Need to Know Your Experiences With Haladol ASAP

Mom is not improving. In January with the UTIs there was confusion, but mostly unresponsivness. This time, she is increasingly agitated and is hallucinating. She has not slept at all since she woke up yesterday morning. They want to give her Haladol. Sorry if I didn’t spell that right. The evening nurse yesterday advised against it strongly. What is your experience with this drug in an elderly patient? Thanks.

Checking In and an Update on Mom

Hi all, I hope this finds everyone and their families well. I had a little much needed time to myself and figured I would check in. Mom is still in the rehab since her fall over a  month ago. She seems to be in good spirits. I don’t get to see her except on the weekends since I am very busy at work and decided it was too much for me to go back and forth since it’s not close by. I figured as long...

Friday Fun: Give Us the Guffaws

It’s Friday, so let’s share some funnies. What’s a humorous experience that’s happened to you in your caregiving role? It could be something that happened years ago or just yesterday, as long as today it makes you giggle. We’ll giggle with you. Please share in our comments section. And, I choose a random winner to receive an autographed copy of my book, “Take Comfort, Too, More...

Can You Get Sleep?

The National Sleep Foundation suggests that most adults need 7–9 hours of sleep per night. The Centers for Disease Control decided to see how well we do with getting enough sleep. The agency released data yesterday that determined 35.3% of survey respondents reported having less than seven hours of sleep on average during a 24-hour period. Lack of sleep is often equated with having young children, having a...

It’s Okay to Look

Robert looks different from other people his age. He is 45 years old but uses a walker, he wears a very hard helmet, he drags his right foot and sometimes he trips. He is slow to respond to questions (he’ll get there, he just needs a lot of processing time). He even has seizures (in public! Oh My!). These can involve slumping down in a chair for 20 seconds or could entail falling flat on his back and laying on...

Who’s Been There Since the Dawn of YOUR Personal Story?

Siblings. Over 80% of us Americans have one. I invite you to think about your siblings and how they have impacted your life. See if they land on your 50 Lunches list. Here are a few quotes to help you reflect… “Siblings are the people we practice on, the people who teach us about fairness and cooperation and kindness and caring – quite often the hard way.”  ~Pamela Dugdale “To the...

The Give and Take of Generosity

This morning on Your Caregiving Journey, Ellen Rogin, our wealthness expert, joined us for a discussion on how generosity is good for our health. Generosity, the ability to give and receive, adds years to our life. According to Dr. Stephen Post, “Giving protects overall health twice as much as aspirin protects against heart disease.” Ellen challenged us to look at adding a small act of generosity in our day....

Back to the Hospital We Go

I was able to reach the uro/gyn that did surgery for Mom a few years ago. His nurse told me that, with Mom’s symptoms, to head for the ER. She also told me that the doctor we know and was so happy with is having surgery himself this morning, or we could take Mom to their ER and he’d be her physician. That would have been lovely. She also said that this is a potentially serious bacteria, but confirmed...

Here We Go Again…

Got the microbiology report back from the lab. New bacteria this time…klebsiella pneumoniae. It is one that is picked up when someone has had a whole lot of antibiotics (check, after the two UTIs of a different variety in January), has been in hospital or nursing home (check, check) or is elderly (check). Good news is that they also ran a sensitivities test on the bacteria, and the antibiotic she’s been...

Tell Us: What Don’t I Know About You?

In March, our Caregiving Happiness Project action word is Learn. So, I’ve decided that this month I’m going to learn something about new and old friends alike. I started thinking about friends here—all the visitors who stop by Caregiving.com. I know something about you—that caregiving affects your life. Today, though, I’d love to know more. I’d love to know something about you...

Powerful Story Shines Light on Elder Abuse

Yesterday, 90-year-old actor Mickey Rooney testified before Congress that he had been abused and neglected by family members. You can listen to Mickey’s story, featured this morning on NBC’s Today Show, at the bottom of this post. Two statistics, mentioned in the Today show story, stood out for me: 3.5 million cases of elder abuse take place every year; 14% of elderly who live with family members...

Silk Velvet at the Broadmoor

Vintage rust silk velvet gown-vintage shop, black silk velvet jacket-flea market, rust silk velvet structured turban-custom made by Jeanne Bjorn. Nelson proclaims that we are in ‘the lap of luxury.’ We feel nurtured and surrounded by beauty. When we arrived at the Broadmoor late yesterday afternoon, we were surprised by gifts from friends from Kinetic Fitness Studio (Nelson’s rowing home) that had lavished us...

Survey Request

I received this request today; thought you’d be interested in taking the survey: A group of MBA Candidates from Temple University’s Fox School of Business is conducting a market research study. They would be most appreciative if you would please pass this survey on to family caregivers and have them take a few minutes to complete this survey using the link below. All of their answers will be anonymous...

Poll: What Have You Gained?

In this week’s poll, sponsored by Caregiving.com and eCareDiary.com, we ask: In caregiving, what have you gained? Please vote and share any additional thoughts in our comments section. In Caregiving, What Have You Gained?customer...

Caught Off Guard

Hmmm. I’ve said before that Hubby has had a downturn. His Lewy Body Dementia has caused him havoc in his cognition. I’m having a difficult time sorting out his words and keeping track of his confusion. There seems so much of it that it is now the normal. We have lots more “people” in our house and one guy that is always looking for someone and another that preaches. I told Hubby that the...

A Little Bit of Silly . . .

In my family, today is March Day. (Well, March 1 is March Day but I’m on the west coast and my work day started super early today so humor me if you’re reading this on March 2). What? You’ve never heard of March Day? My middle brother (Rich) and I made it up when we were kids (please – like Hallmark never made up a holiday!). I’m not exactly sure why we created this fabulous holiday but think it had...

When Has Forgiveness Brought You Understanding?

Today on Your Caregiving Journey, we began our special series on forgiveness. Rick Lauber, author of “Caregiver’s Guide for Canadians” and former caregiver for his father with Alzheimer’s disease, joined us to share how an unexpected discovery helped heal his relationship with his father. You can listen to our show via the player below. During our discussion, Rick offered his definition of...

“Ten Glorious Seconds”

“Ten Glorious Seconds” is a short film about living with Alzheimers and those deminishing moments of clarity which occur. Received this in my inbox and after viewing I really wanted to share here with others who could connect and understand.  Many of us who deal with a loved one (or loved ones) with dementia have experienced those special moments of clarity and we so treasure...

Feeling Defeated

Mom has another UTI. We don’t know what bacteria we are dealing with this time until the culture comes back tomorrow, but we do know that the white blood cell count was “TNTC”. The doctor didn’t know what the lab meant by that, so I had to call the lab for explanation. It means “Too Numerous To Count”.  In other words, a raging infection. Mom is completely out of it. She...

It’s “Free Yourself from the Hook” Day

The New York Times published an interesting article last night (“Go Easy on Yourself, A New Wave of Research Shows”). Author Tara Parker-Pope writes that we need more self-compassion, not discipline and will power: “…Research suggests that giving ourselves a break and accepting our imperfections may be the first step toward better health. People who score high on tests of self-compassion...

Happiness Project: March

We’re heading into our ninth month of our Happiness Project! So, here we go for March. Our goal is to learn. What you learn can be a part of caregiving–or not. Learn a new caregiving coping strategy. Learn about your new neighbor. Learn about a new topic or subject. Just learn. For me, I’m going to learn: More about website technology so I make good decisions about my websites; Something new...

Fall

It’s always tough to take a tumble. Sometimes, though, a fall is just what we need. Or, rather, what happens after the fall is just what we need. We get up. We wipe off our butts. We tell everyone that we are okay. We survive the fall. We fear the fall, believing the wipe-out will wipe us out. So, we tread lightly through life; we avoid taking a chance, stepping out on a limb, breaking out of our comfort...