year now and it hasn’t happened. We have looked at 15 apartments there. I get it is a process, but they aren’t 30 any more and as my mom declines, the process needs to speed up! (BTW, both of their mothers lived there and dad recently said how great it was for them.)
My sibling and I just have the same conversations over and over with them, back off for a while and then have it again. Sometimes it does takes hearing something over and over for my dad to get past a particular issue. Dad adores my mom, needs to move for my mom, knows it, but… If something happens to one of them, I want them already in the retirement community.
How do you know how much pressure to apply to your parents? When to step in? It is hard.
Mom has Parkinson’s and is a fall risk, dad keeps saying “she is fine on the stairs”. I reply “do you know when we will find out she is not fine on the stairs? When she falls down them”. He can’t seem to look down the line. Neurologist basically yelled at dad last month that they need to be living in a one story home. And that he needs to be with her on the stairs when she is using them.
A couple of weeks after that doc appt, my dad told sibling, “mom is fine, we aren’t moving”. So he backtracks but thankfully he hasn’t said that again.
I did have a good convo with mom last night. I made sure she knew that sibling and I totally understand how hard it is for them to leave their home of 60 years and that we weren’t minimizing that at all, but want them in the safest place possible. But mom isn’t the issue, it is dad.
And…we are looking at another unit next week. So fingers crossed. It is the floorplan they finally decided they were going to wait for. But I am sure there will be something wrong with it according to them 
My brother once said “I am just resigned to the idea that it will take a catastrophe to move them”. I have no solution for you, but you certainly aren’t alone in trying to move an intractable parent. Does your Dad understand that when she falls, they will be permanently separated? A hospital won’t discharge her to an unsafe home, and then he’ll be alone. Has your Mom asked him to change his mind?
Short of invoking guardianship, there’s actually nothing to force them. It is a struggle, but I wouldn’t (for your own sake) stop pushing. You will bear many of the consequences of his inaction, after all.
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