My Mom is 94 years old with Parkingson's Dementia lives with me and I have been her primary caregiver. I just hired a nighttime aide so I could get some rest. Instead I was up most of the night supervising the aide. Is it normal for the nighttime aide to shower in my Mother's bathroom? Also, she slept thru my Mom's nighttime medication and I had to wake her up. I was told the aide isn't supposed to sleep. This was only the first night. Should I let it go or is it time to try a different aide? Also, I would appreciate any best practices suggestions in navigating having aides in the home
is she through an agency?
You apparently have a reading disability, as you have missed the considerable comments about different types of ‘night care’ at very different rates of pay. You are also very rude, as per your other post “you were a lousy caregiver”, etc. Go away!
I let slide the one who was supposed to do light housekeeping when she turned out to have no idea how to load a dishwasher because she'd never seen one, but when she came back the next time with a cold, I was done. The one who let my dying dad get out of bed then fall, necessitating a call to the fire department to pick him up, was fired on the spot.
Personally, I have never taken a shower at work, so your aide shouldn't either. She's on the clock when she's at your mom's house, so if she's working days then pretending to work nights while sleeping then showering, then she'd be off my payroll immediately.
I wouldn't have known how to load a dishwasher until quite recently in the last few years. I had one for years but never used it because I consider that wasteful. If we were entertaining for a holiday and there was a lot of dishes, my husband loaded it.
Your aide came to work with a cold because she doesn't get sick time. Agency-employed homecare aide is one of the crappiest, lowest paying jobs in the world. We all have bills to pay, including your sick aide. Jobs that don't offer sick time will have workers coming to work sick.
I’d talk to the aide, find out what is going on, and see if it can be made workable. Yes, she needs an alarm for the medications. Mother probably needs a button to press that will wake the aide up, if mother needs help. I’d guess that you can find one, or someone on the site can recommend one. With both of those things, you may find a workable arrangement that won’t cost the earth and may meet the real needs.
Your problem of being 'up most of the night supervising the aide' should have been a one-off while the aide gets up to speed. If it isn't, you need a different aide!
From what I hear, this kind of crap is typical.
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