Tuesday – Not a Place for Healing
Oct. 9th, 2007 04:37 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
ninanevermoreToday on my drive into work, I was thinking about the nursing home my mother-in-law is in, and how I can understand why she hates it so much.
"It's depressing," she told me when I visited her on Sunday night, "Everyone here is sitting around waiting to die. I don't leave this room if I can help it."
At least she no longer share a room with the irritable and unpleasant Fae, who gave you the idea that everything that could go wrong in the past 100 years had gone wrong for her, personally, and that she was out to punish the world in general for all of it. Doris now has a room to herself, though it has a second bed in it that may be ocupied in the future. A very social and dynamic woman before her stroke, it is starling to find her turned into a wheelchair-bound recluse.
I suspect that this is the only place my brother-in-law even bothered to look at before he chose it. It looks clean, it offers physical therapy, and it's close enough to all of us that we can all visit her regularly. But he didn't inspect the other residents to see if they were working to rehabilitate themselves and live independently again, the way Doris wants to, or if they are simply resigned to be warehoused until they finally expire. The ones I've don't interact with each other; they only stare at one of the many TV sets around the place, or into the space in front of them. It is a place full of humans, but with no human interacation. The few hours of company each week that Doris gets from her two sons and their wives, all of us fully employed, do not make up for the hours of loneliness she endures when we aren't there. She is hungry for human contact, and is starving for it on the few rations we have to give her.
"We're looking for some place else," I promised, because Jeff has told me that he and his brother are, "this is only temporary."
The right side of her body is still useless. Her right hand lies limp in her lap, and the only way for her to move it is to pick up with her left hand. I can see some minor improvements, such as the right side of her face not noticeably drooping like it did right after the stroke. She is not happy about the one hour a day of physical therapy she receives here 5 days a week; the hospital had her on a much more rigorous regime of physical, occupational and speech therapy, even on the weekends. The difference is that the focus of a hospital is healing and rehabilitation, while the focus of a nursing home is simply storage.
She is also unhappy with the food. Doris was a health food nut before. Since she can't chew very well (with only one side of her jaw willing to help with the effort), the food she gets is pulverized. Even before it went into the blender, the meals are not what she would have chosen for herself She liked organic foods and whole grains. She avoided starchy while potatoes and only ate sweet potatoes (because the book Eat Right 4 Your Type told her to), but white potatoes made from dehydrated flakes are all that are on the menu here. I try to help her by smuggling in organic baby food in easy-to-open plastic containers, and the teething cookies they make for toddlers, which melt in your mouth if you can't chew them. It's not a perfect solution, but at least I know she'll have something that she'll eat rather than the nursing home food that she will barely touch.
"Are you ready for bed?" a nurse asked, popping his head through the door. She has to have someone change her into her nightclothes.
Doris said she was, and I stood up to hug her goodbye. She said goodbye to my son and we tried to get him to hug her, but he wouldn't. The nursing home freaks him out. He is not used to his Grandma Dee simply sitting, and with being expected to step forward and kiss her rather than the other way around. In the past, she would scoop him up and give him kisses while he sqealed and laughed. She is strange to him now.
"Grandma Dee is sick," he told me as we walked down the corridor to leave.
"She is. That's why she's here right now, so she can get better."
"Yeah," he said, concentrating on the wooden hand rail along the wall that allows wheelchair patients can pull themselves along.
"Are you ready to go home and take a bath?" I asked him.
"No," he said, "I want read stories."
"We can read stories after you have a bath."
"No. I just want stories, no bath."
"If you don't have a bath, you'll be all dirty during story time. Is that okay with you?"
"Uh-huh."
I heard a short, dry laugh behind us. An pail, frail old woman in a wheelchair was slowing, quietly following us down the hallway so she could watch my son and listen to our conversation. She was enchanted with him. I would have turned around and taken him over to her, if I thought he would let her touch him and talk to him. He is at a stage where he is wary of strangers, though, and it would not have gone well. When we reached the front door, I smiled at her and wished her a good night, and she smiled back and waved, like I was an old friend. She seemed delighted to interact with me, a stranger who brought a little sunshine into this dark building; sunshine that hold onto my hand and demanded bedtime stories.
She was still smiling at me as the door closed, and my son and I walked away into the warm darkness of the balmy October night.
* ~ * ~ * ~ * ~ * ~ * ~ * # * ~ * ~ * ~ * ~ * ~ * ~
"It's depressing," she told me when I visited her on Sunday night, "Everyone here is sitting around waiting to die. I don't leave this room if I can help it."
At least she no longer share a room with the irritable and unpleasant Fae, who gave you the idea that everything that could go wrong in the past 100 years had gone wrong for her, personally, and that she was out to punish the world in general for all of it. Doris now has a room to herself, though it has a second bed in it that may be ocupied in the future. A very social and dynamic woman before her stroke, it is starling to find her turned into a wheelchair-bound recluse.
I suspect that this is the only place my brother-in-law even bothered to look at before he chose it. It looks clean, it offers physical therapy, and it's close enough to all of us that we can all visit her regularly. But he didn't inspect the other residents to see if they were working to rehabilitate themselves and live independently again, the way Doris wants to, or if they are simply resigned to be warehoused until they finally expire. The ones I've don't interact with each other; they only stare at one of the many TV sets around the place, or into the space in front of them. It is a place full of humans, but with no human interacation. The few hours of company each week that Doris gets from her two sons and their wives, all of us fully employed, do not make up for the hours of loneliness she endures when we aren't there. She is hungry for human contact, and is starving for it on the few rations we have to give her.
"We're looking for some place else," I promised, because Jeff has told me that he and his brother are, "this is only temporary."
The right side of her body is still useless. Her right hand lies limp in her lap, and the only way for her to move it is to pick up with her left hand. I can see some minor improvements, such as the right side of her face not noticeably drooping like it did right after the stroke. She is not happy about the one hour a day of physical therapy she receives here 5 days a week; the hospital had her on a much more rigorous regime of physical, occupational and speech therapy, even on the weekends. The difference is that the focus of a hospital is healing and rehabilitation, while the focus of a nursing home is simply storage.
She is also unhappy with the food. Doris was a health food nut before. Since she can't chew very well (with only one side of her jaw willing to help with the effort), the food she gets is pulverized. Even before it went into the blender, the meals are not what she would have chosen for herself She liked organic foods and whole grains. She avoided starchy while potatoes and only ate sweet potatoes (because the book Eat Right 4 Your Type told her to), but white potatoes made from dehydrated flakes are all that are on the menu here. I try to help her by smuggling in organic baby food in easy-to-open plastic containers, and the teething cookies they make for toddlers, which melt in your mouth if you can't chew them. It's not a perfect solution, but at least I know she'll have something that she'll eat rather than the nursing home food that she will barely touch.
"Are you ready for bed?" a nurse asked, popping his head through the door. She has to have someone change her into her nightclothes.
Doris said she was, and I stood up to hug her goodbye. She said goodbye to my son and we tried to get him to hug her, but he wouldn't. The nursing home freaks him out. He is not used to his Grandma Dee simply sitting, and with being expected to step forward and kiss her rather than the other way around. In the past, she would scoop him up and give him kisses while he sqealed and laughed. She is strange to him now.
"Grandma Dee is sick," he told me as we walked down the corridor to leave.
"She is. That's why she's here right now, so she can get better."
"Yeah," he said, concentrating on the wooden hand rail along the wall that allows wheelchair patients can pull themselves along.
"Are you ready to go home and take a bath?" I asked him.
"No," he said, "I want read stories."
"We can read stories after you have a bath."
"No. I just want stories, no bath."
"If you don't have a bath, you'll be all dirty during story time. Is that okay with you?"
"Uh-huh."
I heard a short, dry laugh behind us. An pail, frail old woman in a wheelchair was slowing, quietly following us down the hallway so she could watch my son and listen to our conversation. She was enchanted with him. I would have turned around and taken him over to her, if I thought he would let her touch him and talk to him. He is at a stage where he is wary of strangers, though, and it would not have gone well. When we reached the front door, I smiled at her and wished her a good night, and she smiled back and waved, like I was an old friend. She seemed delighted to interact with me, a stranger who brought a little sunshine into this dark building; sunshine that hold onto my hand and demanded bedtime stories.
She was still smiling at me as the door closed, and my son and I walked away into the warm darkness of the balmy October night.
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Date: 2007-10-09 10:05 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2007-10-10 02:44 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2007-10-10 03:42 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2007-10-10 12:55 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2007-10-10 02:42 pm (UTC)This is what happens when you trust a man to do this sort of research. As a guy, all he was thinking, "Hmmm. No rats. This will do." :P
no subject
Date: 2007-10-10 02:14 pm (UTC)I don't want to think about a time when my parents will be in a nursing home. I hope that day never comes...
*HUGS*
no subject
Date: 2007-10-10 02:48 pm (UTC)We are moving Doris to a rehab facility as soon as we can get the paperwork and logistics done.
no subject
Date: 2007-10-10 03:11 pm (UTC)YAY. I'm glad you're moving her. Very sweet of you guys!!
no subject
Date: 2007-10-10 03:17 pm (UTC)Since Jeff and his brother were able to get time off during the week, they did the looking, and they only had a few days to find some place. The first time I saw it, I told Jeff that they needed to find some place better, and I've repeated that to him after every visit.