Care Options For Dementia-Interview with Barbara Lambert

Welcome To Patty's Place

SPEAKER_00
0:09

Welcome to Patty's Place, a place where we're going to talk about grief, dementia, and caregiving. I started this podcast in honor of my mom, Pat, who passed away from dementia about two and a half years ago. I want this to be a place where you know you're not alone and we can talk about those difficult subjects. I'm your host, Lisa. So uh grab your cup of tea, your cup of coffee. If you're having a really bad day, that glass of wine, and come join us today.

Meeting A Senior Care Advocate

SPEAKER_00
0:31

So I'm excited. Today we have uh Barbara Lambert. She is the founder of Home to Home for Seniors and a Trusted Advocate for Families who suddenly find themselves searching for care and have no idea where to begin. Welcome, Barbara, to Patty's place.

SPEAKER_01
0:45

Thank you, Patty. I'm honored to be here today.

SPEAKER_00
0:48

So this is such a big, overwhelming topic. So that's why I'm excited to talk about you. So where does somebody even start with this, with their loved one?

SPEAKER_01
1:01

So unfortunately, you know, dementia doesn't come with any announcement. Creeps in to somebody's life and everything seems fine until all of a sudden it's not. So generally it's little things that they start to notice, and then things start to get greater and greater and greater to the point that you know nothing is how it used to be anymore, nothing is normal. And um, you know, it starts with the small changes and then it just speeds up.

SPEAKER_00
1:29

So, what led you to start this foundation?

SPEAKER_01
1:33

So

The Nursing Home Comment That Stung

SPEAKER_01
1:34

years ago, um, my grandma was living with my mom and they could no longer do the care. They had tried many, many things, and she was up all night and having hallucinations. And so they eventually wound up moving her into the nursing home. And I didn't live in the same town, but I would drive there, I was about an hour away to visit her. And sometimes I would go and she'd have on the same clothing, the same food stains. And I thought, geez, there's you know, they're not caring for her. And so I went to the administrator and told him I was concerned, and he said, you know what? If you want us to care for your grandma like you would, then take her home.

SPEAKER_00
2:18

Oh my god.

SPEAKER_01
2:20

I still shake my head in disbelief at the his words, yeah. And so I thought, no, no granddaughter, no mother, no son, no wife, no friend should ever have to hear take her home as an option for good care. Yeah. So I decided to advocate for seniors and be that person that finds them the good care. Because I, you know, everybody's going to tell you they can do the care, but through experience, you know, we find who really can and who can't.

SPEAKER_00
2:52

It's very true. And it's very overwhelming for the family member to try to find the right place because you have memory care and you have assisted living and you have skilled nursing homes, and you don't know where the right place is for somebody. Right. Uh with it.

SPEAKER_01
3:10

That's what I help them figure out. They they don't need another AI, no, they don't need another Google to help them and add to the confusion. They need a guide that knows the terrain. And that's what we do.

SPEAKER_00
3:22

Yeah, because when I had a joke for my mom, because um well, and it was during COVID, so that added even more to it. Um so but I was like, they were like, you're not gonna be able to take care of her, and I was like, Oh, oh, okay, you know, and I was like looking for memory care, and not all facilities have memory care either for dementia patients, so you you have to look for that as well. And and it became more about her safety than and obviously good care as well, too. And for my dad and I, we wanted her to be close so that we could be there all the time, too, uh, with it.

When Home Care Stops Being Safe

SPEAKER_00
4:01

So, what does appropriate care mean for someone living with dementia?

SPEAKER_01
4:06

So, appropriate care is care that can meet the ongoing and ever-changing needs of somebody with dementia. And a caregiver alone, I would say most often, more often than not, can't carry that load.

SPEAKER_00
4:22

No.

SPEAKER_01
4:22

And that's a that's a big mistake people make. And so they wind up giving care out of guilt rather than love. And so the person winds up getting compromised care because somebody can't make room in their head that it's okay to hand off the care when it's beyond what you can do. And most of us are not trained for what's coming down the road with dementia care.

SPEAKER_00
4:46

I would agree with that 100%. So, what do you say to some to someone who says, I'd never put my loved one in a home?

SPEAKER_01
4:55

Well, that's denying somebody some some care that they may need. If the care, if it's beyond the caregiver's skill level, where are you gonna put them? What are you gonna do? Right. What if they're up all night? What if they're leaving the house and wandering and getting lost? Where are you gonna put them?

SPEAKER_00
5:11

Right, or they're falling when you run out of it.

SPEAKER_01
5:15

Yeah, yeah. So falls, things can force a change if you know there's falls, if there's constant dehydration issues, constant hospital calls, EMS calls. Unfortunately, they're there to help, but they're also there to enforce to make sure this person gets the care. So that could also lead to social services coming in and helping intervene. And a lot of times it's it's the family guilt that is very hard to make room for that, you know, you're not cheating them out of care, you're getting them the care that they need that you're not skilled to give.

SPEAKER_00
5:51

Exactly. And there are some people that, you know, they didn't mean to say that to me. Uh, and and I would always say, because it it was probably the hardest thing I ever did was having to take my mom there and leave her there. It was horrible. It's very emotional. It was horrible. And I knew she was in the right place. I knew I was doing the right thing for her. Like you said, I knew I couldn't take care of her the way she needed to be taken care of, but it was horrible. The guilt, you know, and in the end, she I I made peace with it because she was I knew we found the right place for her. You know, like she after a little bit, she didn't know any, she didn't even know she had never been there. She thought it was her grandma's house.

SPEAKER_01
6:37

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00
6:37

Uh with it.

SPEAKER_01
6:38

And that that's helpful to the family when they're feeling yeah good about living. So, you know, somebody looking in from the outside and pointing the fingers, it's like someone telling you you're raising your kids wrong.

SPEAKER_00
6:49

Yeah, yeah, that's true. I didn't thought about that. Yeah.

SPEAKER_01
6:52

You know, no one's in your shoes. Nobody's there behind the closed doors and sees what's going on at 2 a.m. to 5 a.m. that nobody's sleeping and well, because there's arguments going on.

SPEAKER_00
7:03

Well, and my mom got out twice in the middle of the night. I've never been so scared in all my life. I caught her right away, but I was like, oh my God, I so will never, when you hear that on the news, like you do not know the story behind how that could have happened. And they're fast when they want to be.

SPEAKER_01
7:21

When they want to be, yeah.

SPEAKER_00
7:22

Yeah.

SPEAKER_01
7:23

What do you mean her walker?

SPEAKER_00
7:24

Yeah. I was in here, like, wait, where are they? Yeah. Uh and I'm calling my dad at 4 30 in the morning because my mom was living in with me because she was uh I thought she was gonna kill my dad. Like she just had this anger and everything with him. And I called him, and the the next morning he came and he like changed the locks and everything, but I still was like in the middle of the night worried, you know, and I was right there. I bet. I

Wandering, Falls, And UTIs

SPEAKER_00
7:48

bet.

SPEAKER_01
7:48

You know, uh funny things happen with dementia. Um, one of the things is a urinary tract infection. I don't know if you experienced that with your mom. Um, but I had I was helping a couple, husband and wife, and they were living alone together. She had dementia. He was the caregiver. He was very hard of hearing, very hard of hearing. And the daughters had called me because the doctor said that they probably needed to, you know, get mom somewhere secure because she was having these chronic UTIs and um wasn't able to make safe decisions for herself and had been caught wandering a few times, found wandering a few times from the house. And so um the daughter called me and she said her mom was packing up and trying to leave, and she was being aggressive, and no one could reason with her. And I said, Well, you know, sometimes packing up and wanting to leave, believe it or not, is a symptom of a urinary tract infection. And she's like, It is. I said, Yeah, I said, I would call your dad and you know, suggest they take your mom in and have her checked. And she said, Oh, dad lives 30 minutes away, and it's you know, it's impossible to talk to him on the phone, and I don't have time to go there and talk to him in person. She said, We'll just wait and see how it goes. So I called, you know, a couple weeks later, still hadn't taken her to the doctor. Mom was still packing up and getting aggressive. And um, so I reported to the case manager at the doctor's office who had referred them to me. And um one morning, a few days later at 5 a.m., the case manager called me and she's like, Barb, did you hear? Did you hear on the news this morning? I said, No, I'm just getting up. What? And she said that this lady woke up in the middle of the night, didn't know who was in her bed, and went and got a knife out of the kitchen drawer. Uh and she didn't, you know, stab him but lacerated him. And wouldn't you know he was on blood thinners? So that looked like there was a big massacre. Uh and she had gone the way they found out about it, she had gone to the um what do they call them? Not a brew house. What do they call them here in Texas? Um, something like that. Anyway, it was the pub, the bar.

SPEAKER_03
9:54

Oh, gotcha.

SPEAKER_01
9:55

Covered in blood in the morning. And so they called the police, and that's how they found the whole situation. And so from there, you know, it was a status change for her. That urinary tract infection had become so bad and ravaged her so bad that it became a real status change in her dementia, a negative one. And we had to, you know, move her into a permanent memory care facility for the rest of her life. But so waiting until things, you know, you know things are bad, but waiting until you think they're bad enough is a mistake I often see.

SPEAKER_00
10:29

Well, and my dad had a hard time dealing with that. He didn't want to accept it because I had noticed for quite a while that something wasn't right. And finally, when she didn't know who we were, uh luckily my parents had done powers of attorney and everything years before that. And I said to him, like, we have got to do something. She doesn't know who we are. And um, you know, so he finally was able to talk her into going to the emergency room because she would not go to the doctor. I tried. I tried many times, and she wouldn't do it. Um, but when she came back from them uh the hospital stay when they diagnosed her, that's when she started just she was screaming and yelling and packing up. And, you know, she I said, I said to my dad, I go, she can't stay here because I was afraid that I was gonna get a call from the police, you know, that she was gonna do something. Yeah, you know, so she stayed with me for a month as we tried to figure out where, you know, where we could find her and

Guilt, Burnout, And Respite Support

SPEAKER_00
11:22

that. So, what advice do you have for adult children who feel guilty about considering outside care? Because I know a lot of my friends are going through that right now.

SPEAKER_01
11:31

Educating themselves on that, educating themselves. Why, why would they do that? You know, if you don't get care, if we don't get care for the caregiver, the caregiver is going to go down next, and we're gonna have two crises going at the same time. And I know myself from my own experience when my dad would um I always get emotional when I have to tell the story, but it's true. My dad would come from Chicago to Texas to come visit me. And every time, every year he would come, I would notice the change in his dementia. But my siblings that look closer didn't see it as drastically as I did because I was just seeing it a year at a time. And one time he came and um I was working and I was on the phone and he was pacing, pacing, pacing. And um, so I got off the phone because I could see he really wanted to ask me something, and he wanted to ask me when we were going to church, Saturday or Sunday. And so I answered, I said, Saturday, and I gave the wrong answer. Somebody with dementia, they just need a yes, no. They don't need well, if this, if this conditions, exactly, and I know that, but here it was, my dad, so nothing applies. I can give you advice all day long, but if it's yourself, right, right. You can't see the forest through the trees. So I'm like, Dad, if I'm not busy on Saturday, we'll go on Saturday. Otherwise, we'll go on Sunday. Okay, okay. Five minutes later, same thing. I'm on the phone. He's pacing, pacing, pacing, getting deep gas of breath. And I can see he's getting more and more disturbed. So I get off the phone, same question. I answer it the same way. Happens again, third time. Pacing, pacing, and this time he's starting to talk to me while I'm on the phone. So I had to quickly wrap up, wrap up the call. And I go, what, dad?

SPEAKER_03
13:12

Yeah.

SPEAKER_01
13:13

And he goes, When are we going to church? And I'm like, Dad, how many times do I have to tell you? Yeah. I just snapped. Right. And my point is, that's not a good caregiver. If it was your if it was your dad, I wouldn't have snapped like that. But it was my dad, and somehow I felt that it was okay to talk to him that way. And so, as family, if you don't get the help and you're snapping off at them, you're a crabby caregiver, they don't deserve that. This is a disease, it's not them. My poor dad couldn't help asking the same darn thing over and over and over again. And, you know, I should have had more patience with it, but I didn't. You know, trying to work and then trying to look after him and figure out why he's so upset. So getting care is going to make you a better caregiver. If you're listening out there, caregivers, it's going to make you a better caregiver so you can take a break. And a caregiver can come for maybe three or four hours, a couple times a week, which I think is a great idea because it's going to give you a break. You can either have the caregiver take your loved one out of the house, you know, get their hair done, go shopping, look at Christmas lights, whatever's going on. And you can do things in the home, or it gives you a chance to leave the home and take some time out for yourself. Even if you just go sit in Starbucks with some friends for a couple hours to get that break. Because in doing so, your loved one is getting used to somebody else meeting their needs besides a family member. Because the day may come where somebody has to meet their needs 24-7 that's not a family member, and at least it's going to kind of buffer some of the change that's about to take place. So I think it's a great idea to get a paid caregiver and they're not another family member. I mean, another family member for sure for help and such, but as that dementia starts to increase and the care needs increase, you have to have a plan. And knowing what the plans are, the options are, and what the costs are, if there's any funding, is what someone like myself helps families do. So if they're not waiting until they're in full-blown crisis and the costs are exorbitant because we waited so darn long, and you know, the care is significant.

SPEAKER_00
15:31

Uh yeah, I would agree. And the cost is ridiculous. And it's not always cheaper either to just have people come in 24-7 as opposed to having them in a memory care facility with it. You know, you you have to weigh uh all the costs and and their safety as well, too. And and I always try to tell everybody, and it took me a long time to learn it, that you have to enter their world. You know, if they say the sky's green, you go, yeah, it's a really pretty shade of green today, you know. Like that's right.

SPEAKER_01
16:00

You meet them where they're at. I think the Alzheimer's Association says meet them in their journey where they're at. Join them in the journey. Yeah. Join them in their journey wherever they're at. And not to be ruling them in with reality checks. You know how upsetting that is and scary that is?

unknown
16:14

Yeah.

SPEAKER_01
16:14

Someone who thinks it's 30 years earlier and you're giving them the reality check that somewhere they've lost the last 30 years. That's that's scary. And somebody with dementia, one of the best things you can do for them, and one of their largest, biggest needs is to feel safe. Yeah, if you're giving them reality checks, that's that's rocking their world. It's not letting them feel safe.

SPEAKER_00
16:37

Yeah, and I think about that sometimes, you know, when my mom was going through it, and even now, like how scared she must have been with it. I I think about that all the time.

SPEAKER_01
16:48

I saw it with my dad when he had that eerie awareness that he should know things that he didn't know and he couldn't figure out why, he couldn't figure it out and how troubling that was to him. I remember one time when he was at my home, he um he opened up an old email and he thought he needed to get ready to go to school. He was a teacher.

SPEAKER_03
17:11

Okay.

SPEAKER_01
17:12

And um, so he was he was asking me where his briefcase was, and you know, telling me, you know, he's trying to get ready to school, couldn't find anything. And you know, he'd been retired forever. And I said, Dad, I just saw in the news that the school's closed today. There's been a water main break.

SPEAKER_03
17:30

Yeah, yeah.

SPEAKER_01
17:31

Save his dignity and not give him the reality check that he retired 25 years ago.

SPEAKER_00
17:37

Yeah. And I know a lot of these decisions can create a lot of tension within families.

Family Conflict And Planning Ahead

SPEAKER_00
17:42

So, how do you help families navigate this emotional dynamic?

SPEAKER_01
17:48

Well, the the tough love I want to say is where is the power of attorney's given that power for a reason?

SPEAKER_03
17:54

True, true. Yeah.

SPEAKER_01
17:56

Because they were trusted to make the decisions, right? You know, more so than maybe the rest or felt more comfortable with the rest. Um, you know, when they're all on the a different page, education is huge. Educating them about the disease, letting them see and experience the life of what a caregiver is. You know, the one that lives the furthest away participates the least amount of in doing the least amount of care just because they live that far away, is the loudest voice on what to do. And what you're doing wrong.

SPEAKER_03
18:29

Yeah, I can see that. I can see that. Yeah.

SPEAKER_01
18:32

And I saw that a bit in myself.

SPEAKER_03
18:36

Yeah.

SPEAKER_01
18:37

But um, so there has to there has to be an educational point. Sometimes you need to bring the doctor in to maybe have a family meeting or a conference call with the family. Sometimes I do that um with the family. And then there's also a great person. They're called aging life care managers.

unknown
18:56

Okay.

SPEAKER_01
19:01

But um, for a family that has the financial means, they come in and they get a whole picture of what's going on, you know, who's providing the care, how the care is going, the stressors, the all the concerns with medication and safety and family relationships that are now starting to fall apart because nobody's agreeing about care. And they come in and they make a recommendation for what to do for care. And often then they switch them over to someone like myself to help them find the right care option based on you know the budget, the location, such as that. But sometimes, you know, we have to have like the mediator come in with that. But yeah, I mean, there's always somebody in the family. The more siblings there are, the more likelihood there's somebody that needs the money.

unknown
19:47

Yeah.

SPEAKER_01
19:48

When mom and dad die, there's something left, and it didn't all go to the memory care. Yeah, yeah. You know, 40s, 50s, no job.

SPEAKER_00
20:01

Yeah, it is, you know, they bring up so much uh for it, and to be able to um really be able to put that person first, their needs first, it is hard. It's really hard to do.

SPEAKER_01
20:18

And I have families that tell me that they think that mom's doing that on purpose.

SPEAKER_00
20:22

Oh, I've heard that too. Yeah.

SPEAKER_01
20:24

Yeah. Or dad just wants attention. He's always been that way.

SPEAKER_00
20:27

Yeah.

SPEAKER_01
20:28

So, you know, denial is great. Everybody likes to jump on that wagon.

SPEAKER_00
20:32

Exactly. You know, and and I I'm like, they're not doing it on purpose. You know, you you know your loved one, they wouldn't do that on purpose. But dementia is such a huge thing that it's it's hard to digest and it's hard to process and to see your loved one that way. It it really is.

SPEAKER_01
20:51

I mean they're slipping away, and there's so much grieving that starts early on with dementia. There, there's grieving the diagnosis, there's grieving the loss of independence. There's so many stages of grieving that happen during this time that um you know it gives you a little bit of time to grasp it because you're seeing them fade away, and then when they finally do succumb to the disease, it's almost a relief because the suffering that they've gone through. And some people, dementia moves pretty fast. Usually the younger you are, the faster it moves. Yeah. In others, it lingers with severe symptoms for years.

SPEAKER_00
21:31

Yeah. Yeah. So it's hard to predict. Yeah, and I think that's why people have such a hard time with it, because it's not like cancer. Like you you understand that where dementia just it isn't like that with the stages and the progression. Everybody is different. And it's hard.

SPEAKER_01
21:47

I do um I volunteer, I'm a speaker for the Alzheimer's Association, and people don't understand when they tell me that their mom has dementia or their dad has dementia, and I ask them what kind, they don't know.

unknown
21:59

Yeah.

SPEAKER_01
22:00

It'd be like the doctor telling you you have cancer, but they're not telling you what kind. Yeah. You need to know. Is it lung cancer, brain cancer, breast cancer, bone cancer? And for dementia, we need to know is it Lewy body? Is it frontal temporal? Is it Alzheimer's? Alzheimer's dementia is the most prevalent form of dementia. We need to know. So we need to know how to prepare for it. Now, my dad had vascular dementia. And for him, he kind of followed the textbook. It moved very slowly. He would have good and bad days. Some days you could have a great conversation with him, and other days he was kind of discombobulated.

SPEAKER_03
22:38

Yeah. Yeah.

SPEAKER_01
22:40

Um, and then went for vascular dementia, then all of a sudden it just like jumps off the cliff. Oh, yeah. He celebrated his 90th son's birthday in April, and then in September, the end of August, I think, was his funeral. It was that fast.

SPEAKER_00
22:57

Yeah. Yeah. My mom um she probably would be more considerate more on the early onset. She well, she passed away 10 days before her 76th birthday. Um but I know she had the symptoms way longer than she was actually in memory care. She's in memory care like three and a half years. So she probably started having them in her 60s, I would say. Uh yeah.

SPEAKER_01
23:22

Well, once the diagnosis comes, and once it gets to a point that it's so bad, then you can stop and look back. But while it's going on, it's you know, nobody wants nobody wants to come to believe that that's a diagnosis because we have an idea of what the trajectory is going to be.

SPEAKER_00
23:39

Yeah, yeah. And um, you know, and there were so many things that I knew were not my mom, you know. Just I I tell the story of how like, you know, she she was having accidents and things like that. And I used to be able to get, you know, be able to change her her pants and things like that. But I got to a certain point, she literally would tell me, Well, then don't look, who cares? I'm like, but mom, there's a stain on your pants. Oh, so what? She would be like, you know, and it so was not like her. Um, but then I knew the caregivers were coming and they were able to do it for her, you know, for it. Uh, because sometimes she'd come out with some really funny stuff. And I, you know, I'd be like, okay, they do.

SPEAKER_01
24:16

Yep. We there's a lot of funny things that, you know, if you can find the humor along the way, it may it's not making fun of them, it's just the situation sometimes can be a little bit corny. Yeah.

The Hospital Stay Window Of Opportunity

SPEAKER_01
24:27

You know, before I forget, I wanted to circle back around to something you said when you took your mom to the hospital and you knew that you know you needed to make a change then. When I speak to families, and usually nobody calls me early on, right? Starting to go wild. Right, right. And we talk about windows of opportunity because um you saw that the situation was deteriorating, that a move was probably going to take place, but yet you didn't want to do it, you probably didn't know how to do it. How would you, you know, tell your mom, tell your dad, whatever. But a a window of opportunity that often presents itself is that hospital stay. And it's easier for everyone. From I'll use you for an instance, it's it would be easier for your mom, for your dad, and for you that when she discharged, that she didn't discharge back home, she would discharge to her new home. Because it makes more sense um logically, because she needs this new level of care. Emotionally, to us, it's very hard to move from home to a facility. It's easier, you know. When we go usually in the hospital comes the rehab stay, from the rehab stay, you're either going back home or yeah, you know, to a level of care. And it's just it's smoother, I think, transitioning when it happens that way.

SPEAKER_00
25:46

Yeah, unfortunately for my mom, it didn't. Um, like I said, she went there. Yeah. Now my dad is actually in that particular situation. He doesn't have dementia at the moment, he's got other issues going on. So he has to go into assistant living, but he's still in the hospital right now. So for him, he's gonna go from rehab to that. So I'm gonna get learning all the sides of things here with it.

Comparing Care Levels And Costs

SPEAKER_00
26:12

So you offer a free service to help families find the right care. So, what does the process look like and why do you why is this so important?

SPEAKER_01
26:20

Well, it's very important because people make a lot of mistakes when they don't know what they're looking for, they don't pick the right level of care. So the process is somebody gives me a call and they tell me, um, you know, I think I think my mom needs assisted living. And so then I need to know the story. I need to know, you know, where is she living? Is she living alone? How's she doing? You know, what are the concerns? What are the safeties? How about her medications? How does she ambulate? Is she showering? Is she able to keep house? Is she getting new good nutrition? I mean, I need to know all those things to know how to help. And so um, based on some of the pieces that are missing or that are needing assistance with, then we identify um is she safe enough to continue on home? And she just needs a little bolster of some care. Maybe she needs some meals on wheels and a caregiver to come in and help her here and there. Maybe she needs a little home health, you know, coming in on top of that. And then we talk about the cost for that because it is it's very expensive to keep somebody home. It's generally a minimum of $30 an hour at least, depending on where you live. And most caregivers want a four-hour minimum, and most of them want two or three times a week, and you almost have to do that if you want the same caregiver.

SPEAKER_03
27:42

Yeah.

SPEAKER_01
27:43

Which is important for somebody with dementia. Even that routine. So we can get somebody in there and keep them home, and then that's eyes on when you're not around. We can kind of let you know how mom's getting along when you're not around. And you know, when they go in, you know how they found her, how she was doing, or dad, how they're getting along. And then um, if the need starts to increase, or if staying home and staying safe is no longer affordable, then we have to look at the different levels of care. There's you know, independent living. Some independent livings are very independent, some look like a mild assisted living.

SPEAKER_03
28:21

Yeah.

SPEAKER_01
28:21

Depending on where you're looking. I mean, they're not all alike. Or assisted living is for people that need that assistance with their personal care. You know, personal care delivered in the privacy of their own apartment. Usually they bring their own furniture and independent and assisted living. And then memory care is for those that can no longer manage their day, and they need uh 24-7 supervision and they need their day managed. They need to be reminded to come eat, they need to remind to drink, they need to be reminded to toilet. They can't toilet that's managed for them. They do all their laundry, they do everything for them.

SPEAKER_00
28:58

And that is overwhelming to figure it all out. Now, what is now what is then the difference if somebody goes into a say a skilled nursing home?

Medicare Ratings And How To Visit

SPEAKER_01
29:09

So a skilled nursing home varies state by state. Okay. So Texas, um, which is where I'm at, Medicare had them rated as the worst nursing homes in the United States. Oh, okay. So if you're in Texas, maybe let's talk about another option if we can.

SPEAKER_00
29:30

And where can people find that Medicaid rating?

SPEAKER_01
29:34

It's Medicare rating. Oh, sorry, Medicare. Medicare.gov.

SPEAKER_00
29:38

Oh, okay.

SPEAKER_01
29:38

So these aren't the Yelp ratings or the Google ratings. These are Medicare ratings. Right, right. Okay, and if there's a little red hand next to the nursing home you're looking at, then it means stay away.

SPEAKER_00
29:50

Okay. See, these are things good to know because people have this misconception, too, about that it's horrible. Yeah.

SPEAKER_01
29:57

I remember I saw one that was a five-star nursing home. And um I went visiting first. And when I went there, they told me they were a five-star, and I thought they were kidding me. It it smelled of urine so bad in there. Yeah. And in the administrative office, there are those big things of like air wet or for breezes all over. It was enough, you know, it smelled like some kind of wilting flower in there. And the general population, the urine smell was so bad. And they were bragging about how they were a five-star. And so when I went home, I looked it up and I thought, oh my gosh, how did they get to be a five-star?

SPEAKER_03
30:35

Right.

SPEAKER_01
30:35

It did say five star. So five star, I learned, can be six months old. The rating. Okay. The rating on Medicare can be six months old. So if you would have made a decision and moved your loved one to that nursing home that had that five-star rating. I don't know. I I think that was a fluke. It's never been a five-star since I've been in the business.

SPEAKER_03
30:56

Yeah. Yeah.

SPEAKER_01
30:57

I don't know how it got to be. But if you would have gone on that alone, that would have been a sad mistake, I think, for to move somebody there. So you need to visit them. Let the stars be a guide, but not a decision maker. And for nursing home care, you know, we know the universal issue is not enough staffing.

SPEAKER_03
31:14

True.

SPEAKER_01
31:15

And so I always suggest that you need to pick a nursing home that's close to where the person who will visit the most lives. And you know, when somebody moves to the nursing home, you're moving yourself or whoever the person is visiting the most to that nursing home as well. Because they need to be there every day to advocate for them if the person can no longer advocate for themselves.

SPEAKER_00
31:39

I would agree that that's that was one of the biggest decisions my dad and I made when my mom had to go into memory care. We knew we wanted her close by. And my dad and I did go every day for it. So not only did we see her, and I know that helped her, but then we also were able to be like, hey, her room hasn't been cleaned today, or you know, what's going on here? Something's not right, or hey, can you call the doctor here for it? So we were always on it. And then we got to know all the caregivers too. So like they were be able to tell us. They could call us and be like, hey, we noticed this today with her. So it is, it's so important, you know, that I think two people get that misconception that they think, oh, you you drop them off and then you never go. No, you're still caregiving for them. You're you're just advocating.

SPEAKER_01
32:26

That's a choice you make if you never go, right?

SPEAKER_00
32:28

Right. Yeah, you're just advocating in a different way for them. That's right.

SPEAKER_01
32:32

You're you're kind of overseeing now.

SPEAKER_00
32:34

Yes. Yeah, it it's just as important. Yeah.

SPEAKER_01
32:38

The memory cares, you know, they're they come in different categories. There's some that may have 60 people in them, and there's others that may have 16. So somebody who's more active and needs to be more kept more busy and involved and out of trouble, bigger is better. For somebody who really needs more one-on-one care, they're not ambulating so much anymore, they're really relying on somebody else to meet every single one of their wants and needs. Smaller is better.

SPEAKER_00
33:04

Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. So you definitely have to look at all of those things. Uh for

Socialization And Signs It Is Time

SPEAKER_00
33:11

it. So, what signs do families often miss that indicate it's time to explore different options?

SPEAKER_01
33:18

Well, I think it's some of that falls under um the denial. I mean, the falls. Falls are a big sign. Um, up all night, not sleeping, sleeping all day.

SPEAKER_03
33:30

Yeah, yeah.

SPEAKER_01
33:32

Um uh messing up their medications, withdrawing. Let's say that dad always loved football. Every football season, he was in front of the TV, he was going to games, and now all of a sudden he's withdrawn from that.

SPEAKER_03
33:43

Okay.

SPEAKER_01
33:44

Doesn't do it anymore. Things that they used to do, they no longer do. Maybe they were real social and now they no longer want to go anywhere because finding the right words or remembering who people are is too hard for them anymore. So withdrawing from things that they once used to like to do, trouble finding the right words.

SPEAKER_00
34:04

And I also think too that people don't realize how important that socialization is, even if your loved one is going, say, into assistant living just because maybe that maybe they're falling and they need that extra help.

SPEAKER_01
34:17

And that socialization really does help them, you know, albeit somebody is huge, especially with um as we get older, that saying an idle mind is a dangerous place to go is ever so true. As we get older, we start to focus on what hurts, what's not working right, who who's died, and what do I have those symptoms to? And um, you know, socialization, especially for seniors, it stimulates them to do things they wouldn't do if they were just living at home alone. Yeah. And if it was just me and my dad, that's no socialization for my dad. Right, right. It's just me and him. And most of the time it's, you know, probably confrontational. He doesn't want to shower. I want him to shower. You know, he smells, he needs to take a shower, or he needs he can't wear that outfit another day. That's the relationship. That's not socialization.

SPEAKER_00
35:12

Yeah, that's very true.

SPEAKER_01
35:14

So getting them out somewhere. There's, you know, adult daycare can can work and be an affordable option to get somebody out and social. Those are generally for people with dementia. But somebody who is widowed and lost um a spouse, an independent living or an assisted living if they need some care, it's a totally great move for them. It's gonna give them a better quality of life and um get that socialization going, get them, stimulate them to do things they wouldn't do if they were just sitting in their house. Exactly. For myself, you know, my home office. You know how easy it is to blow off the gym every day, day after day after day. I was coming home from the office and in the car, and maybe it's some gym clothes. It was out already, I might stop.

SPEAKER_00
35:57

Exactly.

SPEAKER_01
35:58

Exactly. No, it's time to do some laundry, make dinner.

SPEAKER_00
36:02

Exactly.

Veterans Benefits And Free Resources

SPEAKER_00
36:03

Uh so your website is home to homeforseniors.com. That's right. And so anybody can go on there and they can get some free resources or yes, yes.

SPEAKER_01
36:16

And there's even a veterans tab on there. Okay. For um veterans resources. There's um, I think most people are aware that there's a benefit for veterans called aid in attendance. Were you aware of that? Did your mom or dad serve in the military?

SPEAKER_00
36:30

My dad did, yeah. And so he actually got some of it from my mom, and now we're kind of looking into that for him as well.

SPEAKER_01
36:37

Yeah. So for in your situation, we had a healthy veteran and an ill spouse. So she qualified under that. Um, but sometimes it's the veteran that needs it, and you know, the non-veteran is healthy, so the veteran gets a little bit more money than the spouse. But yes, they had to have served um just in a nutshell, 90 days of active duty, one day during wartime, and have an honorable discharge. They did not have to have a service connected injuries injury, they do not have to um be retired military.

SPEAKER_03
37:11

Okay.

SPEAKER_01
37:12

They just had to have served 90 days of active duty, one day during wartime, and had an honorable discharge to start the ball rolling. Now, if they don't have a need for assisted living, someone to help them with bathing, toileting, such as that, then um you don't get the benefit yet. Oh, okay. Unless you're very low income. Oh, okay. Um, maybe 1600 a month or so, you may be able to get some of that uh now because you're living at a poverty level.

SPEAKER_03
37:42

Okay.

SPEAKER_01
37:43

With that income. And then um, you know, there's some other caveats to it, but that's the main thing to get the ball rolling, is those three things. 90 days of active duty, one day during wartime. You didn't have to be, you know, at the country of war necessarily, and this Vietnam has some funny rules, but there just had to be a declared war with the United States during that time that this veteran was in service, and then they had to have an honorable discharge.

SPEAKER_00
38:09

Okay. So that's all on your website, and anybody can go on there and check it out and get more resources for it. Well, this has been so informative.

Closing Thoughts And Next Steps

SPEAKER_01
38:19

Well, thank you so much, Patty. It was an honor to have the opportunity to come here and help your folks. And you know, if anybody resonates with some of the things that we talked about today, and they're like, oh, this sounds just like my family. You don't have to do this alone. Exactly. Give me a call, go to the website, there's a little form that pops up and fill it out. And my services are free. So um we can chat whenever you're ready.

SPEAKER_00
38:42

And I will make sure that I put the website in um thank you on our on our link with the with the show so people can click on it as well. So okay, great. Thank you for joining us. So I hope this has been very informative for everyone, and I hope you've enjoyed the show. So I hope you enjoyed your cup of coffee, your cup of tea, or your glass of wine if it was a bad day. And join us for another episode of Patty's Place.