There are a billion things that can go wrong with these meat sacks we inhabit. There is no one solution. Example: the minute someone can't move on their own anymore, you now need multiple people to maneuver them around. On toilets. Off. Bathing. Into bed. Out of bed. Regardless of their mental state. You need lifts. You need wheel chairs. Special beds. This person could be 100% with it mentally, but the lack of mobility creates a whole world of challenges. Which wear on their own mental health, let alone, the wear on those family members trying to help and keep them at home and comfortable. Then you add mental decline. Then you add cost of private care on top of the gov't help. PLUS PLUS PLUS. Then the family wrestles with "what's the best solution for ALL?" And that question gets asked several times a week!
Just saying "keep them at home... it's better for them" is very often not a solution. We're living it right now. The anger. The tears. The good days and increasing bad ones. Decisions to stay or put them in LTC. The GUILT of even thinking about LTCH.
But palliative, as I understand it, is REALLY about "end of life". So for me... that's at home, on the best drugs money can buy, to say our good-byes and keep someone as comfortable as possible in the remaining days and hours. BUT, "at home is better" doesn't work when they can't move or function or they're completely "gone" mentally.
All I can say is hug your loved ones. Do the best you can. Decide as a family based on the love you feel for them. And I wish everyone strength. It's the shits man!
Thanks. Deciding as a family was a really tough option in our instance.
I being the youngest one when my dad was going through his last years, and I was away studying, felt the elder ones were perhaps more knowledgeable about that stage, and also following traditional guidelines regarding the oldest etc and their presumed powers, left the decisions to them. Maybe it was just that I was not confident enough, as some of their choices, did not align with mines. And my mother just blindly trusted them, as she was not taking it well.
Did I ever learn a lesson, based on some of the outcomes, and promised my mother and myself never to let that happen again.
When it was my mother’s time, we all meet together to discuss and decide. The first time in about 25 years .
Long story short, I had been the only one to keep in frequent touch with her and knew her wishes. A meeting was organized with her children (3), and one of her sisters.
Although my mom was present, her wishes were never asked for, which I brought to their attention.
All, except myself, voted for external residence and care and they decided it was a done deal. Note my mother knew my take before hand and she did not face us or voted during the so called voting.
I had brought it up that no decision is valid without her say prior to the meeting, and tried to agree on guidelines in case a consensus was not possible, allowing my mother two votes in that scenario.
Knowing my mother’s wishes and her two votes and mines, against my siblings’ I had stacked the deck, in her favour .
As a result, my siblings washed their hands more or less.
It was not until five years later they admitted I made the best decision, and one confessed that mom had said to them, she would commit suicide of she was made to leave her home.
