My mother in law is I think someone put it as actively dieing. We are very near the end for her now having alzheimers and dementia for about 4 years diagnosed but took a dreadful turn for the worse after a fall last September.
Up until that fall she was still bumberling around the house, eating us out of yogurt and annoying the cat but after the fall she broke her hip and her capacity was MIA.
Her wish was to come home. So we faught with everyone to make that happen and her front room was turned into a bedroom and all necessary hospital furniture was delivered. Mum came home with a care package and carers come 4 times a day to do the heavy lifting as it were then hubby and I do meds and food. It hasn’t been easy since last November and at times we have felt that they have shoved us out of hospital, waved us goodbye and left us too it and this makes what I’ve found out heartbreaking.
We’ve had the district nurses involved for the last week or so as mum is nearing the end. Mum was quite ill one night and we were stuck as we didn’t know who to call as we had never been given like an emergency check list and it was night so we ended up calling 111 for advice and they sent out lovely a paramedic team who helped out and sent an email to everyone they could think of so we could get help for mum. That’s how the district nurses came into our lives. They came and sorted out mums pain relief and then looked at her paperwork and asked questions about why was she not getting this or that or something else and here’s the annoying part.
Mum had a folder that the carers had put together with everything about her. In there were her discharge papers from hospital. On these it basically said mum was due palliative care as soon as she left hospital. In other words we would have been under the care of the district nurses from day 1. JIC meds would be in the house from the start instead of the chaos that occurred trying to get hold of them one evening. We would have had support instead of feeling abandoned. Bed soars would have been delt with sooner. 8 months would have been much easier to cope with knowing that they were there and they had our backs.
I want to go and shout at someone but I don’t know who to go and shout at- any ideas???. There must be others in this situation who do not know what they are entitled to and are struggling. Mum is currently still here but this is her last few days and with thanks to the district nurses they will be pain free and she gets her wishes granted of being able to die at home.
So at this moment in time I’m sad as I watch my mother in law take her last breaths but I’m hopping mad as we could have had extra care for her and not 8 months of second guessing ourselves to if we were doing the right thing. If anyone does know the person I can go and shout at then please feel free to comment. Thanks for reading. 