Senior Long-Term Planning: Where do I begin?

It’s always the question we ask ourselves when we are faced with challenges we’ve never imagined before. You’re used to living a “normal” life and now, Mom or Dad or both are sick and you ask yourself, “Why now? Why me? What now?”

When our father suffered a stroke in 2000, I was lost. My sister, who’s always been the “rock” of the family, knew what to do and sprung to action. Much of it came from her own experience with my late brother-in-law and her best friend who passed away from cancer. I mean, heck she was a pro as far as I was concerned. What was I going to do with my Dad who was so independent before? My mom had no idea how to take care of him now, she couldn’t handle the stress. He always took care of her. Now here I was, 25 years old, back in school again, and now I was in charge! What was I going to do? My sister lived 400 miles away, and my other siblings had their own lives.

Fortunately, his stroke was very mild and today he has virtually no physical effects from it, other than aphasia which robbed him of his wide vocabulary. He could only speak simply now as opposed to pulling words straight out of a thesaurus.

Then it happened.Little did we know, that we would be facing an even greater challenge 4 years later when our mother was diagnosed with Alzheimer’s Disease. We were pretty ignorant to the disease and virtually knew nothing about it.

I had heard about it, obviously. I only knew that it was a disease that former President Reagan had. I only knew that it made people forget. That was all I knew. My sister and I should have done something at that point. We should have told the rest of the family the news right away.

We should have started the search for for housing alternatives or arranging for in-home help, getting a power of attorney set up, and putting our mother on Alzheimer’s medication right away. We didn’t. Unfortunately, we didn’t do too much in the 2 years between her diagnosis and when we noticed a significant change in her behavior and health. It was only then that we realized that something had to be done, and at that point it was already a crisis at hand. None of our brothers or sister had any idea what to do either, so it was up to us to find out how, when , where and what.

Get Educated and Don’t Wait!
It was our lack of knowledge that hurt us, and in a way hurt our mom. We saw the signs before, we just didn’t think it was serious enough to warrant attention. We figured that it was just a part of growing old. It’s not! Though cognitive abilities do decline with age, Alzheimer’s symptoms are so much more serious than that. My mother would forget to turn off the fire on the stove, and her food would burn. She started becoming incontinent, both urinary and fecal. She started falling, losing her balance, and repeating the same questions over and over again. She would forget names, or confuse names and people.

The signs were obvious. We just didn’t know how to read them. They were definitely not normal symptoms of aging. Before a crisis occurs, take your spouse or parents to the doctor right away if you even have an inkling of suspicion. And, if you are not satisfied with their answer, get a second opinion. It is imperative that you remain assertive with your loved ones’ health.

Don’t let your ignorance of any disease stop you from getting your parent or spouse the help that they need, right away! That’s the first step, get educated. Second step, move on it. I can’t stress that enough. As our population gets older, diseases such as this one will become more commonplace.

Professional help or going at it alone
As you ask yourself that question, “Where do I begin? “, the first place you should probably consider, is a public service agency. There are many free agencies where you don’t have to pay for their time. We chose the Southern Caregiver Resource Center, located in San Diego, CA where we are.

I consider myself a pretty resourceful person. I “google” just about everything. But even then, I found the center to be a considerable help to both my sister and I. We spoke with a resource manager for a couple of hours and she gave us great information and some tips on how to proceed with our situation. She even put us on a waiting list for free respite care

If you have the money to spend, you may want to consider a Geriatric Care Manager A Geriatric Care Manager is a professional, usually a Social Worker or a Registered Nurse who has a good amount of experience working with seniors and connections with the community. For a fee, normally between $100-400, you will meet with them for approximately 2 hours as they perform an in-depth assessment of your parent/spouse’s situation. They will speak to doctors or nurses (and also staff if your loved one is already in a nursing facility or assisted living) and anyone involved with the care of your loved one. After writing a detailed report, you are provided with suggestions and an action plan to take for your parent/spouse’s ongoing care. Many times, they will follow up with you to see how you are progressing with your loved one’s care.

Unfortunately, for us, we found much of the same information on our own, so the money spent on the care manager would have been better used for something else. This of course, was something my sister had already guessed and thus was a learning experience for me. However, as I mentioned before, I’m the type of person who will spend hours on the internet and library searching for information myself. If you are a busy person, or someone who would rather have someone else take over, I highly recommend setting up an appointment with a Geriatric Care Manager if you find that using a public service may be a little too daunting and disconnecting. After all, stacks of fliers and booklets can make your head spin. It’s a long journey ahead, but finding a good place to start is a step in the right direction and will help get you started.

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