When the caregiver needs care.

[Cleita]

My eighty nine year old neighbor has gotten to the stage in his life that he needs twenty four hour nursing care. So I was talking to one of his nurses today and she was trying to give herself a pick me up with strong coffee. She said she was feeling bad and was having a problem finishing her housework. Also she’s diabetic.

Then she is telling me about the other caregiver who is also diabetic and has had one of her feet amputated. Yet, she too must look after this old man who has neuropathy in his feet and is prone to falling. Fer chrissakes these poor women, both middle-aged, need caregivers themselves!

This is what is so wrong with our system and why we need social programs like universal health care and yes, welfare if need be, so that those people who can’t work anymore don’t have to. Looking at the clothes these women wear and the cars they drive, I get the impression that they will become homeless when they absolutely can’t work anymore.

I think the old man is getting cheated too if these women faint while they are caring for him or go into a diabetic coma. God our system sucks! I wouldn’t doubt that they also have kids to care for at home that I haven’t pried into their personal lives that much to know.

[zanne]

1. Most caregivers are overworked and underpaid.

My mother, who died last Easter, needed caregivers (besides me) for the last two years of her life. They worked for the Visiting Nurses Association. They weren't guaranteed eight hours a day and often had to scramble to get extra patients. They were all paid per diem (they didn't get paid holidays). They had to run around town in these junky little cars and do the heaviest, dirtiest work there is, and they all had hearts of gold. I came to love and admire these women, who really cared about each patient and put up with conditions I wouldn't dream of putting up with. They took care of my mother who was confused, incontinent and paralyzed by her illness (Alzheimer's). When she died, they grieved with me and came to her funeral. They still stop by from time to time, just to see how I'm doing.
I think that they deserved better, I deserved better and my mother deserved better than the stingy aid that came from Medicare and this Health System in general. When someone in a family becomes an invalid due to disease, it's not only the patient but the family and friends of the patient. Thank God there are still angels out there who care.

[Cleita]

3. Wouldn't it be better if they were on the government payroll

and were paid a guaranteed yearly wage with benefits? It could be done with money that we waste on making our GOP politicians and their friends rich. They could be sent to the jobs where they are needed and not just to the people who can afford them.

Also, these two women need healthcare themselves and probably welfare. I don't think they should be working.

[zanne]

11. Isn't it ironic....

I'm on disability and receive social security payments. The payments are very low but I can't work because I'm on disability, right? However, I took care of my mother 24/7 with the same disabilities I can't go to work with. My mother was sick for ten years. She only qualified for home health aides when she was no longer able to walk. For eight years, I had to do it alone. Medicare wouldn't even help with things like a bathseat or railings for her bed. (Nothing for the bathroom or bedroom).
We're really all alone out here. All of us. All it takes is for a crippling accident or disease to happen, and the American dream goes away, just like that. Yes, we need nationalized healthcare desperately.

[EFerrari]

2. Although he's better than ever, I do the dc thing for my husband.

I have a sinking feeling that what I do isn't sustainable. No health insurance for me and no window where illness could occur without fracas.

During the last five years, I've managed to enlist some really awesome family and community support and am always on the lookout for more ways to do that. Even so, I can't think about this very long or my head will re-explode for the umpteenth time. And then I'd have to clean it up! :P

Our system does suck. It is dangerous. People aren't getting the care they need and everyone involved with them is becoming more and more compromised in every way.

We need to re-imagine this whole thing. Those people who cry "Socialism!" need to fucking get over themselves -- and do it sometime before one of their family members (if not themselves) requires 24/7 care. Or before they lose a family member to a preventable tragedy. Or before they lose their home and try vilifying social medicine from the cold, smelly street.

Maybe I have a bad attitude. :evilgrin:


Thanks, Cleita.

[Cleita]

4. Other countries do it. Why can't we? n/t

[EFerrari]

9. Because we're free.

We're free to endure needless health care crises.

[Cleita]

13. Isn't that the truth.

The fix is out there if any legislator is willing to tackle it.

[bobbolink]

14. Here's to your "bad attitude".....

:toast:

:hi:

And a big, fat "RIGHT ON!!"

[EFerrari]

15. Hey, bobbolink.

:hi:

[bobbolink]

17. CHIRP!!

And, an extra-speshul tweet, jes' for you....

:)

:toast:

[w8liftinglady]

20. I've always felt that communal living was the ideal set-up...

caregivers for all ages,using everyone's talents to the fullest,everyone eats,is clean,schooled,and self-actualized.I guess that does kind of make me a socialist,Huh?

[oneold1-4u]

5. Care providers

In OR and across the nation are getting the shaft as the Feds shut off more and more funds to the states and require more proof of need.
One example recently was stopping payment for needed travel for food, medical, business or emergencies.(one trip a week for food) We have a Union and the government quickly began looking at everything they could shaft and make the Union look bad. Now they are apportioning the minutes needed for each care activity under different values. Like any part of caring for another person is of less value than another! (sort of like combing hair 10cents-bath25cents)
A Union would not be needed if the nation cared!
Many thousands of these people worked for from $3 a day to a dollar an hour to build this nation and win the wars. Their SS checks will not even sustain them today for food!
I forgot to add that food stamps and housing allowances have also been cut drastically for these people!
I was always told this was the greatest country in the world but today- - - - -

[Samurai_Writer]

6. I'm starting a caregiver job next week

After being a caregiver for my 94 year old great uncle, my grandmother, and my schitzophrenic sister over the past 20 years, I am starting a part time job as a caregiver. I know it's going to be hard and sometimes unpleasant work, but when I was looking for a part time job, I wanted to do something that could make a difference in someone's life. Also, I didn't want to get stuck behind a computer or cash register, as I work a 40 hour a week computer job. I wanted something that would give me some activity as well.

I'll let you all know how it goes! I'm really excited about it, and hope I don't burn out too quickly.

[Cleita]

7. That's so wonderful if it's what you want to do.

I hope it works out for you as you guys are really needed.

[SoCalDem]

10. My friend did it for a while, and had to quit

Most of the elderly on her "route" were lonely, in addition to being sick, so she would chat with them, and it made her day incredibly long. Her bosses were always after her to "work faster", even though she was paid by the visit...not by the hour......so she quit. She said she felt like she was shortchanging the people, if she could not sit and listen to them or to treat them like people instead of patients.

[me b zola]

12. It sounds as though it may be very rewarding work for you

You already know from experience that it will physically and mentally tough work, still you look forward to providing care for people. You really are a special person, and I believe that you will find the work rewarding. :hug:

The love you take is equal to the love you make

[nosmokes]

8. there is no doubt the system is broken

for better or worse, our society lives multi generational in the same house as often as not even in the same town. yet we've really not developed system for taking care of our aging and elderly. sure, there are assisted living facilities and nursing homes, but anyone with an intimate knowledge of these places Will tell you they're a poor substitute and for most residents provide a quality of life that is sorely lacking. it is said, with quite a bit of accuracy, that we often treat our pets with more care and compassion than our elderly. i'm not speaking of euthanasia, just of spending time and sharing things with them, even when they become a pain in the ass. they get in our way of making money, of trying to get a bigger house or a fancier car or other shit that in the overall scheme of things rate a "so what?" we get too busy to allow the old folks to be useful anymore. it takes them too long to help make the salad for dinner so instead of waiting an extra couple of minutes we stop giving them that job, like we're gonna starve if we eat at 5:05 instead of 5:00. and in the meantime we rob ourselves of the gift the elders can give us, patience and acceptance and wisdom, often learned in putting with them true, but a gift given nonetheless.

[KT2000]

16. Get an illness? Lose your insurance

This assures profits.
I sure hope the women get health insurance through their work. They need the health insurance to exist.

I hate to say this but we better be prepared for more people of middle age developing chronic illnesses, especially women. Autoimmune illnesses among women are epidemic but hardly noticed.

America lives by greed I guess.

Those poor women, what a crime.

[DanCa]

18. The system is messed up.

We need solutions... it begins by tossing out the rethugs in November. On a side note I hate the term welfare. When I was working they took money out my check. As far as am concerned ssdi is giving back me what I put into it.( Infact since the return is so small I think that SSDI owes me more )

[w8liftinglady]

19. I see SO many of my patients' families get broken down

My patient population are all chronically ill,with multiple medical problems..and they come to me to get off the ventillator or to heal bad bedsores.They have usually been in ICU for weeks,and are very debilitated.Insurance dictates when they go home.Many folks do NOT want to put their loved one in a nursing home,and try to take care of them at home.Unfortunately,many insurance and medicare policies only allow for intermittent care.A lot of times,the previously exhuberant extended family become exhauted and visit less frequently.The primary caregiver becomes sick and has to be hospitalized themselves.I can't tell you how many of my patients have spouses in the hospital simultaneously.It's a crying shame.

[EFerrari]

21. My whole system seems to be discombobulating after 12 years.

I'm trying not to panic. But, it's ironic that because I chose to care for and demand treatment for Doug, I am automatically disqualified for any help whatsoever.

In addition to tilting with the horror that is the mental health system in this country, I'm shut out on anything for me. Getting help FOR HIM was a war. I just don't have the energy to mount a second front.

We make do and are secure for now. Get to do some in the community, for other families that are dealing with the same stuff.

But, I don't really see how I can sustain what I'm doing over time.

My choice, of course. And I love what we're doing especially when we go to DC or to state capitols and get to keynote for our families. But, you know, it's just goddam stupid to not allow the carers who soak up most of the cost to get basic health care. At some point, someone will try to book me for a keynote and they'll just get dead air.

If I drop dead -- and having no health care for many years, I've to hope that won't happen -- ALL the costs of my husband's care will go on the public ledger. All. Whatever little I can organize or bring in somehow -- pooof!

Let alone all the work we're doing right now to shore up community efforts, with the press and so on.

It's a net loss, I think.

Whatever.

Good thing some of my people are curanderas so traditional medicine isn't my only choice.

But, America makes a carer's job as hard as possible.