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Hi all. Well, my sweet mama fell on Thursday evening and broke her humerus in dominant arm. She also bruised her face as her head struck the wall. We are very fortunate there was no internal bleed as she is on Eloquis twice daily. Aside from breaking my heart to see her in pain I am really afraid she might not be able to come home again after this incident. She turned 94 on Monday and although I definitely feel overwhelmed being her live in and primary care giver but boy does the thought of mama not coming home make me incredibly sad. I feel awful when I leave her each day at the rehab. We have been in rehab before but with each incident my anxiety gets higher as she is getting older and more frail. I simply cannot afford to cut back my hours any more than I already have and am really worried as this is a major setback for her. Anyone had similar experience? How did things work out?

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I'm sorry about your Mom's injury. Last summer (July 2021) my Mom (92) fell and broke her wrist of her dominant hand. She lives mostly independently next door to me. The doc reset her wrist and said if she were much younger he would recomomend surgery for it, but was concerned that at her age the surgery itself had enough risks that probably outweighed the benefit.

She recovered at home and after the removal of the cast, it took the pain several more months to subside. She was going to PT to try to regain strength and movement. She did her exercises faithfully as she was very motivated to return to "normal".

Honestly it is hard to know what is now normal aging or what is a result of the injury. She also has arthritis in her hands and other parts of her body. She needs help getting lids off jars, zipping up, tieing her shoes, things like that. She still drives, does yardwork and housecleaning, etc.

At our Moms' ages recovery takes so much longer and can be discouraging. Normal age-related decline is hidden in the mix, so I don't think anyone can give you an accurate answer to your question because it all depends on the individual.

I highly recommend she do PT faithfully and keep reminding her to be patient about how long it takes for her recovery. If she simply lost her balance and fell, I'd have PT work on that as well (my Mom was doing performing an unusual maneuver while wearing flipflops and moving backwards, then tripped over the shoes). Chances are your Mom won't get back to where she was before her fall but she may get close. I wish you both all the best!
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My father-in-law (94) is in this situation right now. He broke his leg last month after a fall. He is returning home from rehab today, not exactly against medical advice, but not with full blessing either.

I'm expecting it to be a disaster but I'll let you know.

Your mom may do much better considering it was just her arm, but will need significantly more help.
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drowningcat Oct 2022
Thank you and please keep me posted. Well wishes for your FIL.
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Only YOU know if you can care for mom at home anymore after this last incident. Do you feel like mom is safe alone at home while you work? If not, can she afford to hire caregivers while you aren't there? If the answer is yes, then that solves the issue and you can let the staff in the hospital/rehab know you have your bases covered for her return home. If you feel that you're unable to properly care for her at home any longer, there's no shame in admitting such a thing.

When my dad was 91, he fell at home in his independent living apartment and broke his hip (refusing to use a walker). After the hospital surgically repaired his hip, he was sent to rehab where he made no progress; Medicare stopped paying for his stay and they insisted he stay there permanently in their long term care (Skilled Nursing) section of the facility. I said no b/c mom was alive and they needed to stay together. So I found them both an Assisted Living facility to live in together, and with PT, dad started to make some progress. But he had a brain tumor (that was discovered during an MRI after the fall) and that wound up killing him 10 months later. His broken hip turned out to be a major setback indeed, but mostly b/c he had a brain tumor and never was able to walk again afterward.

What's important with your mom is that she can make the necessary progress in rehab TO come back home. If so, great. If not, then you can discuss alternatives, such as hiring in home help to be there with her when you aren't.

Wishing you and mom the best of luck and a full recovery for her.
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Hi and thanks so much for your feedback. I am glad your mother is doing so much better with the wrist recovered and living her new normal. And yes, it is hard to discern when normal aging is the culprit. My mama lived alone until a few months ago and I ran back and forth between my house and hers. Now that I live with her some things are easier but others are harder. Basically, my mama can only be on her feet for a few minutes at the time due to degenerative disc disease and arthritis. She does have balance issues and is supposed to use her walker when moving around the house. However, recently she has been leaving the walker and maneuvering around by holding onto furniture, the wall, etc. Literally had just gave her a pep talk about how frustrating it must be to need the walker but that it keeps her safe. A few hours later I found her on the floor by the back door - her walker was around in the kitchen. :(

She will do rehabilitation at the facility for a 3-4 weeks and then hopefully home again.
I have a meeting with her treatment team tomorrow morning to discuss treatment plan, expectations and so forth.

I hope your mom continues to be as independent as possible and stays healthy!
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Cause and affect may be telling you that if she does not use her walker then she will fall again. Are there any more safeties that you will put in place when she returns. Will someone be watching and reminding her daily? You feel guilty now but what about when she does this again on your watch.
Personally, I feel that she needs many more eyes on her, either in AL or even MC since the pep talks may be beyond her reasoning.
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Cat, this depends entirely on the individual, strength, determination, support and other factors.

My father fell and broke his hip at age 94, second fall and broken hip on the other side at age 96. He fell a few more times, but no broken ones. He was slender, about 135 pounds until the last month or so. He died at age 96.5.

He was a Vet, and I'm sure that made a difference.
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My grandma, at age 94, fell and broke BOTH wrists. Any major bone breakage at 90+ is serious.

She was in a rehab facility for about 6 weeks, then mom tried to take her home. That lasted less than a week.

She ASKED to be moved to a NH near her condo. She never went back to her condo, instead, she decided she was now going to die. She was really organized that way. While there, she slowly began the final slip.

Mom and I cleaned and sorted her condo, Gma was very much in charge. It felt so weird to be packing all her stuff away when she was still alive, but she was planning to die, and by golly, she did.

If she had WANTED to heal and go back home, I am sure she would have. But she was DONE.
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My 92 yr old mother fell and broke her hip. After surgery she went to rehab where she didn’t put any effort into physical therapy. She wanted to go home so we told her she needed to really work at getting stronger if she wanted to go home. Still no effort so when her insurance paid time in rehab ended she went to a NH. We talked with the PT and OT and they definitely pushed her to do therapy but finally told me they thought she had plateaued and couldn’t do more. The hip healed completely but she just gave up and she passed away yesterday. She was there 2 months. Encourage your mom to really do the rehab and keep her spirits up and there’s a chance she’ll come home. I’ll pray for both of you. ❤️
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In January 2020, my mother who was then 92 years old, fell off of a chair and broke her left hip.

She (and me) were in the hospital for 8 days and she came back home with me instead of going into a rehab facility.

She began physical therapy twice each week, and I also worked with her daily to regain her strength and mobility.

She healed amazingly and is still going strong at 95.
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My 97 year old grandmother broke her leg after falling out of her recliner while reaching for the phone. She was in rehab for two weeks and then sent home. She did very well on her own with a wheelchair but finally allowed someone to come in to help with cooking and cleaning (her insurance covered it because she went on hospice) -- she did pass away shortly after her 100th birthday, but it had nothing to do with breaking her leg.

I think the most important thing is for your Mom to literally use her whole body (I don't mean working out, I mean physical therapy and daily activities of living) while she is recovering. My father passed away Aug 31 -- end stage heart failure and kidney failure; his visiting nurse explained that the problem was that he lost pretty much all mobility a few weeks before the end. Our organs and vascular systems require physical activity.

Final note: I would speak to her surgeon or PCP about helping her remain physically active, if you can. Also please bear in mind that Tylenol can do wonders for pain without the negative effects of a pain medication.

I'm so sorry you're going through this. It's hard to grieve the loss of a parent while they are still alive but as my father told me several years ago, this may be the hardest part. And you will be ok. It's going to be OK.

Take care,

Rachel
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Sorry what happened to your mother. Mother needs to be placed into an AL or NH so you can get back to full-time work. Sadly, we may all face aging care needs if we live that long.
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Talk to her doctor about this. If she heals well and does the rehab to regain her strength, she could return home. Consider getting some counseling for yourself to cope with your feelings of sadness and feelings of being overwhelmed as a caregiver. Try to take some breaks for yourself so that you can recharge and feel energized when she comes home. All the best to you and your mom!
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See what happens during PT and OT. Talk to them about her progress. Encourage her to progress during PT and when you visit let her do as much as she can for herself.
When my Husband slipped and fell and fractured his hip and had surgery and went to rehab I was worried about how well he would do, his dementia was pretty advanced at that time. I worried that I would not be able to bring him home after that.
I went every day and encouraged and helped during PT and OT (I actually gave them ideas how to work with him.)
(One of the things I would do is I would sit on his walker and he would push me around! One day the walker stopped moving and I thought he was just looing out the window and when I looked up he was no where near the walker, he went back to his room and just left me in the hall!)
See how she adjusts and then make a decision as to your and her next step will be.
BUT do begin to make the "What if" plans. Those plans should be in place anyway because you never know what is going to happen.
If she needs a bit more PT than is covered can she spend a bit more time private pay to get the therapy she needs? Or is there a place that does more intensive PT that she can transfer to now?
If she has to come home can she pay caregivers to come in and help out where and when needed?
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I am actually more worried for you than your mother. It sounds like she already isn't doing much for herself. Your profile also makes it sound like you are fairly enmeshed. You needing to work and her seemingly not capable of being left alone are a bad combination. Can you use her income to pay caregivers in the home for at least part of the day? Right now receiving treatment in rehab and getting the pain under control is much more important than her coming home (in her current condition). I would focus on that for now, one thing at a time. If you decide to bring her back home at the end of it, look into getting some help.
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My Moms story was similar but we made different choices. She was a vibrant 98 year old who fell at the bathroom threshold and broke her dominant arm. I'll spare the details but she was in the hospital for almost a week during Covid - without visitors - and crying on the phone for me every night. I couldn't bear to send her to rehab and had her brought home by ambulance. She was in pain, but happy to be home and it for me it was a ton of work. But after a day or two she started to have problems breathing and she was gone within the week. Would this have happened in rehab anyway? The answer is uncertain.Another person would have said I absolutely did the wrong thing by taking her home. I do have many regrets yet having her home where she wasn't stressed out emotionally wasn't one of them. I adored my mom, and miss her every single day.
I wrote this to say you have to go with your gut, because we don't really have the final say over life and death. In advanced age, anything can happen at any time. Just by reading other's stories here, you can see the endings vary. You know your Mom better than anyone else - do what you feel is the right thing to do, and prepare yourself to live with the outcome. I wish you and Mom a happy outcome!
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robert152 Oct 2022
You did what you thought was right at the time . You did it with love in your heart. You cannot do more then that. You are a good daughter.
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You have to do what is right for Mother. Not you.

It may be hard on you to have her in rehab or another living situation, but it will be 10x harder on mother if she doesn’t get the help she needs.

I don’t mean to sound cold, but mother probably doesn’t have many years left. She’s lived a long life and you’ve taken great care of her! But you can’t ‘die’ with her when she does pass away. There’s no real way to prepare for this inevitability, but try to weave more of you and your interests into this life now.
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I'm so sorry to hear that your mom fell with residual injuries - I hear how it's emotional painful for you to see her go thru that. I wish her a full recovery and an easy healing process.

My grandmother passed about 20 years ago, but I remember her still working in my uncle's office at 91 yrs old - which she enjoyed...and one day, she took a fall in the office's parking lot - she bruised her face, like your mom did - and she had broken her wrist. Thankfully, she had a full recovery - physical therapy and a lot of rest and a home aide in her apartment - and for safety reasons, my uncle decided that she should stop working - my grandmother actually filed for unemployment benefits at 91 years old and when the attendant asked if they found suitable employment for her, would she consider still working - and she said an enthusiastic YES! That really kept her going.

She passed at 96 yrs old, but the years that she was working actually kept her much more vibrant, and having purpose, while being in a large office building filled with everyone referring to her as "ma"! She became very bored during her retirement. So, every situation is very different - and it, of course, depends on your mom's health and recovery status in order to make the best decision for her...and to accommodate what her health needs are. It's a very individual and personal decision, and also based on whether you can arrange any type of in-home aides to help support her and provide more relief for you. Also, there are some excellent rehabs that make a tremendous difference and improvement - maybe you can try to shift your mindset while she's in rehab by considering that your mom is being properly cared for in order to best support her healing.
Very best wishes and prayers for a very positive outcome ~
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Patathome01 Oct 2022
Ther is a saying, she "Died in her boots". God Bless your grandmother for a long happy life.
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My almost 92 year old mother fell in April and also broke her humorous resulting in the need for a complete shoulder replacement. Trust me, I know the anxiety you're going through. After 6 weeks at her house with her and the doctors saying she couldn't be alone while she recovered, my fiancé and I decided to bring her to our home in another state because we needed to get home and take care of our stuff. We were assured that if she could get back to how she was getting about prior to her fall (doing everything with the help of a walker) she could again live alone. She is now at that point and we are taking her home after Thanksgiving. However, if she has another fall I intend to have her start living at an assisted living facility because my fiance and I both work as does my brother and his wife. So, yes, it is possible but you need to have a plan in place for the next thing that happens, which, unfortunately will eventually happen. Best of luck to you and hang in there.
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100% possible! My mom is now 93. At age 88, she broke her right hip. Returned home after surgery & three weeks of rehab. Since then, she has broken her femur, humerus, and most recently, the other hip! Each time there were surgical repairs done and 2-3 weeks spent in short term rehab, following by visiting PT provided by her insurance. The only problem is, is that with each fall/break, it seems to slow her down more (understandably), and she is more frail and low energy. However she is still enjoying life at home— eating well, fully alert and aware, and doing ok for her age of 93! She is in a wheelchair but uses walker to take a few steps with my assistance, in order to transfer from bed to wheelchair, wheelchair to commode, etc. Wishing you good luck and sending best wishes!
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If you are not a stay-at-home person, it really is dangerous to leave mom home alone. You might want to make an appointment with a Geriatric Psychologist who can help you sort through all your emotions and refer you to a Psychiatrist if medication would help.

If Mom is just down the road at a facility that can help protect her while you're not there, that is a bonus for mom. Wearing a helmet and other protective gear may extend her life, but death is inevitable and that's where you might benefit from Grief Therapy (letting go is never easy when you love someone). You can keep your hours and income and still make time to visit and dine with her: finding balance is the key to success.
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Since she broke an arm, there is no reason why she can't move from rehab back home. She needs to work hard to regain flexibility and strength in the injured arm in rehab. She will most likely also need to use a walker or cane(s) for stability from now on - another skill to work on in rehab.
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Patathome01 Oct 2022
However, at least a companion should be with her for her safety..
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I'd vote no on bringing her home because she might come home too prematurely. At a rehab facility, they have lots of equipment, and with the rehabs I've dealt with for family members, they work them hard. In the long run, that's beneficial, though the patient may not like it and may complain at the time. In-home PT didn't compare AT ALL with what the facility offered. As for your being the live-in caregiver with her in such a frail state, it doesn't seem as if your caregiving hours will decrease. They'll probably increase, and you can't afford more time off work. Try to consider every day that she can stay at rehab a blessing for both of you. Hope that she gets stronger as a result of being there, and keep having her evaluated by the staff for possibility of return home. Good luck to both of you.
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my 99 yr. old mother fell in Mar. 2021 and broke her ankle in two places. She was in the hospital for several days. The hopital orthopedic doctor did not want to do surgery - made no effort to "set" the bones even though it was a clean break. She was sent to a "rehab" facility where no rehab took place. This was the height of covid and I was not allowed to visit or to be her advocate. When her medicare days ran out she came home - to her own home - refusing help. She is now 101 and is in constant pain from the ankle but she still can do the ADL's . She is still as fiesty as ever......so it would appear that it totally depends upon the person.
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My mother broke her leg last January. It healed, she was in PT for months, but she did not regain her pre-morbid mobility. Yes, your mother can recover and come home but don't expect everything to be just as it was before. She likely had a concussion, which may or may not resolve on its own or fully.
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drowningcat: My late mother broke her femur one month shy of turning 80 years old. At the time, she was employed in a full time job and had to retire. Only you will know if you can continue to provide care for your mother in your home. If not, perhaps then your sweet mom will have to opt for residence in a managed care facility.
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My FIL is 94 and broke his hip during a fall, came home without rehab and fell again. It has been 5 months and he is doing great. His only concession is he agreed to a hospital bed and a cane. He is very highly motivated.

Best wishes!
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My mother broke her femur at age 83 and had a metal rod the length of the bone inserted to reinforce it. Rehab was tough but she came home after about 6 weeks. She still needed a lot of assistance in the house every day though. Now 85, she broke both bones in her right arm just above her wrist. They didn't have her go to rehab but instead she came right home from the surgical center. Again she needed a significant amount of daily help. Fortunately we live side by side and I am home with an ill spouse anyway. You definitely will have to find a way to provide assistance with ADLs to bring her home. Another key point is how seriously the patient works their PT program to regain full use. But this doesn't have to be the end of her independence if you and she don't want it to be.
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My Dad broke his hip, went to rehab and came home at age 95 because that was most important to us. We were able to get aides to help him so the burden wasn’t on one person.
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My dear little Mom broker her hip in her very late 90s. She was in rehab 2 weeks then went home. Her surgeon was amazed how fast she healed.
It was a uti that finally ended her stint on earth though, her weakened immune system could not cope. So guess it just depends on the person and their own health.
But yes it is possible so here's hoping a full recovery for your loved one.
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My grandmother, then 81, broke her hip, went to rehab and returned to living alone, using a walker (this was in 1965, at the very beginning of Medicare).
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