Caregivers behaving badly.

There is nothing better than a gift of love and sharing. Having the gift delivered is also a very nice touch.
Have tried to arrange a visit for dH to his family, but they won't take him!

LoraLee, I was only able to go through with it as I know my sister has the time & ability to care for my Mom. I need the break SO badly!

That's perfect!! I wish I could do the same for my brother :)

My sister moved out of state 20 years ago, leaving me alone to care for our parents. Dad died 8 years ago, so I'm now the sole caregiver for Mom, who is 85y.o. & has dementia. We have no other family living in this state. My sister often calls & whines about how it's "so unfair" that I'm the one who "gets to" take care of Mom! Mom also fusses about how she wants to fly up there & see my sister more often than we've been doing so every 2 years. (When we do visit, my sister begins complaining by the 2nd day about what a pain in the a** Mom can be!). Well, I decided to be a bit naughty... I bought our Mom round-trip tickets to fly up to visit for 2 weeks, paid a friend of ours to fly with her as an escort, mailed my sister enough $$ to cover Mom's expenses during her visit, then called my Sister with the wonderful news! I told her it was a special birthday gift from me!

Go Lora - thats my kind of gal!

This may be wrong thread for that, but for me, that would be bad behavior lol

I just recently (4 months) moved mom in with me. I want to go through the rest of her stuff in the basement and hang her pictures and tell her she must have forgotten she told me to go ahead!!!

Bring the bleach in the shower.

What about wearing a pink bra and black panties, in the shower, would that work?

Now that's a novel idea. Sleep in the shower, dine in the shower. Maybe even do your business in the shower? Hmmm.............could work. I might consider that myself.

My Mother wouldn't get into the shower unless she had on her pink panties and black bra.....

A nice naked lunch!Why not?!!

Should have named this thread, "Care-recipients Misbehaving Badly".

Just move her into the shower/loo/now dinng area for good? Put a t.v. in there too?

So today is shower day WITH hair wash. Now showers aren't so much of a problem - I sorta learned how to do that relatively easily. But hair washing - Hmmm she doesn't like it I don't like and I ALWAYS get drenched.

Now I also always check mum is awake enough to have a shower. A fall in a shower whilst getting into or out if the seat could be pretty drastic. This morning she wasn't fine but this afternoon yep wanted the shower and hair wash well would allow the hair wash. Got her into shower did everything I needed to and then just as she was getting out she decided to sit down for goodness sake.

Not a fall but a sit down. Are you on strike I asked or is this a sit down protest?
Im still waiting for my dinner...yeah right.....so I let her sit there and got her a sandwich ....which she promptly ate and then was able - with a lot of help - to get up. Sometimes it is easier to go with the flow except that I have now done the back in....perhaps I should just not shower her and get someone in to do it - oh lawdy she would hate that - hmmmm must make arrangements for that then!

MsMadge, Wherever you put it-I am guessing the toilet, that makes you a brat too, albeit a tired one. Lol!
Congrats your bratness!

Just posting to put this up top - it's too hot today to be a brat

Worked an 11 hour day yesterday and got to mom's memory care late to find her in bed in her clothes - took her potty and get her ready for bed but could tell she wasn't going to go back to sleep

Regular evening nurse was off and sub said she already had her meds early with my private caregiver which sounded odd so a late nite text to my caregiver who said no not even Tylenol so back down the hall who grudgingly checks med cart and says oh here they are

So back down the hall and now mom is in the hall in her diaper saying her roommate is going to kill her and she won't go back in her room - took another 45 minutes to settle her down including me lying in bed with her so she'd fall asleep

seems staff left a walkie talkie in mom's room and she could hear them all talking but didn't see anyone and it freaked her out

Guess where I put that walkie talkie?

My brother finally stepped up after four months and said he would keep an eye on dad's diapers. Came back from work, soiled diaper. I chucked it in my brothers bed. Just like I do when I find cherry pits on the couch or other offenses after cleaning all week. Into the bed, shut door. Oddly he never says anything. Next time maybe i won't wrap it but leave it wide open and place it strategically. Or on top of his pillow.

Brat-Laureate, Jude.

Luckulu, You have,proved the conspiracy theory that none of the cat scans, mammograms, and MRI's are actually done at all-it is,all fake, and the results are faked too. Lol.

Was that over the top?

Mom had a "Thing" about her hair...When she had a catscan oor MRI, I put Mother's snood on and I didn't take out the bobby pins like they told me to and none of the pins blew through Mom's head...is that a brat move?

Brat poem

I have a brand new lovely car
It is my pride and joy
We bought it to get mum around
So its partially her toy

Today the sun shone brightly
So I suggested we go out
Lets go by the foreshore
Her yes was nearly a shout

Now do you need the loo I said
As you would asked a rather small child
NO I DONT And don't ask me again
Oh Gosh I have made her wild
AGAIN

Now the shore is about 2 minutes away
With cafe and facilities nearby
Just tell me why she had to 5H1T herself
Tell me why oh why

So I took her to the disabled loo
And there I cleaned creamed and changed her
She was very cross with me
Because she seemed to think Id made her
POO!

Well I was mad and rightly so
And perhaps this story should stay untold
But it did rather make me smile
When the only water I could use was COLD

200 brat postings-so encouraging-hope this thread is helping lighten a load.

Not evil at all Kimber. Just real, dealing with reality.
Humans at every stage of life are held accountable for their actions.
In my opinion only, and in certain cases, when a patient's behaviors become detrimental to the health and safety of another person, this cannot continue.
I don't have the answers, but somebody will.

I hope I didn't come across as too evil!!! My dad is housebound physically, but his mind is clear and he knows what he is doing. His reward for better behavior was going for long drives in the country so he could see the crops and lakes. His reward for not throwing food was his favorites for lunch and dinner.

In my heart of hearts I do feel sort of guilty for my brat behavior, but my stepmom had a good laugh and said not to feel bad.

Anyway - I'm not condoning abuse. I just felt that a grown man who deliberately pushes buttons should reap some "rewards" for doing so. THat being said, I told my stepmom I just can't keep doing the weekends - my son's activities are stepping up, & I get so ANGRY. Bless all of you out there that take this abuse E V E R Y S I N G L E D A Y.

I have passed through fear and guilt to defiance and made a breakthrough: I have started throwing books away. Not giving them away. Not donating them. No! - this is along the lines of Dorothy Parker: "this book should not be tossed aside lightly, but hurled with great force."

It started with a police procedural (mother was big on crime fiction) - successful TV series, much acclaimed, brilliant reviews. And, excuse me, but even making allowances for my tolerance threshold being already low because of mother's edits and corrections every other page - far more irritating than the errors themselves would have been - this book is TRASH. It is rubbish! Four hours that robbed me of. I will not inflict it on another.

Next was an Aldous Huxley. I don't care how bloody celebrated he is, I never much cared for 'Brave New World' and this next work, can't even remember its name, hit the bin halfway through the first chapter.

And at last I've worked my way up to a hardback. By someone called Llewellyn, a tale of international finance, espionage and assassination. Chapter 3, I have absolutely no idea what is going on or who all these people are, but you won't blame me: I quote...

"I went into the beam-ceilinged bar, hooked with hams, warm in smells of casks and a generous kitchen, candles on tables, shining on bottles and racks of glasses, and in the barmaid's wedding ring. But I - in that recurrently terrifying dream - saw another, narrower, of diamonds, heard a magnificent basso choir, walked through a church blazing in the stained-glass palette of the Caribbean sun, sniffed a bouquet of lilies of the valley, felt Consuelo's fragrant pliancy, knew, held, crushed."

Is Consuelo ever a girl's name anywhere? Consuela, surely? But that aside, there are another 300 pages like this and the decade is drawing to its close. See this book sail through the air and into the waste paper basket. The crime was the writing style and the mystery was how it ever got published. Solved it now though!

Thank you Phoenixdaughter for that prison lesson-I have never seen the comparison published before. Makes one wonder, doesn't it?
I do think you will have more options open up to you other than breaking your promise to your Dad, or anyone going to prison. For starters, can you access the respite program again until you are feeling better? I recall, I hope correctly, when your Mum was in hospital/rehab, she was improved?
Song" "I promise you Dad, not to go to prison, cause Mum would have to go too!"

Not only did Kimber handle her week on duty with aplomb, but she has also paved the way for her Dad to appreciate her stepmother a heck of a lot more when she gets back! Win win, I'd say.

Oh wow, Kimber! You would make an excellent prison guard. Your actions exemplify the concept of behavior modification. This technique, if used, may work on some parents. In dementia and alzheimers, the patient might forget the next day, but will also forget they hate you for it, maybe. Or, if they hate you, didn't they do that already?

Also, for any too too soft-hearted daughters out there, this behavior modification stops short of mean or abusive. I am going to have tuna sandwiches today too, because I like them.

Kimber, I am not authorized to give Brat Awards, but how about it peeps, wasn't she a good Brat?

Brat episode 2 - I recently took care of my dad for a hellish week so step mom could go away. 4th night no sleep - he will yell, turn the TV up really loud, etc to chap my a$$ so I won't let step mom go away - I marched into the TV room, took the remote away, turned off the TV and didn't give his remote back for 1 and a half days. NO COWBOY shows, or movies until my stepmom returned. Boy was he mad, BUT, his behavior settled down somewhat. I also served tuna salad sandwiches - which HE HATES but I like, because the previous days lunch was thrown on the floor. and I told him that tuna salad was all he was going to get until he stopped throwing food. I think he hated me after that visit. Feeling is mutual. But boy did it feel great to be a brat.

Naughty me in my teenage years - I ordered a sex toy for the evil pastor's wife and had it delivered to the church office. Secretary opened it. heee hheee. Gossip all over town,.