Spinoff: G'parents and Nursing Homes

[cheshrcarol]

I didn't want to threadjack Cider's thread even more, but in reading about everyone's experiences with grandparents I was wondering if anyone had experience where both grandparents were alive and living together, and one started to degrade (from stroke or alzheimer's or whatever) to the point of needing a nursing home, but the spouse wanted to continue taking care of them?

This is going on with both sets of my grandparents and I'm wondering what everyone's experience with this is? When did the other spouse finally concede that the other person needed more care than they can give? On one side I have my grandfather taking care of my grandmother, who has alzheimer's. She's not that far gone yet (can talk, remembers who people are) but she gets confused with objects and can have some dangerous behaviors, like putting an unopened can of soup in a pot and turning the stove on. My grandfather is adamant that he take care of her, and she of course wants to stay with him.

On the other side the situation is that my grandfather had a stroke and my grandmother is getting to the end of her rope taking care of him. He also isn't that bad considering (he just gets confused sometimes, and trying to keep him away from driving a car is hard). She really hates nursing homes and my uncles put a lot of pressure on her to take care of him herself.

[biodork]

Definitely happened to me. My grandmother (on my mom's side) was 15 years younger than my grandfather. His health definitely started to deteriorate over the past several years. He started with getting macular degeneration, so his eyesight was basically gone so he couldn't drive anymore. She had to drive him everywhere. Then he started getting cancer. They took care of his prostate cancer, but eventually it came back and spread and that's what he died from in the end.

My grandma took care of him through all of it though, and he never went to a home. I think the only reason she was able to handle it was because she had my family around, and my grandpa was retired Air Force, so he had military benefits to take care of him until the end. Towards the end my grandma was forced to get someone to come to her house from like 8-4 during the day. I know that even though she was sad when he died, she was relieved because it was very hard to take care of him in the end.

Now with my dad's side, my grandma's short term memory is starting to go (although she doesn't have alzheimers). She will say goodbye to us like 10 times, and not recognize us from far away. Sometimes even close up. My grandpa definitely has to snap her out of her zoning out sometimes too. But with them, they live in a retirement community that they wanted to go in. It's actually really nice. My grandpa did a good job saving up for retirement so they have a beautiful condo and 24/7 care if they need it. And there is a wing for those who can't get around on their own anymore. I know my dad would take care of them if they needed it, but the place they are now is really great for them.

[wordsmith]

Well, in the case of my grandma with Alzheimer's, my grandfather died 29 years ago, so she'd lived on her own for about 25 years before got so seriously sick and eventually wound up needing round-the-clock care. So obviously there was no option of spousal caregiving.

In the case of my grandfather with congestive heart failure, who passed away last summer, my grandmother took care of him at home for about 10 years previous to that (her own choice, and his, he wasn't incapacitated enough for hospital/nursing home/hospice care until the last couple of months of his life). I know it was hard on her, both emotionally and physically...she's both very high strung and small-framed, and it was emotionally hard for her to deal with a slowly dying husband, as well as just plain difficult for her, at about 5'2" to physically assist him in most ways. After he started going into pneumonia and organ shutdown, he was hospitalized for about a month, and it didn't get a lot easier on her, because she basically set up residency in the lounge of the ICU floor. When he was well enough to come home, basically to die, she had the help of a home hospice care person who came a couple of times a week, and my mom, aunt and uncle, who came to stay and help for the last three weeks of his life.

[frogleggz]

This situation happened with my grandparents. My grandpa was diagnosed with alzheimers in his late 70s, and it was a slow decline that lasted over 10 years before he finally passed away earlier this year. Other than the alzheimers, he was in very good physical health, as was (is) my grandma. Of course she insisted on taking care of him and continuing to live in the house they had lived in for 50+ years, but when he started to do things like "escape" from the house when she wasn't watching him, it became too much for her to handle. So at that point he had to live in an assisted living house. Eventually my parents moved out of state, where some of my mom's siblings are living, and my grandparents moved up there as well. My grandpa went to a different assisted living house, and my grandma bought a large house with my parents, with her own living quarters (kitchen, etc.) that was very close to the place where my grandpa was living. She spent a lot of time with him at the assisted living house, and it was very difficult for her when he passed away, but I think it helps for her to have so much family around.

[coll214]

One grandmother it never got to that point, my g-pa died from a heart attack suddenly 20 years ago. She went to live with an aunt until she started refusing her meds. She's now in senior nursing home where two of her siblings had been at. Unfortunately one died 2 years ago and the other just last week from Alzheimers'. She'd had it for 15 years too i believe.

As for the other g-ma, when my grandfather started getting bad; she was still in AZ with most of her family on the east coast. But being the stubborn Irishman g-pa was, i hightly doubt he would have gone into a nursing home. He wasn't really bad until the end. He'd had multiple heart attacks and a stroke or two through the years, but it was the emphysema and cancer that eventually got him. She had a hospital bed and a nurse to help out, but my father ended up going out there to help g-ma out at the end for the last month or so. She eventually moved back here into a senior apartment housing down the street from him.

[pisces2473]

I would suggest moving to a type of facility that has independent style living but also has an area with assisted living, then a nursing home--all on the same campus. That way, the "healthy" g-parent can still live independently, but the sicker one can get the help that she/he needs.

My other suggestion is for a professional care giver to come in and help out the well grandparent. Even younger people who are helping out sick relatives need help (and a break).

[wordsmith]

Also respite care, even if you don't want to hire a full-time live in nurse like we did for my grandma. Shit, even the full-time nurse had a respite care person come in once of twice a week. No one person can deal with severe Alzheimer's needs around the clock.

[SpaceMonkey]

My mom has worked in nursing homes for most of her career as a nurse. There is actually now a trend of "multi-stage," I guess I would call them, retirement centers wherein you buy into a life-care contract and live in a condo. As you age and require more care, you become eligible for in-home nursing care and then, if you really deteriorate, you transfer to their full-fledged nursing home.

These kinds of places typically don't have many beds in their nursing home units, though, so it can be pretty competitive to get offered the contract.

[coll214]

I would suggest moving to a type of facility that has independent style living but also has an area with assisted living, then a nursing home--all on the same campus. That way, the "healthy" g-parent can still live independently, but the sicker one can get the help that she/he needs.
This is the kind of place my maternal g-ma is in. They have a small amount of condos, and then the main facility. Typically the higher the floor, the worse off the patient.And I believe they also have a few couples that they allow to live together.

[wordsmith]

Where my grandma is living is partially assisted living...she's not in that part, though, nor could she be.