I’m 24 and I take care of both my elderly parents. Between both of them, their doctor appointments & physical therapy appointments fill up my calendar. They have appointments five days out of the week.
This has been going on for two years already. The elderly services in my state only provide transportation if the individual can transfer from vehicles on their own.
How do other caregivers manage multiple appointments every week?
I advised my LO needed other solutions. A new plan for transport. Maybe Assisted Living where the Doctor came to them.
Then I quit.
PS Then my LO did find other solutions.
When you look at a calendar and see a week with no appointments, something always comes up.
I don't understand it. I don't get it. And I vowed to myself I'm not living just to go from one appointment to another.
Sorry that turned into me venting back on you.
As for how do I handle it. I guess the answer is , not very well. I'm only taking care of one parent. I don't think I could handle 2.
For example , what their conditions are , what kinds of doctors they go to . Their ages .
The answers may be in deciding if it’s really necessary to go so often . Perhaps they would qualify for a visiting nurse to come take blood pressures etc . Perhaps the lab could come to the house to draw blood tests .
Are you not able to work because of this ?
Do your parents have money to hire someone to take them to the doctor ?
If they moved to assisted living many provide transportation to doctors as well as they have many services there , primary doctor . Podiatry . Vision , dental , PT, OT , speech , psych therapy , lab , portable X-ray . They could possibly only need to leave to see specialist like cardiology , neurology , etc .
You are too young to be tied down to this . You need your life .
Do your parents take care of themselves otherwise . What else are you helping with , shopping , cooking , cleaning , laundry. Do you live with them ?
I live with them, and do all the necessary house work. My father is still able to drive, so that is one thing he can do. They don’t want to live in assisted living, so I am responsible for them.
The excessive doctors appointments are dental for teeth implants, Wound care, Physical Therapy (3x week), and Eye Care. Because they are both diabetic, they go to the eye doctor and wound care often.
Kathryn, at age 24 if you are organising appointments 5 days of the week, you have no time for a life of your own. No time to work, study, date, have fun … in fact do anything worthwhile to set up your own life. If this is the level of care that your parents genuinely need (and it probably isn’t) they need to pay for some sort of care that doesn’t involve ruining you. Be a bit more hard-nosed about this. An old expression says 'the life you need to save may be your own'.
Being in a wheelchair does not in itself mean that either parent needs care. I have worked with ‘wheelies’ long enough to be quite clear about that! Don’t believe that you don’t need a career because you will inherit the house. It’s one more step along the path to insanity.
I am ‘in my late 70s’ and have some quite difficult physical conditions. I cannot imagine expecting either of my daughters (in their late 40s with school age children of their own) to be a live in maid/carer! They are not ‘responsible for me’. That is ridiculous, as it is for you. I think you need to see a counselor to get your head around this bizarre situation.
both of my parents are heavily disabled, and can only walk a short distance hence the need for physical therapy multiple times a week.
What other people come to help them during the week? What services to they have to help out?eg Meals delivery, housecleaning, personal care help?
Mom & Dad can 'age in place' if they can arrange enough support for themselves. But doesn't sound like they can. Sounds more like they are very dependant & in denial.
Make plans for a weekend away. Go visit a friend or something. Sometimes the physical space can help with mental clarity. To see the bigger picture.
Your parents certainly have some health issues. However the way it reads is that these are not overwhelmingly heavy. In fact if they did require an around-the-clock carer, you would not be able to do it for two people. You wouldn’t be able to take them out three times a week for serious physiotherapy, even if it was 'yes, a help'. You are doing what they ask. It would be a very very good idea if you could get an independent assessment of their care needs, in order to see if what you are doing is the best for them and for you. This level of care time commitment is not something that anyone should just drift into, at the cost of writing off their own needs at the age of 24.
Why not get an independent assessment? Not just from one health professional, because of course they will say that what you are doing is a good idea for the part of the problem that they deal with. What you really need is an assessment of the total situation.
Your parents are not being unfair. At 24 you should be finding a way to support yourself. At 32 you need to be earning a decent salary so you get a decent amount of Social Security.
Your parents, with diabetes, will probably lose a limb. That will make even harder to care for them. Diabetes effects every organ in the body. Especially heart and kidneys. Their care will be more and more. If I was caring for them, I would make sure I received the house in the Will. That there was money set aside so when they are gone I would have money to start a new life. Your future is important.
I was intrigued by your post about DispatchHealth. It sounded wonderful. Then I went online to TrustPilot.com for reliable reviews from their customers. The majority of their customers felt abused by DispatchHealth's "fraudulent" billing practices, among other complaints about how the company operates.
So I'd recommend that people tread carefully before engaging DispatchHealth for in-home health care.
Unfortunately.
If your parents aren’t keen on this contact, it doesn’t mean that you don’t make the contact. Why shouldn’t you? If the three of them don’t get on, a contact doesn’t mean that you are planning on ‘ganging up on the parents’. Your sibling is one of your very limited number of family members, you really ought to be in touch.
There are PT services that can come to the home. Do that ASAP. I have used Genesis' Vitality to You. The patient does not need to be homebound as Home Health Services requires.
At your very young age, you need to start living your own life. You are not their slave. Your brother is right to say no. Your parents would be much better off, especially for you, if they were in AL.
Also can try to get appointments on the same day when you really have to go to one. Really, time to get working on your own life. Do you have a job? If not, that's a good place to start. Or with taking some college courses to build a path to a nice career.
Best of luck.
Or does helping run the houshold & care for your parents absorb all / most of your time?
I sincerely hope there is room for your life too.
I wish that I had an answer for her
and I hope that someone on here does.
Schedule other appointments remote--over the cell phone by video.
Wound care can be done in the home. Ask their doctor about it
I am wondering if PT is the answer. Have they plateaued? Maybe they need someone who privately does excersise in the home. It sound like they do not do the required work daily and just wait for PT. If this is the case, then Palliative care might be an answer.
They are vicitims of their own bodies and the things they did to cause them to have chronic illiness. You are a victim of their will. If you were not there then they have to solve their own problems and change where they live or hire their own caregivers. Yes they can hire caregiving assistants who will drive them.
It is time you put on your own big boots and start backing away. Your are grown up which means you should be on your own. Making your own way into he world and getting out of their home. Stop being a slave and if you feel guilt, then get counselling.
If not, you should. It is possible that your parents are initiating the request for additional appointments because it is a way to get out of the house and go do something else.
Don't depend upon the doctor's paperwork as it is a summary of the visit, but usually does not include all the other details that determine whether the followup visit is necessary versus optional.
I would suggest that you enroll them in senior day care maybe 3 times a week. That means that the PT and doctors appointments can only happen on the other 2 days and you would get some of your life back on the other 3 days.
The other thing is to start logging the results of their appointments in a book, one book for each. It is possible that the reasons why they are going to the doctor are being confused between the 2. One might say they have problem x and the other one, in their discussion, might indicate they also have problem x, when in reality they had problem x years ago. Included in the book would be everything you heard them say, so that you can ensure that the appointment was for the right reason and discussed the correct ailment. Think of it as a health log for each parent.
Good luck!
She sees a doc and says, I can’t sleep and have migraines. Doc checks her out and says I don’t know .. you look okay to me …. So she either asks for/or he offers a specialist. “I mean, we could do an MRI or send you to a neurologist,” and she says, “yes, please!” Next up that neurologist doesn’t see anything so says … “maybe a CAT scan would tell us something … and a different type of neurologist” … I’ll take it, she says. Anything to avoid acknowledging the fact that she’s 80. Things are deteriorating and whatever diagnosis she’s chasing isn’t going to change how she feels day to day. Anything to avoid doing the things we now know have to happen to feel good - sunlight; exercise or movement, real food vs the processed garbage she loves so much.
Look at your parents and consider what’s driving this. Is it a doc who can’t find anything wrong and sends them on to the next doctor? What would happen if after all those appointments something like cancer gets found. Are they really going to have the chemo or radiation? Depending on their age - would whatever it is even get treated? my mother wants to take my dad with dementia to a new cardiologist. Why?!?? He has late stage dementia. His bad ticker isn’t the problem — and even if it is a problem, the dementia is fatal and perhaps a heart attack would take away his suffering quicker than the dementia will.
why are they seeing so many doctors? Whose idea is this? Is your mother obsessed with doctors and pills and procedures like mine is?
Have you explained to them the goal in later life is LESS DOCTOR visits .. not more? My mother isn’t important unless a doctor is giving her attention. It’s an addiction, I swear. Let’s not even get into the money spent on appts, tests, pills, procedures. Even her Medicare out of pocket is insane. She thinks it’s all “free” because she has insurance. If you can’t reason with them about how futile the appts are .. maybe you can get through with the cost angle.
Although, the OP's parents both have diabetes with the attendant health issues that accompany that disease, especially in old age. They're just putting way too much onto her.
I've had several PT sessions. What a joke. I can roll a ball across the floor and do stretches at home for FREE. Insurance only paid for three sessions.
Doctors have their place in emergencies. However, for health and well-being, find a good naturopath or holistic practitioner who is an MD. Doctors are only trained to manage symptoms with toxic poison pills and nothing more.
Your parents adopted and raised you, but that doesn't mean that you have to give up your own life in favour of theirs.
Perhaps they don't realise how selfish they are being; it can be difficult to think beyond your own needs when you become ill, or disabled, and in chronic pain. However, by saying they don't want to go into assisted living and expecting you to take care of them, they are putting their own needs ahead of yours. And so are you. You, unwittingly, are enabling them in their selfishness.
Perhaps you feel afraid of what the future holds. You don't know how they'll cope and, after having been a carer during the time you should have been getting qualifications and work experience, you might not know how you'd cope either. But you would and so would they. And the experience would be life-affirming.
Being a carer has given you many transferable skills. You will have learned time management skills, how to multitask, how to deal with people from different outside agencies, how to budget, how to work out a care regimen and administer medication (admin and management skills), and you have learned how to manage people.
You may need to learn how to advocate for yourself, just as you have been doing for your parents all this time. Building confidence and resilience would be very useful for you, as would self-assertion. These skills can be learned - through counselling, group sessions, or self-help books, podcasts and YouTube videos.
Please let your parents know that you need to live your own life. It may be that they can have carers come in, or they can try assisted living, which still gives them independence. But you can't give up your youth for them.
You don't need to know exactly what you want to do with your life when you tell them that you need to do something else. Being unsure of your next step is no reason for you to be tied down. Nevertheless, it would be good if you made a start - a part time job, an academic or vocational course, a self-help group (a back to work group, carers group, or self-assertiveness training etc.)
You can ask at your local library, local council, social services or any other organisation in your area that helps people, about anything that you can join to help you with your future.
(In my area, I went to a jobs fair, while I was on disability benefit but wanted back into work, and I found out about a charitable organisation that helped people back into work. I never would have known such things existed if I hadn't put myself out there. I'm now a teacher.)
Whatever you do, I wish you all the best.
One thing that struck me was this:
"My friends all live in other parts of the country, so I don’t see them often. I mostly just talk to them online or on zoom."
I found that really sad. If you weren't tied to your parents for the best part of the week, you would be out in the world and making new friends. You should be out there, making a life for yourself. Why is your life less important than the lives of your parents? Why does your wellbeing matter less?
Kathryn, it doesn't. You matter. Please take care of yourself.
I’d love to meet new people, but I can’t relate to them because they travel. have relationships, and have careers.
It comes down to being what I call - what your heart will allow you to do. My heart would NEVER have allowed me to put parent in facility care. Siblings/family members can have a touch of leather where their heart is concerned. And some have an attitude of caretaking was your choice, so when you wear out I guess parent will go to facility care like they suggested in the beginning. Almost like waiting for an "I told you so" to happen.
Not sure of their age or disability status, but if they are on Medicare and/or Medicaid or private health insurance. start trying to locate a Home Health provider in your area and during the Q&A process, find out how many services they can provide to your location. Ex: Podiatry home visits quarterly to trim toe nails. In home doctor visits. Can they take blood/urine samples to a lab for you? PT and OT staff who can come to them for therapy? Nurse coming by weekly just to check vitals is pretty much a standard care practice. Do they have wound care nurses on staff (wound care and wound vacs can be managed in the home with minimal office visits).
If someone unable to walk on their own or transfer from car to chair, they can probably get Medicare and insurance to cover the cost of medical transport via ambulance stretcher (if they can't sit up for a car ride) or wheel chair van. However, you'd probably still need to ride with them in order to be present for the doctor visit.
Once you find a Home Health Co that can handle many of the needs with home visits, talk to their primary doctor to request home health for them and YOU tell doctor which company you have chosen.
Five days a week for doctor appts is probably excessive. May be the visits are only set up just to 'see' the patient, but not really necessary. If each parent has their own dr because they 'like them or used to them', doesn't mean it has to continue. Let both parents see the same doctor when you can. And, most important, find doctors who can do many visits online/zoom with face to face only happening when required (for medicine refills, etc).
If they both have severe health problems that actually require weekly visits, talk to home health about in home palliative or hospice care so that you understand what those really mean. Will patient be removed from all meds/procedures that are intended as curative? If parent(s) getting meds/procedures already that will not cure their illness, they may be getting palliative/hospice care already to just keep them comfortable. Have a frank discussion with each doctor - can you cure what is wrong with dad? Or are we just making him comfortable? That may be the answer you need to decide if hospice/palliative care is already happening.
You are a year younger than my son. I am in tears for you right now because you are far too young to be dealing with this situation - a situation that most of us on here who are dealing with are much much older than you.
i am 54 & taking care of my 86 yr old father who has had strokes, is wheelchair bound & refuses to go into a facility as well as refuses help from anyone besides me (I have gotten him in home care, he sends them home early & then calls me. I am putting a stop to this behavior but it is a process) I can’t imagine my son having to deal with the stress and heartache of dealing with my father. There is absolutely no way in hell I would let him. None.
Forgive me for being blunt, but your siblings are selfish a$$holes who learned their behavior from your parents.
You should not be doing all of this on your own.
my advice? And it’s not gonna be easy, but you need to send a text to your siblings explaining that you are taking a break, a deserved break with the dates you are going and then tell them that if they don’t step up and take care of (THEIR PARENTS as well) then your parents will be forced to fend for themselves.
Tell them that you have quit your job, you have done this for (however long) and they your decision is final, you are NOT open to negotiations.
i am so very sorry and I hope that you are set free soon.
JFC i am so pissed at your family for doing this to you. You should be nursing hangovers on the weekends, not your elderly parents.