Friday, July 31, 2015

A Day in the Life of My Dying Mother-in-Law PART III

continued from yesterday - PART III:

Everyone is looking for you” (Mark 1:37).

Yeah sorry to go on and on. I tend to do that; stream of consciousness. I just wanted to give u a sense of a "Day in the Life Of." And that was just the first half of yesterday. We had a tough 2nd half of the day too. Geri had a very important Doctor appointment yesterday late afternoon. Since she can no longer walk or go in a wheelchair she has to be transported everywhere via private ambulance. The drivers took her to downtown Philadelphia to a very wrong address, not to the correct address in a town just outside of Philadelphia!! The doctor's secretary yelled ridiculously at Amy which got Amy crying. The doctor, a "good" friend of Geri and Jack's, said he was leaving his office and would not wait for the ambulance to arrive at the right location which would take about 40 minutes. The secretary offered that Geri could reschedule in another 3 weeks!! We had already waited 3 weeks for this appointment. The secretary and doctor should react
with a lot more empathy and kindness and urgency.
We're now literally on about our 12th private ambulance company in the last year. There's been a HUGE problem here in and around Philadelphia with private ambulance companies engaging in massive Medicare fraud, especially for dialysis patients like Geri. They're getting shut down and arrested by the Feds. Most of the companies are run by shady people, several by Russian expats. Their equipment and employees are very substandard. It's scary and a shame. And it's made things much more difficult for us. It's actually so far been impossible to find a good private Medicare-approved ambulance company here in Philadelphia. Anyway, just so you know. Thanks. Amy and I are trying very hard and doing a lot for Geri, but we're not really equipped for this. Hospice does open up a lot of help in terms of people coming to help us at the house pretty much on a daily basis: nurses, social workers, bathers, etc. We have no idea if Geri has a week, a month, 6
months left.?! We're always hopeful she'll get better but ...

To Be Continued

Thursday, July 30, 2015

A Day in the Life of My Dying Mother-in-Law PART II

Continued from Part I yesterday - Part II:

As of this week Geri cannot leave her bed. Prior to her most recent hospital visit I was able to lift her out of her bed and place her in a wheelchair so she could eat, watch TV, etc. Now we cannot do that.! Plus in the hospital she developed a severe bedsore!! which smells mightily of rotting flesh, and cleaning it and changing the dressing are difficult and actually disgusting.
A few weeks ago it was suggested that she start hospice. Medicare will pay for hospice care here at home. Geri agreed to it verbally but when it came time to sign literally on the dotted line she refused. She said she felt hospice care meant death and she wanted to try rehab yet again only here at home. Well once again she really didn't try to rehab very hard. So the other day in the hospital she finally agreed to hospice care here at home and she signed the documents required. So we'll see. She's a bit delusional at times but the boys (grandsons, aged 5 and 2) have been great to her and very loving. I think it's tough on them too. Her husband Jack has been obscenely mean to Geri. We think it's horrible of him. But Amy has been very tough with him and is insisting that he get more involved, and that he be nicer to his wife, and to us. We understand it's probably difficult for him to cope with not having a healthy spouse for some years now, but . . .

To be continued - Part III next

Wednesday, July 29, 2015

DEATHWATCH:A Day in the Life of My Ailing/Dying Mother-in-Law

A day in the life of caring for my ailing/dying? 74-year-old mother-in-law; just so you know: Part I:

Not sure what you know about Amy's Mom Geri at this point Ellen but she has been very unwell for some years now. It's been difficult and sad to watch her slowly but surely get worse and worse, and to really not do very much to try to get better. But she is tough. She's like a cat in that she's had about 29 lives so far. We've been surprised a number of times that she's still alive. She's reached a very tough place now. She cannot walk. We've bought a hospital bed for her and put it and her in the living room on the first floor. She came home yesterday from her most recent hospital and then hospice facility. She needed yet another surgical procedure about 2 weeks ago and then she went to rehab briefly. Most of the "rehab" facilities she's been to have frankly been a joke. They excel at taking Medicare money and NOT rehabbing her at all. In fact she's gotten much worse in each of the last 3 rehab facilities she's stayed at.!! When her Medicare
allotment is used up they've all released her to us at home. It's not been a matter of where she is health-wise but that Medicare won't pay for her to stay beyond a certain period of time. They should be ashamed, but they're not.
Anyway last night she fell out of bed after taking her diaper off and shat all over the floor. She was due to go to dialysis this morning at 5 AM via ambulance. We heard her and cleaned her and the rug in the living room up, and then the ambulance guys showed up shortly thereafter and because there had been a fall they are required by law to take her to the local ER to make sure she's OK. So she missed dialysis today and she'll go tomorrow. She goes via ambulance there and back 3 times per week.

To Be Continued

I think of Pete Rose at 74, Mick Jagger at 72, Keith Richards at 71, the Rolling Stones, etc. etc. etc.; all going strong seemingly somehow. And then my sickly dying ungrateful whining moaning, constantly and repeatedly and loudly calling "help" and our names for help. I'm sure she's scared. It's tough, and sad.