She can get around the house, most of the time without it, but she has balance problems and dizziness. She hates it because she relates it with being old.
MissSuzy, is the walker the type that has no wheels on the front lower section? If so, I can fully understand why so many people refuse to use those types of walkers. One has to lift the front to move about on carpeting, etc.
Once I got my Dad one of those rolling walkers which has hand brakes, 4 wheels, a seat, and a basket, he was so thrilled. He was rolling everywhere, and was so proud of his walker. You'd think I had bought my Dad a Shelby Mustang :)
"Gee, Auntie -- how old do you think you'll look in a wheelchair after you fall and can't even rehab to a walker?"
"Gee, Auntie -- I had no idea you were getting older. I never picked up on the gray hair."
"Gee, Auntie -- No one would think you're old if you were independent and tearing around everywhere with a walker, but they would if you were staggering around, falling, or clutching people's arms to keep from falling."
"Gee, Auntie -- 'Old' is not defined by a number nor a piece of medical equipment, but it can be defined by state of mind, stubbornness, irrational behavior, and acting curmudgeonly."
"Gee, Auntie -- I'm with you -- don't use the walker. Fall and break a hip, THEN see how old you feel."
The gray aluminum walkers that are given out like candy upon a hospital and/or short-term rehab facility don't do the trick. They usually are too low and the person walks head down, bent over, bad posture and it doesn't glide over a lot of services.
I discovered an UpWalker Lite. My mother uses her gray aluminum walker for the bathroom only at night. I invested in good walking shoes since when the elderly get sick their feet size change. I wish health insurance companies would cover shoes, not the robotic kind but the kind that fit for that particular person, rather than all of the toothpaste, cotton balls, etc.
The UpWalker Lite (for some people) can build inner core strength, help with posture and breathing. It can go to the market, fold down fit in the trunk.
There is also a seat on it. People stop us all the time as ask us, I respond my BMW. They laugh...basically I paid $495 with health insurance reimbursing after 10 months of pleading, begging, letters, email. I just looked it up and it's now $595.
Well worth the money for "our situation". Every person is different. A lot of elderly are on blood thinners so you are right in being concerned about falls. I had my mother have services for p/t and o/t for balance.
The UpWalker Lite looks like a piece of exercise equipment as opposed to medical equipment. My mother uses it out in the hallway and chats with the neighbors.
You are so right! I wish we had known about the UpWalker when my mom first begrudgingly bought her first walker. She bought the cheap one at Walmart and never upgraded. She also never modified the height of the handles so she walked stooped and developed further conditions because of her misuse of the walker. A really good walker, properly fitted, would have cost 10 times as much but would have been 100 times better.
"This is your walker. This is how to use it." (Play video with Fats Domino song 'I'm Walkin')
Show and tell: A person with casts on arms and legs and a bruised broken nose because he didn't use his walker.
"This color is dirty green. It is the wall color that you will staring at 24/7 in your rehab room after you fall. For six months or more."
"This is a urinal. This is how to use it."
"This color is mellow yellow, the color of urine in your urinal."
"This is your wife, who will be emptying your urinal if she doesn't run off to Maui with the pool boy after you're incontinent because you didn't go to the urinologist to take care of your humongous prostate."
Numbers: "This is the number 1. That is how many bowel movements you should have every day. This is the number 2. That is what we call a bowel movement. This is the number 3. That is how many aides or grown children it will take to clean you after a bowel movement."
"This is the word GONE. That is what your caregiver will be after 6 months of your complaining and swearing and not taking your meds."
All it will take is for her to have a nasty fall and end up in the hospital and then rehab before she will understand the importance of using her walker. Until then I'm not sure there's much you can do. Sadly, sometimes it takes something bad to happen to someone before they will make the necessary changes to make their life a little better/easier.
FunkyGrandma59, Excellent reply to MissSuzy. For months, I squabbled with both my Mom and Step-Dad about using walkers. I couldn't afford to get the kind with brakes and/or seats, but did get the wheels and slides for the back. I caught my Step-Dad and Mom (even after getting the walkers, doing things without using them. I finally had to warn: "If you fall, I call the EMTs because I can't pick you up without injuring myself. When you go to the hospital, it will be the doctors and social workers who decide IF you get to return home or go into a long-term care facility." It's difficult not to feel guilty making those kind of demands and predictions, but it has to be done to do the "Care for yourself, or you cant care for them". In the end, Dad was falling even using his walker (he passed in February 2022), and since September 2022, Mom fell several times with her walker and "Life Alert". Her falls caused damage to the brain which caused aphasia. In both Mom and Dad's cases, discussions with the social workers and the MDs, resulted in them being placed in Long-term care. I hope MissSuzy can use some of my experience and your advice to make the right choice for her and her Aunt.
A good friend of mine has to walk with a cane now. She has very stylish canes. She actually started collecting beautiful handmade wood carved canes.
She has fibromyalgia and has found some relief from certain meds. She feels like you, that if she has to rely upon a cane at times, it’s going to be stylish!
I can relate! My sweet mom (diagnosed with dementia in 2018) refused to use her doctor recommended walker for MONTHS. We (my Pop and I) decided to keep it with her in the house, even though she refused to use it. It accompanied her when she moved from one activity to another.
Last week, she finally started using it when her fear of falling surpassed her sadness/denial over aging. We also chatted about the walker often, mentioning how much easier it would be to walk if she used the walker.
We were blessed that my mom came around. Normalizing it and watching videos on how to use it may have helped.
In hindsight, I think my mom was hesitant to use it because she wasn't sure she could do it "right". (This is due to her dementia.)
May God bless you with patience and endurance as you care for your aunt.
Telll her a little fib. I was in the same position with my wife. I told her that our med insurànce would drop our coverage if she did not use it. Today she loves the walker.
I am a fairly active and mobile 80-year-old, but sometimes pain or instability make me feel insecure and I am grateful to have a walker to rely on. It is not worth falling and breaking a hip for the sake of false pride.
Getting old is not shameful. Do it as well as you or your aunt are able and do it safely.
Way to go! I also have a walker that I used after a pair of surgeries 6 years ago. My husband and I keep it stored upstairs, out of the way, but readily accessible. When either of us has need of support after a minor injury or during an illness, the walker comes into play again. Why take any chances? We are in our 70's and we have only had to pull the walker out a few times, but we both feel good knowing it is there if we need it.
When my mother was still living I took her to lunch with her friends every Tuesday. It was surprising to me how many of them (all in their 80's and 90's) worried about whether they might seem old. My sisters and I had used walkers or wheelchairs at times because of injuries or surgeries and did not feel at all "old" by using them. We were just doing the smart thing to get our lives back in order.
Now I am approaching my mid-seventies and I get it. When you are middle-aged and using a walker, you are still given the respect and privacy accorded adults in our society. As you age, the more signs of age that are visible, the more people treat you with the condescension and lack of respect that most in society display toward the old. It is all too common for the elderly to be treated like children or as though wrinkles and white hair denote an absence of intelligence. It is embarrassing and annoying.
Of course, the answer is not to avoid using a cane, a walker, or whatever appliance is needed to make the "new normal" of life with an older body a bit easier and safer. The answer is to practice comebacks that will set the offender back a bit and give a reminder that we are adults and much more capable in mind than in body. Ageism is often really extreme in our culture. It should be pointed out as such.
You might try to help your aunt understand that she is the same person with or without the walker and it is up to her to stand proud and independent regardless of whether she uses aids or not. There is also the fact that using a good walker--probably a rollator for your aunt--will allow her to do more and stay stronger for longer.
Excellent answer. Ageism is a form of ignorance and I was waiting for some examples of a quip that would not only retaliate but also educate. Thank you for giving us a perspective that I think is far too often overlooked.
Once I got my Dad one of those rolling walkers which has hand brakes, 4 wheels, a seat, and a basket, he was so thrilled. He was rolling everywhere, and was so proud of his walker. You'd think I had bought my Dad a Shelby Mustang :)
My mom loved that there was storage under the seat of her rolling walker. We called it her trunk. She put her purse in it.
"Gee, Auntie -- I had no idea you were getting older. I never picked up on the gray hair."
"Gee, Auntie -- No one would think you're old if you were independent and tearing around everywhere with a walker, but they would if you were staggering around, falling, or clutching people's arms to keep from falling."
"Gee, Auntie -- 'Old' is not defined by a number nor a piece of medical equipment, but it can be defined by state of mind, stubbornness, irrational behavior, and acting curmudgeonly."
"Gee, Auntie -- I'm with you -- don't use the walker. Fall and break a hip, THEN see how old you feel."
Feel free to use any of the above.
The right "picture words/phrases can go a long way to helping an elder get the point.
The gray aluminum walkers that are given out like candy upon a hospital and/or short-term rehab facility don't do the trick. They usually are too low and the person walks head down, bent over, bad posture and it doesn't glide over a lot of services.
I discovered an UpWalker Lite. My mother uses her gray aluminum walker for the bathroom only at night. I invested in good walking shoes since when the elderly get sick their feet size change. I wish health insurance companies would cover shoes, not the robotic kind but the kind that fit for that particular person, rather than all of the toothpaste, cotton balls, etc.
The UpWalker Lite (for some people) can build inner core strength, help with posture and breathing. It can go to the market, fold down fit in the trunk.
There is also a seat on it. People stop us all the time as ask us, I respond my BMW. They laugh...basically I paid $495 with health insurance reimbursing after 10 months of pleading, begging, letters, email. I just looked it up and it's now $595.
Well worth the money for "our situation". Every person is different. A lot of elderly are on blood thinners so you are right in being concerned about falls. I had my mother have services for p/t and o/t for balance.
The UpWalker Lite looks like a piece of exercise equipment as opposed to medical equipment. My mother uses it out in the hallway and chats with the neighbors.
I hope I was of some help.
"This is your walker. This is how to use it." (Play video with Fats Domino song 'I'm Walkin')
Show and tell: A person with casts on arms and legs and a bruised broken nose because he didn't use his walker.
"This color is dirty green. It is the wall color that you will staring at 24/7 in your rehab room after you fall. For six months or more."
"This is a urinal. This is how to use it."
"This color is mellow yellow, the color of urine in your urinal."
"This is your wife, who will be emptying your urinal if she doesn't run off to Maui with the pool boy after you're incontinent because you didn't go to the urinologist to take care of your humongous prostate."
Numbers: "This is the number 1. That is how many bowel movements you should have every day. This is the number 2. That is what we call a bowel movement. This is the number 3. That is how many aides or grown children it will take to clean you after a bowel movement."
"This is the word GONE. That is what your caregiver will be after 6 months of your complaining and swearing and not taking your meds."
Etc.
He never moved out of his modest home even after becoming successful.
He was a really sweet guy and it was fun to watch him perform.
Sadly, sometimes it takes something bad to happen to someone before they will make the necessary changes to make their life a little better/easier.
I'd personally have some 80's bright coloured streamers off the handlebars & spoke lights 😁
A good friend of mine has to walk with a cane now. She has very stylish canes. She actually started collecting beautiful handmade wood carved canes.
She has fibromyalgia and has found some relief from certain meds. She feels like you, that if she has to rely upon a cane at times, it’s going to be stylish!
Last week, she finally started using it when her fear of falling surpassed her sadness/denial over aging. We also chatted about the walker often, mentioning how much easier it would be to walk if she used the walker.
We were blessed that my mom came around. Normalizing it and watching videos on how to use it may have helped.
In hindsight, I think my mom was hesitant to use it because she wasn't sure she could do it "right". (This is due to her dementia.)
May God bless you with patience and endurance as you care for your aunt.
Getting old is not shameful. Do it as well as you or your aunt are able and do it safely.
Now I am approaching my mid-seventies and I get it. When you are middle-aged and using a walker, you are still given the respect and privacy accorded adults in our society. As you age, the more signs of age that are visible, the more people treat you with the condescension and lack of respect that most in society display toward the old. It is all too common for the elderly to be treated like children or as though wrinkles and white hair denote an absence of intelligence. It is embarrassing and annoying.
Of course, the answer is not to avoid using a cane, a walker, or whatever appliance is needed to make the "new normal" of life with an older body a bit easier and safer. The answer is to practice comebacks that will set the offender back a bit and give a reminder that we are adults and much more capable in mind than in body. Ageism is often really extreme in our culture. It should be pointed out as such.
You might try to help your aunt understand that she is the same person with or without the walker and it is up to her to stand proud and independent regardless of whether she uses aids or not. There is also the fact that using a good walker--probably a rollator for your aunt--will allow her to do more and stay stronger for longer.
Thank you for giving us a perspective that I think is far too often overlooked.