Caregiving For Dementia

27 Months Without Mommy

Fri, 03 Dec 2021 18:30:00 +0000

This is just an update of the family. 27 Months after losing Mommy!

Life After Caregiving Part 2

Mon, 10 Feb 2020 10:00:00 +0000

This Episode is a continuation of what went on after Mommy was picked up.

Life After Care Giving

Fri, 31 Jan 2020 10:00:00 +0000

This is the first of a few episodes that goes through what you may feel right immediately after your loved one has passed away. There's not a whole lot to show notes with these episodes it's just me talking about what had happened immediately after Mama's death. What I thought would happen that didn't and that kind of thing. I hope these few episodes help you get along for a few months immediately following your loved one's death.

A Happy Thanksgiving Message

Wed, 27 Nov 2019 10:00:00 +0000

This episode is just a brief message to all those that are still downloading the podcast happy Thanksgiving to all.

Caregiving journey ended

Tue, 03 Sep 2019 17:28:23 +0000

The hardest talk a family can never have.

Tue, 03 Sep 2019 05:41:17 +0000

Episode # 93

There comes a time in caregivers journey that they know time
is very close to running out. We hear caregiving for dementia have realized
that fact.

The past five days Mama has not eat anything at all, the past
four days Mama has not drank anything, and for the past three days Mama's been
very hard to wake up at all. When she is awake it's about two minutes and she's
right back out.

Mamas, breathing has also changed its no longer normal
breathing. Doesn't look the same, doesn't sound the same as the normal
breathing does Mama breeze through her mouth now and has for the past three
days. And also she's breathing through her mouth it's not as loud as you would
think it should be.

If you listen to me anytime at all you know that we keep my
older brother and his wife informed as to what mamas doing anytime something
changes with Mama last night we had the hardest conversation the family can
have. We talked about what to do when this journey is over. What to expect and
what not to expect from Mama. From the people that we need to talk to when it's
done. What we want and what we don't want as for his funeral arrangements.

I guess I'm kind of lucky in this respect because my older
brothers always told me that he married mom, meaning that his wife and mom
think an awful lot alike and I know from my own standpoint I've had
conversations with mom and turned around had same conversation with his wife
and dam near had the same conversation and there was no way, absolutely no way
that mom and his wife had talked.

So now I find myself trying to come to grips with the fact of
not having mom in the living room. Mama not be in there when I come home from
the store. Not knowing exactly how to fill. All kind of emotions are floating
through my head, my heart, and I'm sure that the same kind of things are going
on with Stephanie and Michael I'm sure they have all kind of feelings running
through their brains as well. Feeling helpless is probably my number one
feeling right now. Not being able to help mom do anything at all.

Everything is changing
so rapidly this week, although mom is still with us for now we are getting
prepared for Mama's last trip to West Virginia.

I'm not sure if there
will be in episode next couple weeks I'll have to play that by ear.

Things we take for granted as Caregivers

Mon, 26 Aug 2019 21:00:15 +0000

Episode #92

Show Notes

There are so many things in life that normal people take for
granted. This becomes more apparent the longer you take care of your loved one.
There are things that I take for granted because there things that come natural
to me that Mama can no longer do for herself.

Mama can no longer wash her face, brush her hair, brush her
teeth, or even talk. Mama tries so hard to talk to us and you can see the
frustration in her face as she tries to say something and can't. Mama tries to
hold a cup of something to drink and because of her Parkinson's she shakes so
bad that some of whatever's in the cup spills out. Mama so apologetic when she
makes a mess.

One of the things that I have taken for granted myself in my
caregiving was the fact that when Mama was taking care of my grandmother who
fortunately was not as bad as Mama is Mama never asked me to stay with grandma
to help with grandma. I always had free time on my hands to do whatever I
wanted to do. And I've forgotten that in my caregiving because we were leaving
Michael with his grandmother way too much. We sought that it was good training
for a after all he is old enough to have a child of his own. And until recently
here we did not realize that Michael was having a troubled time taking care of
his grandmother. And I've forgotten how much free time I had with my
grandmother.

A lot of times I'll go out and check on Mama and mamas
asleep, but there are other times where mamas really fidgety, and the only
thing I can do is just sit there to chair and hold her hand. Tell her she's
okay, tell her that she's safe, that I love her.

A lot of the time in my own caregiving, I take for granted
the fact that I can go brush my teeth, my mouth. Mama can no longer do that and
here the other day I was trying to give her some ice water out of a spoon and
this white flaky something another come out of her mouth. I asked Mama said
Mama what is that and of course I didn't get a straight answer, all I got the
beat was mumbo-jumbo, come to find out what ever this crap was all through her
mouth, was on her tongue, the roof of her mouth. Now I don't have nerve enough
to stick my fingers in my mother's mouth! That's just not going to happen. So I
ended up taking a toothbrush and brushing her mouth her teeth, the roof of her
mouth.

So if your loved one stops eating check their mouth make sure
this pasty crusty group is not in their mouth. Because it could stop them from
eating could stop them from swallowing.

Caregiving Mistakes,Regrets

Tue, 20 Aug 2019 00:36:17 +0000

In your caregiving a lot of times you do things in the heat of the moment. After time goes by you wonder whether or not what you did was the right thing to do.

A lot of caregivers won't tell you everything that they go through in their caregiving. I am one of those people who won't tell you every little thing that goes on in in the house with the caregiving I am one that won't tell you what Mama has done to us I won't tell you what we've done to Mama.

What I tried to do in this podcast is tell you what we do and what we don't do because of dementia. When we first started caregiving we didn't know what we were doing at all.

I've gone out to Facebook to the caregiving support groups and I have found that a lot of posts in those groups are things that we have had questions about in our caregiving. So I try to take this podcast and tell you what we have done in that situation and what we haven't been in that situation All to try to help you in your caregiving.

I am also taking some courses in podcasting through the school of podcasting and you can find out at www.schoolofpodcasting.com and while taking these courses we have meetings every once in a while and in one of those meetings I had a lady asked me, if I had any regrets in my caregiving? Immediately the answer was no. If you hurt listen to me anytime at all you know that I have the attitude of I'm not doing anything for Mama that Mama didn't do for me when I was a kid. So now I don't have any regrets taking care Mama.

There are times when Mama doesn't want to eat or drink anything. That seems to of gotten worse for some reason this past week. We don't know why all we do know is that there are times when we could get her Glucerna shakes down her when we couldn't get her to eat anything but for some reason this week were having a lot of problems getting her to drink anything. We're having to take a spoon and try to get her to take a sip out of the spoon. We'll have to see how long that takes. If you don't get anything down her and she doesn't get her medicine the right way the right time.

There comes a time in your caregiving where a lot of things don't matter anymore. If the one that your caregiving for doesn't eat or drink anything, there's not a whole lot you can do about it. That would probably be my, if I had to pick a regret, in my caregiving that would probably be it, the fact that you can't make them eat, you can put food in front of them, you can put drink in front of them, but you can't make them drink, and that that would be my one regret the fact that I can't force Mama to eat or drink although I may try you can't force them to take anything in.

Caregiving Mistakes/Regrets

Mon, 19 Aug 2019 23:05:08 +0000

Episode #91

Show Notes

In your caregiving a lot of times you do things in the heat
of the moment. After time goes by you wonder whether or not what you did was
the right thing to do.

A lot of caregivers won't tell you everything that they go
through in their caregiving. I am one of those people who won't tell you every
little thing that goes on in in the house with the caregiving I am one that
won't tell you what Mama has done to us I won't tell you what we've done to
Mama.

What I tried to do in this podcast is tell you what we do and
what we don't do because of dementia. When we first started caregiving we
didn't know what we were doing at all.

I've gone out to Facebook to the caregiving support groups
and I have found that a lot of posts in those groups are things that we have
had questions about in our caregiving. So I try to take this podcast and tell
you what we have done in that situation and what we haven't been in that
situation All to try to help you in your caregiving.

I am also taking some courses in podcasting through the
school of podcasting and you can find out at www.schoolofpodcasting.com and while taking these courses we have meetings every
once in a while and in one of those meetings I had a lady asked me, if I had
any regrets in my caregiving? Immediately the answer was no. If you hurt listen
to me anytime at all you know that I have the attitude of I'm not doing
anything for Mama that Mama didn't do for me when I was a kid. So now I don't
have any regrets taking care Mama.

There are times when Mama doesn't want to eat or drink
anything. That seems to of gotten worse for some reason this past week. We
don't know why all we do know is that there are times when we could get her
Glucerna shakes down her when we couldn't get her to eat anything but for some
reason this week were having a lot of problems getting her to drink anything.
We're having to take a spoon and try to get her to take a sip out of the spoon.
We'll have to see how long that takes. If you don't get anything down her and
she doesn't get her medicine the right way the right time.

There comes a time in your caregiving where a lot of things
don't matter anymore. If the one that your caregiving for doesn't eat or drink
anything, there's not a whole lot you can do about it. That would probably be
my, if I had to pick a regret, in my caregiving that would probably be it, the
fact that you can't make them eat, you can put food in front of them, you can
put drink in front of them, but you can't make them drink, and that that would
be my one regret the fact that I can't force Mama to eat or drink although I
may try you can't force them to take anything in.

Know It All Doctors

Mon, 05 Aug 2019 20:38:41 +0000

Care Giving for Dementia Know It All Doctors Episode # 90 While in your caregiving journey there will be a lot of things that happened that you don't understand. I know when not when we first started there was a whole lot that went on that we didn't understand there's a whole lot that I haven't gone into with this podcast that went on when Mama first got dementia. That's one reason why I started this podcast. What is a post on Facebook was talking about talking to a loved one's doctor who asked the question, why are you getting your mothers hair done? He was told because Mama used to get her hair done Mama feels better getting her hair done Mama likes getting her hair done. I'm here to tell you after dealing with this stuff for eight years or more there are times when my mother still knows what's going on around her. She may not know exactly what it is or who it is or exactly what's being said but she still knows that somebody stalking door she knows it's something's been said to her. Stephanie and I asked Mama if you want to go get her hair done this week and she said yes. So we made her hair appointment to go get her hair done but when it comes time to go Mama, decided she didn't want to go she didn't feel good she didn't feel like getting dressed to go get her hair done. Now fortunately we've got it fixed to where the lady that does mom's hair knows what what's going on and so we can work within that couple hour window. But if Mama would've told us yes that within that two-hour window to go get her hair cut we do gone and I don't care what the doctor would've said about it. If I stop for one minute it made mom feel better we to take her. I'm here to say you can't tell me that the doctors know everything about this dementia. Because I'm here to tell you that they don't have seen too many reactions good and bad for mom was conversations that have gone on with mom. For any doctor to ask the question why would you do something they had your loved one doesn't know what's going on is BS. If you to left every decision that you make four or about your loved one up to the doctors you would have a absolute living zombie on your hands. They've proven that to me and if I get mom all the medication that the doctor wanted to give mom mom would be a living zombie. All all they want to do is push pills that make him sleep all the time. Mama sleeps enough the way it is let alone with more medication to make her sleep. So I just said all that just to say the doctors don't know what everything. Doctors may think they do but they are not God! They do not know everything and for some doctor to say they don't know what's going on around them just because they have dementia doesn't know what he's talking about I've seen too many changes to many expressions good and bad for my mother for any doctor to convince me that she doesn't know what's going on. So just make the right decision for you and your loved one and don't worry a whole lot about whether or not to Dr. seems that think they know what's going on because they do Mama has proven that to me and yours will to given the chance.

Getting your loved one to do whatever

Mon, 29 Jul 2019 15:45:36 +0000

Care Giving for Dementia

Trying to get your loved one to do what ever

Episode # 89

There are times when you try to get your loved one to do something that they don't want to do. When that happens the only thing that you can do is back off and give a little better time and try again you just need to keep trying until it works.

There are times where your loved one doesn't want to eat now here with Mama sometimes that's three days. We usually are able to get her drinks down her but not always. Mama sometimes just takes these spells where she just doesn't want to eat anything at all doesn't want to drink anything at all, and most of the time she'll let you know that she doesn't want it. We have come to the understanding that these ensures, boost, and Glucerna drinks are meal within themselves so as long as we can get mamas Glucerna her, she's okay.

With taking a bath there are times that Mama doesn't want to take a bath I have come to conclusion that this is part of dementia. A lot of times we have to bath mom whether or not she wants to take a bath. And a lot of times you have to back off and give her a little better time and go back to trying to give her a bath and she's fine with a bath.

As far as sleeping when Mama was first diagnosed with this dementia and at times it was a pain to get Mama to go to bed. The boy had to get up early in the morning and go to school when the wife had to get up and go to work in various things and Mama didn't always want to go to bed when we went. I didn't like going to bed and leaving her awake by yourself so I stayed up as late as she did and then I would lay down most of the time when she was down.v

Cowboy Theme Pacav 1711860633 is Royalty Free Music

There But Not There

Mon, 08 Jul 2019 23:00:19 +0000

Episode # 88

There are times when mama just seems to be staring out into
space. There are times when mama doesn't look at you but she looks through you.
She doesn't realize there's anything going on around her.

Over the Fourth of July weekend mamas great-granddaughter
come to see her. Not mama seem to be fixated on the granddaughter but I'm not
sure whether she realized it was her granddaughter or if she just realized that
somebody different was in the house.

Mama was not afraid of the granddaughter because she did
allow the granddaughter to feed her some food, she did talk to the
granddaughter, she did hold the granddaughter's hand. Which I believe told us
that mama was not afraid of the granddaughter.

Mama was never one for the fireworks even before she got
dementia now she would take us kids to see the fireworks are let us kids have
fireworks at the house for the Fourth of July especially sparklers but that was
back before the government said you couldn't have a said the fireworks were
dangerous. So mama didn't even acknowledge the fact that the fireworks were on
the TV this year the didn't seem too upset her at all she didn't react to them
at all and didn't seem to anyway.

When mama first got her dementia I would always tell her that
I love her I still do that today but I used to get on I love you too or a me
too however I am no longer getting tighter those all I'm getting now is oh
okay. There are times when I don't even get that all I get is the blank stare.

I understand that this dementia will eventually take
everything away from mama. I'm wondering if this blank stare into space is part
of the dementia taking everything away from mama. It's a stare of almost
looking through you instead of at you.

When mama broke her hip the insurance company sent in some
therapist in nurses and stuff and one of the therapists worked with mom's legs
and showed Stephanie and I how to do some exercises with mom's legs and mama
reacts to those exercises especially the lake that has the broken hip. Now I
don't think the exercises are actually hurting the hip however I do believe
that they are making mama a little more uncomfortable because of mama's
reaction.

I do believe that the blank stares or the stare into space is
happening a little more frequent it last a little longer and it takes a little
bit more to get a reaction out of mama than normal. However fortunately it
doesn't seem to last very long once we start moving mama around a little bed
once we start talking to mom once we start Robin mama's back mama comes to her
self for lack of a better description.

I have not been able to pinpoint any trickier that causes
this blank stare. The stare is just there at any time and I have not been able
to figure out anything that's causing it nothing that mama does nothing that's
on the TV nothing that we do here to house so I'm not sure where the stare
comes from it just appears out of nowhere for no reason.

Family Interference

Mon, 01 Jul 2019 11:00:17 +0000

Episode # 87

This week's episode of caregiving for dementia was inspired
by a Facebook group post someone said something about their siblings giving
them a hard time about caregiving for their loved one.

If you are the main caregiver for your loved one you are the
one that is dealing with the aftereffects of your siblings coming to visit. If
they are not around 24 seven 365 days a year like you are, if they are not
sharing in the caregiving you'll need to be able to tell your siblings to kiss
your you know what, if they start trying to telling you what you need to do and
what you don't need to do.

Mamma's had six of us kids five of us are still living. Three
of the five have just up and disappeared. They don't call, they don't write,
and they definitely, definitely don't come around to see mom. They have been
gone for 5 or 6 years and if they were to show up today I don't know that I'd
would let them in the house. I'm not even sure I'd have a long drawn out conversation
with any of them.

Your siblings should have enough respect for you and for your
loved one that they would not argue too awful much about what you're doing and
what you're not doing. If your siblings don't have enough respect for you or
your loved one then you need to be able to put them in their place. After all
you are the one that's taking care of your loved one not them. The siblings
would have a hard time forcing you to do anything other than what you're doing,
especially if you have a doctor's letter saying that your loved one is
incompetent. So believe me and my siblings showed up and started trying to tell
me how to take care mom or how not to take care mom I would waste no time
putting them in their place and if need be waive the doctor's letter at them
just let them know that the Dr. knows that she's incompetent and that you know
that the Dr. knows.

When Mama divorced my stepfather the three siblings stayed
with their father instead of living with mom and I. Now I'm not really going to
whole lot of details here but they abandoned mom then.

When the siblings decided that they wanted to go to college
they knew where to go to get the help for college they knew that mom would help
them any way that she could. Mama helped all three of them through college one
she even helped with other bills and did without a lot of things and we didn't
do a lot of things when it was just mom and I in my 20s because the three of
them were in school. They needed mom while they were in school. Now then that
Mama needs them, and they have all, once again up and disappeared.

Mama has two great grandkids that she's never even laid eyes
on. Mama is now so far gone that even if you brought the kids around Mama
wouldn't know them so Mama will never actually know those two great grandkids
because their mother is not around.

Before Mama got sick my sister would come down and see mom
and take mom shopping and whatever else they wanted to do but when they got
home,all Mama wanted to do in the evening was rest. When she wasn't here
she would call every evening and talk to mom for at least an hour or so. But
since Mama has been diagnosed with this devastating disease of dementia none of
them are around. Mama

A Dementia Evaluation

Mon, 24 Jun 2019 11:00:00 +0000

As your caregiving for someone and the longer it goes the more things go wrong. The more things do go wrong the more help you need. Toward the end of the school year it become apparent that we were going to need some help with mama, getting her from the bed to the pot getting her from the pot to bed getting them from the bed to the dinner table and so forth.

This has never been more evident than when mama broke her hip somehow. Mama hasn't been mobile for quite some time and now that she's broken her hip it's even worse mama no longer can set up by herself. This means that we have to do everything that involves moving mom ourselves. It's already evident to us that were going to need some help so we made of call to Medicare and Medicare said talk to the doctor and get things set up. Well the things that the doctor has set up so far, is not what we need.

We have a nurse that comes in we have a physical therapist that comes in we have an aide as well as a occupational therapist that has come into a valuate mom this week. Now the nurse the thing the nurses do is take mama's vitals, the physical therapist showed us a few leg exercises that we could do with mom for mama's legs, the just contend to help bath mom and to help dressed mom, and the occupational therapist just command to see what we got as far as equipment to help mom get around.

The occupational therapist is really the only one really is much help mean she's talking about another type of wheelchairs she's talking about a hospital bed although with her experience she says that mama's insurance is quite hard to get anything like that to go through. And we can't afford to do it ourselves, so I am not sure what's going on. We are just going to have to wait and see what goes on and go from there.

Now when we called to get some help because stepping was going to go back to school in winner we actually need a physical body a physical person that can sit and help move mom around and talk to mom and all everyday things. With these four people that the doctor has got coming in their here about 20 minutes and that's it that's all they do and that's not what Stephanie and I need, we need somebody that can actually take care mom while we go out and take care of other things that need to be taken care of.

I mean hopes that when these three weeks are up for the nurses in the physical therapists that they will get together with mama's doctor and just come up with a game plan for us to help mama out. I'm sure that we not going to get somebody 24 seven 365 days a year. Although that would be great I don't look for the insurance company to offer or even paid for it. Mama doesn't need a nurse however she does need 24 seven care and without mama needing a full-time nurse which mama doesn't need I'm not sure that insurance company will pay for someone I hate typing I hate this is a episode number six who mama dialectics and develop and want you to you are interested in leading adherents Sunday that start taken studies all last theory to help sit with mom.

We are running out of time before Stephanie has to go back to work very quickly. Where at the end of June and Stephanie has to go back to work at the end of August that's only about 60 days 80 days may be to where we can get something or someone in place before she goes back to work. I'm hoping that we can do so but if we can't, you heard me say before in his podcast that mama is not going to a nursing home. As long as I can possibly get to mama with any kind of reasonable strength mama will not see the inside of a nursing home.

So will just have to wait and see what goes on between now and the time Stephanie has to go back to work, hoping for more than what I honestly think we'll get but any help would be grateful.

72 Hour Conversation

Fri, 14 Jun 2019 22:00:00 +0000

Caregiving for Dementia 72 Hour Conversation Episode # 85 When Mama 1st got this dementia the doctor give her a lot of medication to take. A lot of it made Mama sleep. It made Mama pretty much a zombie. So I took half of it away from her. When I took half of the medication away from Mama, Mama woke up. Mama could function a little bit Mama was awake a little bit. Everything was fine. Although Mama still slept a good bit, until Mama broke her hip. When Mama broke her hip, I had asked the doctor for some help take care of her, so the insurance set out 4 or 5 different people to work with Mama couple nurses, a physical therapist, and an aide, and I don't know who all else. The 1st person to come out, turned out to be a nurse and the 1st thing that she did was go through mamas medication. She found out that they all cause drowsiness. She even said that some of them were interacting with the others. So she took 3 or 4 more pills away from mom on top of everything that I took away. In 72 hours. I've had more conversation out of my mother that I've had a year or more. Although Mama still sleeps a good bit. She's awake a lot more and were able to actually carry on a small conversation with her. You can actually make sense out of what she says. Now you still get a lot of jibber jabber, but you can make out enough to know what she's talking about. This is one of the reasons why I don't like nursing home very much. They just over medicate all of their patients, so the staff doesn't have to deal with them. There are a lot easier to take care of. If there sleep in the art of their wake. I don't know. I guess maybe I'm just abnormal I would rather have my mother awake and talking to me and have to duck from being it carry around scratches and pinch marks than to have Mama a zombie 24 hours a day 7 days a week 365 days a year. My brother and his wife come down yesterday to visit with Mama for a little while, and Mama actually wanted to get up, go to the dining room table. Drink a cup of milk and talk to them. My mother hasn't done that, in I don't know how long. That she didn't stay long and she didn't carry on any long extensive conversation, but you could understand enough to carry on a small conversation with Mama. So I've said all of this to say that if your loved one is sleeping more than you would like them to adjust their medication yourself. Talk to their doctor and let your doctor know, but the medication is what's making them sleep, or at least in Mama's case. So if you don't want them sleep in 24 hours a day, 7 days a week. I'd say take half of the medication away from you could always give it back to woman. It's too much for you, but at least it might wake him up a little bit you might have a little bit of conversation with them.

Second Guessing Family Decisions

Fri, 07 Jun 2019 21:16:35 +0000

This week we know why Mama, is no longer able to set up from a lying down position on her own. We got up Sunday morning and put Mama on the pot when we got her there we notice that are left leg was swollen as big as a small basketball, and it was as hard as a brick. This prompted me to call mom is Dr. and explain what was going on. The doc said, take her to the emergency room. In the emergency room, They did a sonogram on Mama's left leg and they found a blood clot that was old. They also took some x-rays of the left leg and that told them that Mama had somehow, someway broken her left hip. The only way that they're able to fix a broken hip is surgery. So I talked to the rest of the family that has anything to do a mom, and we have decided that due to mamas age and mamas other physical problems we have decided not to do the surgery. We don't think that Mama would come through the surgery to start with, let alone all the pain that surgery causes. The only reason to have the surgery would be so that Mama could walk or walk without a limp. The family decided that since the scene Mama didn't walk. Anyway, the surgery would not do her any good. But now I'm sitting here second-guessing myself with the family decision not to go on with the surgery. Are we wrong not doing the surgery? I don't know. That's one of the good things about having family support behind you, you can go to them and have them help you make some major decisions. So you don't feel like you're out there all alone, making the decisions that could or could not help your loved one. As well as knowing that you're not the only one that made that decision. It was a decision made by all of you, not just a decision that you made on your own. And knowing that you have that support from the family is a tremendous weight lifted off of one shoulders. One of the things that I did when I did bring Mama home from the hospital is I get a little bit of research on breaking one hip. Some people seem to think that it's a death sentence to have a broken hip, but the majority of it is that if you move if you get to move it around to get the mobility back. It's not a death sentence. A lot of people don't move after a hip break it hurts too much soda don't feel like moving. So they don't move which is a major problem. We have started moving. Mamas legs just a little bit of the time, moving her knees back-and-forth so that she can stretch those legs out a little bit so that she doesn't get to where she's not totally immobilized we've got to work with her legs got to work with her knees to get her to move them to where she is able to stretch them out. She'll need to stretch them out eventually. I think y'all know what I'm talking about their.

Getting Older with Dementia

Sat, 01 Jun 2019 22:30:00 +0000

Getting Old with Dementia Episode # 83 The longer you take care of someone with a mental disease. The more problems you have. In the past 2 weeks, Mama has developed a few new problems, one of which is not being able to set up from a lying down position, all by herself. The longer I'm taking care mom, the harder it's becoming to move her around. Now that she not only can't set up. It's also causing a problem with her standing up even though she has a hold on me. I'm finding out that I am not that it be able to pick her up, hold her up and do what I need to do after a bathroom trip, all by myself. The longer you take care of someone; it begins to dawn on you that there are just some things that you're not going to be able to do all by yourself. It's a lot easier to do some things with 2 or more people than it is with just one person doing it all. I find it much easier to move Mama around when someone else's in the house. We started looking for someone to come help a few hours a week. We were able to find a lady from our church that was willing to come and sit with mom and help us out with mom. And we've had this lady for now, for about 6 months, but now this lady may have the opportunity to make a little more money than we can afford to pay her here. So we believe that were going to lose this lady due to financial needs. Fortunately, Stephanie only has 2 weeks of all of school left, so she'll be here for 3 months or almost 3, to help me with mom. In the fall however, she'll go back to work, which will leave me with mom once again, all by myself. I know how much easier it is to care of Mama with 2 people that it is one, so I contacted Medicare to see if I can get this lady's time paid for. Unfortunately Medicare does not pay for a ny one caring for someone that is not certified in caregiving. However, Medicare did say to talk to mom is Dr. and have Mama's Dr. set things up for in-home care giving, and then Medicare would take care of it from there. With that said, though, let me make it perfectly clear, I am not now nor will I ever plan to put Mama in a nursing home and if you have listened to this podcast for any length of time you know my feelings on nursing homes. Assisted living places may be a little better; however, that's not an option either. I will take care Mama until Mama is gone If I have to crawl on my knees to do it. It's just a lot easier with 2 people that it is one on one.

The Effects of Dementia

Fri, 17 May 2019 23:30:00 +0000

Episode # 82

This episode
is about some feelings I have after reading some Facebook support group posts.
Some news from a very old friend that reinforces the thought that dementia
kills. I also asked the question whether or not we are taking care Mama
correctly or not.

A lot of
times I get into the support groups on Facebook and the post that some people
make often get me upset after reading them, because those post are sometimes
nothing more than complaining about every day, normal things that happen when
your caregiving for someone. Often times I forget the ones that are caregiving
for someone else's loved one. Although at the time, it does not stop me from
getting upset.

I've
received some news from a very old friend that I haven't talked to since I have
been 17 years old that just reinforces the fact that dementia kills. I learned
about 3 months ago that this friend's mother had dementia unfortunately she
lost her battle with dementia on Monday night. I reached out to the old friend
and we had approximately and hours conversation. About her mom and how things
were going with her dad, now that her mom had passed.

While caregiving for someone, you always have in the back to your mind. The question is this right, in my taking care of this person correctly? Should I or shouldn't I do this. These are questions that only you can answer as your taking care of the one that you're taking care of your the only one that knows whether or not it would be easier for you or easier for them with your decisions.

Trying New Things with Dementia

Fri, 03 May 2019 20:41:26 +0000

Caregiving for Dementia Trying New Things with Dementia Episode #81 When you try new things with somebody that has dementia, they don't always react the way you think they will. It's not an easy thing to do. In fact, it's quite difficult because they are used to certain things. And when you change those things they get a little confused, standoffish, and sometimes even a little scared. After having several coffee cups broken, we decided to go get some plastic drinking cups for Mama. We got Mama used to these cups, which was no easy task. She got used to holding something hard and when we give her the plastic clear see-through cups and she grabbed them a little too hard and they would collapse almost to the point of being closed. Fortunately, we got Mama used to the plastic cups. Unfortunately, we ran out of the plastic cups this week so we give Mama back her coffee cups, and unfortunately, it was several days before we got the plastic cups again. So Mama got used to the hard cups once again, and when we got the plastic cups once again, Mama squeezed it a little bit too hard once again. Mama at times during the day will stare up in the ceiling and just go off. Now she's talking to somebody about something, but we just don't know what it is. I go over and try to talk tour try to calm her down a little bit, but unfortunately it seems like I'm not even there at times other time she just lays in the bed and stares out into space and I go over and try to talk to her, rubbing her back, hold her hands or something on that lines and I get the same reaction like I'm not even there. I've mentioned these to the Dr. and the doctor said that was just dementia. It seems like everything knew that mom is doing is just chalked up as dementia. And dementia is just chalked up to her being old. So I'm not really getting any good answers about any of this. I thought about changing doctors, but Mama chose this Dr. when Mama was Mama. Mama liked this Dr. and if I go changing doctors on Mama, it may do Mama more harm than good due to the new factor. Dementia is just terrible. It takes someone who is fearless and turns them into someone who's scared of their own shadow at times. As a kid, I was told a story about my father buying a car that was a standard. The way the story goes is that daddy bought the car because it was a standard and he knew that Mama couldn't drive a standard. So one day he went to work, and Mama Road into the town with him. When he got to his work, Mama told him she was going to take the car. He said you can't do that you can't drive this car. Mama said by the time you quit work all know how to drive it. So that fairness that Mama once had is now gone from Mama, due to dementia. Tonight. May 3, 2019. There will be a live Q&A for dementia on caregiving for dementia's Facebook page. Come join us.

Dementia Exercise

Fri, 26 Apr 2019 19:36:54 +0000

Dementia exercise is what we talk about this week. You see the lady that we have coming in from the church is not only sits with mom, but she also gets Mama fed and puts Mama is a chair with wheels on it and gets Mama to work her legs a little bit. I have seen a change in Mama the past month as we've had this lady for Mama, because this lady doesn't let Mama sleep all day. This lady gets Mama up this lady gets Mama fed this lady gets Mama to work her legs a little bit. This is something that we don't normally do we let Mama sleep the biggest part of the day. I'm hoping to get Mama outside this summer, not only to get Mama a little bit more exercise, but also to exercise myself because I'm getting just a small tummy. So I think that walking Mama around 8/10 of a mile circle hear from the house would help us both tremendously. Yesterday I walked about a mile and a half from the store back to the house and my legs are hurting from the walk. Because I haven't walk ed all winter long. I think getting Mama out in this circle in front of the house would not only exercise mom, but it would do me some good as well. I can tell a difference in Mama since we've gotten this lady from the church to come in and sit with mom. We have been able to sleep on Tuesdays and Thursday nights for most of the night because of this lady working with Mama the entire time that she's here.

An Easter Forgotten

Mon, 22 Apr 2019 21:55:01 +0000

In this episode # 79,

, I talk a little bit about Easter When I was a kid. Easter
is a holiday for the children. When I was a kid, one of the 1^st
signs of spring was Easter. One of the 1^st signs of Easter was the
fact that we were able to go out and get some dress close to where for Easter
Sunday.

I talk about Mama not remembering those times. The times when
we were kids and we went out my front yard running colored eggs for Easter, the
times where we all got candy for Easter Mama doesn't remember any of that.

One of the other things that really stick out is the fact
that Easter is a Christianity holiday. It's a holiday where Christians
celebrate the resurrection of Jesus Christ from the dead.

It used to be that whenever I wanted to know anything about
the Bible or the church. I could go to Mama and say, Mama, what does this mean,
what does that mean? And usually Mama knew right off the top of her head what
things were. But with this devastating disease called, dementia, Mama can no
longer do that. Mama no longer remembers the holidays and things of that sort.

I literally had to look up on the web, the true meaning of
Easter. But anytime we look up anything like that giving with religion on the
web. We always look at our King James version of the Bible. To make sure the
web says exactly what the Bible says. In years past, all would've had to done
would've been gone to Mama.

This dementia has taken all of mamas memories of not just the
Easter holiday, but all of the holidays. Mama no longer remembers any holiday
of the year she doesn't remember doing anything that we did as kids she doesn't
remember anything much about anything. Dementia has turned my mother back into
a child. I seen on Facebook. The other day a picture of 2 people holding onto a
child below that picture was 2 people holding on to an older person and that
made perfect sense, because that's exactly what dementia does. When your kid
you got mommy's fingers in one hand daddy's fingers in the other hand, trying
to walk. As time goes on, we get older our parents get older and sometimes they
get dementia and when that happens, they no longer have your hands, but you
have their hands.

Q&A from Facebook

Fri, 12 Apr 2019 21:29:04 +0000

Once again this week I was on
Facebook. I was in some of the caregiving for dementia support group's, and
I've got a few questions that I had answered and I thought I would just make an
episode out of the questions.

1:33 – 4:40 The 1^st question that I come upon was, someone had
said something about getting their loved one in iPhone and iPad or an android.
I wasn't really sure why they were talking about it, but my advice to the
writer was, don't do that. Here in the house, Mama has times when she likes to
throw things and if we were to get her something like that. Mama is not a very
techie person, but if we were to get her something like that and she got into
this mood where she would want to throw it. She would just throw it not
realizing what it was or how expensive it was. You're not only out the money of
the gadget, but you're also out the money for the contract that you have to
have. Plus you would be out the money to get whatever it was fixed. So I
suggested due to the fact of the expense not to get an iPhone, iPad, or android
for this person.

4:40 – 8:00 Someone was talking about bringing their kids, or grandkids,
or great grandkids, to see their loved one in a nursing home. I suggested to
the writer to bring the children around as much as possible. You see, we now
have a lady from our church come in and sit with mom of 2 days a week. There
are times when this lady needs to bring her grandbaby with her, who is only
about a year old. Mama seems to perk up, Mama seems to be more alert, more
awake. Long story short, Mama seems to be more live with the child in the
house.

8:00 – 10:52 I also suggested to the writer, though if the children were
not able to come around, for the writer to get a baby doll about the size of a
new born baby for their loved one to play with. It'll also stimulate them to
where they are more alive.

10:52 – 12:20 I've seen some film for Facebook, where people have give their
loved one, a newborn size doll baby and their reaction to that doll, and now
I'm not to put Mama on film for Facebook are you to be the one. I've been asked
not to put Mama on any kind of film for anything other than just pictures.

13:30- 16:45 Question number 3 was from another caregiving support group
page on Facebook and the question was whether or not someone with dementia
actually heard what you were saying or not? My answer to this question was, yes
they do hear you when you talk. I know every time we tell mom that we love her
we get yeah, love you too, and sometimes we get. I love me too, and then she'll
laugh. So yeah they do hear you when you talk to them. They understand what you
say.

16:45 – 21:01 question for from of
support group page from Facebook was is it normal not to feel anything when a
loved one that you been taking care of passes. I don't know what to say here. I
hope it's not normal. I hope that I would feel something, but I know from the
family that has taken care of someone there seems to be a double feeling sort
of I guess yeah, there's sadness their sorrow that there they're gone, but
there seems to be as well. A feeling of relief, relief because it's a lot of
pressure off with a off of you relief because it's the blood loved one is not
suffering anymore. But yeah, there's still the sadness there they're still the
morning there. There's still the sorrow there. My only advice that I was able
to give in the Facebook group was that put 1 foot in front of the other take it
day by day, moment by moment, because it gets easier as time goes on. So I've
been told you never forget them, but it seems to get easier as time goes on to
do things without them.21:02
– 29:00 I want to throw out a question
to everybody, the question is would you like to see caregiving for dementia
turn into a live Q&A? Do you think it
would be a better show? Do you think it would be more of a help? Or would you
rather just have me sit here and talk like I have done for the past to have
years?

Getting some Help with your Caregiving

Fri, 29 Mar 2019 21:00:00 +0000

Getting some Help with
your Caregiving

Episode # 77

In this week's episode, I talk a little bit about getting
help with your caregiving, because after dealing with this disease for 7 almost
8 years now, I'm finding it very difficult to do everything by myself.

We have ran on to a lady from our church who is willing to
come in and sit with mom and help take care of mom. And Stephanie and I are
really thrilled with the way she handles mom. This lady, not only helps mom to
the bathroom, she gives mom a bath, dresses mom, and even takes a little bit of
toothpaste on one of her fingers with a Playtex glove to brush mamas gums and
tongue. She also fixes food and not just for mom, but for whoever's in the
house.

We've had help in here before through an agency, but that
become very expensive. Here in the DC area. They are $20 an hour and up, but
they do not take care of mom, the way that this lady from the church does. They
command and they would help mom go to the bathroom when necessary, but that was
pretty much it. The rest of the time they would sit on their stuff and do
nothing. If you had them do anything else. There was an extra charge for it.

I think it will be a good thing to have this lady and from
the church, not only to help out with mom, but I believe it'll help me out, not
only physically but mentally as well. It'll give me time to get out of the
house and go do something either around the house or actually leave the house to
do some things that we been putting off for months, and some of the may even be
for a couple of years. Having this lady command may even allow Stephanie and I
do have date nights. Where we can go for dinner and a movie once in a while,
which is something that we have not had for quite a while.

If you're able to get some help in whether that be someone
from your church someone from your neighborhood a sibling or someone on that
lines. It'll be a tremendous help to you. It may even give you back a glimpse
of your own life, even if it's only for a couple of hours.

I think that I will be able to get not only the physical
break, I need, but I think I will also get a mental break, which may be more
important even though I can get out a little bit with Michael and Stephanie
here. I know how Michael and Stephanie are, and that leaves me. Still worrying
about what's going on here at house with mom. Having this lady for
approximately 2 weeks, Stephanie and I just absolutely love the way she treats
mom. I also think that having this lady help with Mama will be a good exercise
for Mama, because it gives Mama a chance to get used to someone else dealing
with her, besides myself and the family.

Not Understanding Dementia

Sat, 16 Mar 2019 18:46:46 +0000

Not Understanding
Dementia

Episode # 76

This week's episode, I talk a little bit about some of the
things that I don't understand about dementia. One of the things that I don't
understand is where dementia comes from 2 how you get dementia and 3 why does
it act the way it does.

It doesn't seem that anyone knows exactly where or how you
get this devastating disease of dementia. No one seems to know why it acts the
way it does. There are some that say it's connected to concussions, but the
problem I have with that so far is the fact that, as far as I know. Mamas never
had a concussion. So if dementia is connected to concussions why or how did mom
get it.

I also don't understand the way it affects some people so
quickly because at episode 46, I talk about your personal
appearance, because I had gotten my haircut and shave my beard. Episode 46 is a
recording of the reactions I got from mom. When I recorded episode 46 Mama was
so happy that I cleaned up. She was happy she ran her fingers through my hair
and I got a lot of goo goo gaga from her. Approximately 4 days ago I got
totally 360° different reaction from her, when I got my haircut and shave my
beard once again. This reaction that I received 4 days ago was a terrifying
look she didn't want anything to do with me. She didn't want to talk to me. She
didn't want to have anything at all to do with me. She was absolutely terrified
of me.

I don't have any real good explanations as to why she was so
terrified, other than the fact that it was a quick and sudden change. I don't
believe she handle the quick and sudden change very well. I think she was very
confused as to who I was, so that would explain the terrifying look that I
getting for approximately 4 or 5 hours.

I also don't understand why for some reason, Mama is getting
nightmares. You know when you have small children, your 1^st reaction
to a nightmare is to just put your child in the bed with you and let them go to
sleep as you are comforting them and let them know that it's all right. You
can't do that with an adult who has dementia that has nightmares. The only
thing you can do an adult is just comfort them. The best you can sit with them
hold their hand and love on them until they calmed down from their nightmare.
They will eventually just fall asleep in their own bed.

Medications are another thing that I don't understand, When
you have a child who's on medication, you can somewhat force that child to take
its medication. With an adult, you can't force them to take their medication
when they don't want to take it. Trying to force them to take their medications
is only going to upset them, which is going to upset you, which is going to
upset them even more, and that's not good for either one of you. The only thing
you can do with their medication time is to take your time and if they don't
want to take it on time back off and come back in a little while and they will
eventually take their medications. You may end up happening to do this several
times in order for them to take their medication.

These are just some of the areas that I do not understand why
dementia acts the way it does. Mama never had nightmares before, Mama never had
a problem taking medications before. These are some signs of the dementia
getting a little worse. I believe. The only thing I can think to say is don't
lose your patience with them, which I know is easier said than done, been there
done that. When you feel yourself losing it just walk away. They'll be okay
even if they're on the pot they will be okay. Come back and just tell them you
love them, calm them down, if you can, because one day sooner than you may
think they may not be here to tell them that you love them. They may not be
here to give you problems with their medication. They may not be here to wake
up from a nightmare. So just love on
them as much as you can now, because one day they may not be here at all.

Mental Stress

Fri, 08 Mar 2019 23:28:13 +0000

Mental Stress

Episode # 75

In this episode, I talk a little bit about mental stress while
caregiving for our loved one. There are a whole lot of things that goes on that
I don't share in the podcast. There may come a time when I'm able to do so, but
as of right now I don't feel comfortable sharing everything that goes on.

There's a lot of times when there is of good bit of back and
forth between Stephanie and I, Michael and I, Stephanie and I and Michael that
we don't go into in the podcast.

There's a lot of things that Mama does and says that she
would not do or say, if it were not for this devastating disease of dementia
and there are times when you have to step back and catch your breath to where
you can handle some of the things that are said and done that are quite hurtful
at times

I do not have any real good answers for anyone who's dealing
with stress while they are caregiving. My solution a whole lot of the time is
getting on the computer. This is where I spend most of my time that I'm not
caregiving for mom.

I also honestly do not think that the doctors have very good
answers, either, except to push pills. They don't even seem to know where this
dementia comes from, or even how you get it.

You also have some mental stress when you 1^st
start taking care of a loved one with their medications, especially if you are
on medication yourself for an issue. You worry about whether or not you're
giving them too much or not enough of their medications, but you work through
it and you relax as time goes on.

Things that may help in your caregiving

Fri, 01 Mar 2019 22:00:00 +0000

In this episode, episode # 74 I'm a little bit all over the place with some things that I found on Facebook. I had joined some caregiving for dementia and Alzheimer's support groups on Facebook. With being in those support groups, I have been able to come up with some really good content.

One of those things that I've seen in
these groups is someone had asked a question, If the medication that they were
giving their loved one would help? With dealing with dementia for or the past
6, 7, 8 years, I can honestly say that the medication does not seem to help a
whole lot other than the fact of making the one that you giving the medicine to
sleep all day long. I would rather have mom awake a little bit and have a
little bit of a hard time, then I would to have Mama sleep and be a zombie all
the time.

I also saw someone talking in the
group about putting their what I believe their mother in a home. they were
talking about their mothers dog having arthritis, and something about whether
or not to let their mother in the room when they put the dog down or whether or
not to go ahead and put the mother in the home before they put the dog down.
Well I'm a dog lover. So I would not put the dog down simply because he has
arthritis. I would not put the dog down simply because I was going to put my
mother in a home. My advice to this person was to see if the home would not
take the dog as well. I believe there are some nursing homes that will also
take pets. I talk about our dog here Bucky. It seems to perk Mama up a little
bit when Bucky comes around and is ready to play.

The other thing I have noticed that
seems to perk Mama up a little bit is the fact that our sitter that we have
come in to sit with mom. When we have to go out is the fact that the sitter has
a one year old grandchild that she brings with her and the baby seems to perk
Mama up as well. But then I also talk about Michael coming home from work that
seems to perk Mama up a little bit as well.

There was also someone in this
Facebook group that was talking about being harassed by members of the family.
My advice to that person was simply, don't answer the phone. If they're not
around to help you to give you support in any way shape or form. It's really
none of their business. How, where or what you do to take care of the one that
your taking care of. I know in my instance I have 3 siblings that have just
absolutely abandoned mom not once but twice and I'm not sure that I'd even let
them in to see mom. Now after 6 years. Because it would just confuse mom, mom
wouldn't have no idea who they are or anything else. They haven't been around
to know what's going on in the past 6, 7, 8 years. So why would I worry about
what they say about how to take care mom. They haven't been around. I really
don't care what they say. Sometimes you just have to tell them to kiss your you
know what, and go on about your every day caregiving for the one that your
caregiving for.

I will

Fri, 22 Feb 2019 19:30:00 +0000

Care Giving for Dementia I will Episode 73 I come to you again this week with yet another poem from a Face book group that I had joined. The poem or saying that was posted was posted by Michelle DeSocio. The saying is as follows. I will When you forget I will remember for the both of us When you get lost I will find you When you are sad I will be sad with you When the fear comes I will comfort you When you cry I will dry your tears When you lash out at me I will not be angry When you repeat I will have patience When you forget my name I will understand When you can't eat I will feed you When your legs fail I will carry you When you long for home I will be your safe place When your journey is ending I will be by your side I will love you for eternity I will I talk a good bit in the podcast about Mama being sad. She seems to be said so much. She cries out of the blue for absolutely no reason at all and I tell her, there's no reason to cry. I do my best not to get angry when she lashes out at us, but I fail miserably at times. Mama has already forgotten my name and I do understand, although it does hurt. There are times when Mama can't feed herself. Now I'm not sure if that is the dementia or if it's her Parkinson's, but there are times when she can't feed herself and we do start to feed her and that she try so desperately to take over at times. Sometimes she can and sometimes she can't. Mamas legs of already failed or she can no longer walk. She can barely stand up by herself, so we have to move her wherever she needs to go. And yes, Mama also is one that lingers for home, but I'm not sure if that is her thinking that she's in a nursing home. Perhaps and she's wanting to come back here to the house or is that she wants to go back to West Virginia, where she is originally from. I am not sure. I don't even want to think about, mama's journey ending. I don't want to think about the day that Mama is no longer in the living room. No longer with us to tell her I love her, even after you she's gone. I will love her for eternity. Just because they're gone, you don't stop loving them.

Mistakes

Fri, 15 Feb 2019 23:27:15 +0000

Care Giving for Dementia Episode # 72 Mistakes I talk a lot in this episode about mistakes in life and caregiving and mistakes in general. We all make mistakes and we will make mistakes and till death. This is just part of life and no one or anything will stop you from making mistakes, whether that be in life in general, or within your caregiving journey. I don't know about you all, but I know that when caregiving journey is said and done, I will always ask myself, certain questions like, did I do everything I could for Mama, what did I do that we should not have done things like that. I've always been told that you should never do anything in haste. The decisions that you make in a haste are always the ones that you regret later on. I know when I go to buy a car. I have learned never to buy the car 1st time you look at it. I always end up regretting it. Every car bought in a haste I have regretted buying. In our caregiving journey. I know that there are mistakes that we've made. I know that there are things that we regret but you've got to do what's best for you at times, whether or not everybody agrees with you. You've got to do what you need to do how you need to do it. There may be times when you have to tell somebody to kiss her, but and they may or may not be helping you in your caregiving journey, but they think they have the right to give their opinion on what you doing how you're doing it, where you're doing it. I talk about last week's episode of this podcast. Not knowing whether or not I should of recorded data in the state that I was. I was really emotional with last week's podcast because the poem. Don't ask me to remember. Really got to me. Really bothered me because mom and I have such a close relationship and I know for fact that I'm losing her. I know that one of these days. Hopefully not very soon, but one of these days mom is going to be gone. I also talk about society and the fact that society does not learn from its mistakes. Case in point. Solomon and Gomorrah. From the Bible society has not learned from its mistakes in society. Web only will never learn from its mistakes causing changes on a dime. We also talked this week about whether or not it was a mistake to take some mamas medication away from her. Because of the agitation that she is been going through. I talk to her doctor about it. Nice light will give her this one medication back which will help with the agitation. Yes, this one particular medication has helped with the agitation, but it's also taken some of Mama's appetite away from her. I think. She seems to want to do nothing more than sleep now with this additional dose. Now, Mama sleeps good bit. Anyway, but I do believe that this additional dose of medication has made it the sleeping a little worse. I talk about whether or not it would be a mistake to mention patreon, as a way to possibly make a little bit of money on the podcast wondering whether or not it's a mistake to me been mentioned wondering if it'll upset some people that I'm even thinking about it. So I haven't put it out there yet. I just made one up trying to decide whether or not it's right to do. It may even be a mistake to mention it in the podcast. It may even be a mistake to mention it here and show notes. I guess I said all this just to say you going to make mistakes until death. We are human. No one is perfect. No one will get away without making some mistakes. Somewhere along in their life, whether that is a day-to-day thing or whether that will be in your caregiving journey you're whether that will be in some other form. We all make mistakes. We all have to let our children at the proper time decide whether or not to drive on icy snowy wet roads. For me it's a very hard thing to do to let Michael decide whether or not to drive on icy roads because I know what icy snowy roads can do to a car been there and done that. So the only thing I can say is that we supposed to learn from our mistakes, we are supposed to teach our children about our mistakes and hopefully they won't make the same mistakes that we did, although they may. At the end of each day, Make sure your loved ones know you love them know that you hear form let your kids know that you love them every day. Let your one that your caregiving for know that you are there, for them.

Do not ask me to remember

Fri, 08 Feb 2019 22:00:00 +0000

Caregiving for Dementia Don't ask me to Remember Episode # 71 One of the things I constantly hear from veteran podcasters is be where your audience is. The people that are listening to your podcast are hanging out in certain places such as Facebook, LinkedIn, that kind of thing. You need to be where they are. You need to be able to talk to them. You need to find out what they're thinking what they 're talking about what they have questions about. So this week I went and joined some caregiving for dementia support groups on Facebook. This week's episode. Don't ask me to remember is something that was shared by Sherrie Smith in one of the Facebook groups that I had joined.

It reads as follows.

Don't ask me to remember.

Do not try to make me understand.

Let me rest and know you're with me.

Kiss my cheek and hold my hand.

I'm confused beyond on your concept.

I am sad, sick and lost.

All I know is that I need you with me at all cost.

Do not lose your patience with me.

Do not scold or curse my crying.

I can't help the way I'm acting.

Can't be different though I try.

Just remember that I need you.

The best of me is gone.

Please don't fail to stand beside me.

Love me tell my life is done.

I found it very hard to read that on Facebook. I also had a hard time doing this podcast on this subject. Because, I too like Sherrie Smith, every time I read it. I think of mom. After reading this and working on the podcast. I give this poem to Michael and Stephanie to read. As I thought they didn't take the saying or the poem the same way I did. Though they did read it, and they do seem to understand it. It just doesn't seem to affect either one of them. The way did me. I guess that's because mom is my Mama, and Mama will always be Mama. And I will always love her even after her life is done. Again, I'd like to give a big shout out to Sherrie Smith, who shared this poem, saying or whatever you would like to call it on Facebook. Thank you so much for sharing this.

Why

Fri, 25 Jan 2019 23:12:17 +0000

I talked this week in a podcast about why society thinks it's all right, just to put sick people, your loved ones that you are caring for in a long-term care facility. I talked to mom is Dr. and that was one of the things that he was talking about was putting her in a nursing home. I don't understand why people are constantly asking, why mamas not in a nursing home ? She's not in a nursing home because I refuse to put her in a nursing home and as long as I am physically and mentally capable of taking care of her. She will not see the inside of a nursing home. That's not to mention the expense of a nursing home. I mean, were talking $10,000 a month. Not only that but nursing home will take care of her , the way I will. They'll doper up some much to where she won't even know whether it's day or night out. The lever sit in wet and dirty diapers for Lord knows how long. So no, she will not see the inside of a nursing home. As long as I can take care. I'm not doing anything for Mama that Mama didn't do for me when I was coming up. It's my time to take care of Mama, instead of Mama take care of me. She's take care me all her life. It's my turn to take care of her. Mamas had a hard life. She married twice, once to an alcoholic and the 2nd one was just an SOB. I'm sure in those 2 marriages there were times when we were kids that she would've wanted to go out and couldn't because she couldn't afford a babysitter. There are time s when Stephanie, I would like to go out as well. However, the expensive in home care is, just like a babysitter was when we were coming up.

Being Worried

Mon, 21 Jan 2019 05:13:42 +0000

In this episode, I talk about things that I worry about. Things like whether or not mommy's eats, whether or not were giving her the right medication, or even the fact whether or not the doctors are giving her too much medication. I also talk a little bit about worrying about the family being out in bad weather. Mama seems to be getting more and more agitated. She doesn't always want to what we needed to do. I don't know whether that's because we've taken some of the medication away from her or if it's because the dementia is getting worse. If we give her the medication the doctor wants us to give her. She sleeps all the time. I would prefer her to be up and awake and agitated and be able to talk. It's not really talking to her. Then I would for her to be sleeping all the time. When your caregiving for someone you have to put that person ahead of everything else that you may be worried about, because they cannot take care of themselves. You need to worry about what they need more so than the other worries that you may have in your day-to-day life no matter what those consequences of not paying attention to those worries may be. I find myself worrying about the family being out on the street in bad weather, although, they are not children. That does not stop me from worried about them on the roads, when the roads are bad due to the weather. Sometimes you just have to let your kids learn by mistakes. I know when I was a little younger than Michael. My older brother tried to tell me how to drive on bad roads. I thinking I know better. I ended up tearing up a couple cars on bad roads in winter. Although I try to tell Michael about bad roads, there are times that we just need to let him learn for himself. I've said all this just to say that you could worry too much. Worry causes stress and stress may cause other physical problems. You can worry yourself to death. You can't worry about every little thing. There may be things that you do need to worry about, but there are a whole lot more that you don't need to worry about, in spite of the consequences of not worrying about those things.

Inheritance

Sat, 12 Jan 2019 05:12:57 +0000

I talk just a little bit about some things that you inherit from your family. I don't mean the inheritance that you get when someone dies and leaves you money or any kind of material possession. What I'm talking about is your hair color your eye, your nose your mouth that kind of thing. When your firstborn. People always say you look like this when we look like that when and that's the kind of inheritance and want to talk to you this week about. The thing that makes you, you is what I want to talk about. You know your outlook on life. Your attitude your temper your bullheaded all that kind of stuff that just makes you-you is what I want to talk about this week. Every once in a while I tell Mama that I have inherited her bullheadedness and daddy's temper. And most of the time that works to get her to do what we needed to do, but it doesn't work always so what I mean by that is the fact that all I need to do is hold my ground until she gets tired enough to where she'll do what we needed to do. Most of the time that works. And the other times all you can do is just wait until she gets tired. A lot of times, though, you also inherit your family's health issues. I believe that You inherit cancer from your family, or even something as mental as this devastating disease of dementia. I believe that my grandmother had it on Mama's side toward the end of her life because my sister and I were sitting on grandma's front porch and grandma looked at us and said I want to go home. My sister and I looked at each other and said grandma, you are home you're sitting on your front porch. Nothing we could say or do would convince her that she was sitting on her own front porch at her own house. I don't believe the doctors know where this mental disease comes from. I don't believe they know what causes it. However, I believe that the doctors may think that you may inherit dementia, or Alzheimer's. If the doctors seem to think that this disease of dementia is inherited what's the chances of your kids getting it. Or even your grandkids may even get it. My brother and I worried a little bit about the this to dementia, because where both starting to forget some things. But the doctors seem to think that it's just part of getting older to. But is that or is that not the start of dementia, who knows? Even though I'm putting Stephanie and Mikey through this mental disease with my mother, I'm not sure that if I get this disease that I'd want to put either one of them through this same ordeal. Definitely something to think about. I'm not sure that there's anything that, be able to do about that though because the price of nursing homes is outrageous. Nursing homes in this area are $10,000 and up per month and it's just ridiculous.

Christmas Not

Sat, 05 Jan 2019 03:55:22 +0000

I called this Christmas not due to the way Mama reacted to Christmas this year. In 4 years. We have went from being able to go Christmas shopping cannot even knowing what Christmas is. 4 years ago, Mama was able to go Christmas shopping for self. 3 years ago, she was able to tell somebody to go get something for somebody for Christmas. Last year she was able to open her own presence. In 2018 Mama doesn't even know what Christmas is. She was unable to open any of her presence. She was barely able to stay awake for supper. One thing that I do know for sure is although we may be losing mom. She has not forgotten how to give good hugs. Quite often anymore when I go out when I come home I usually need a hug from Mama. One day this week, Stephanie and I went to the movie we saw the Clint Eastwood's latest movie The Mule. The Mule is not a Dirty Harry movie. However, for being 88 years old, still able to talk, walk, drive act and direct this movie is awesome. However, when your caregiving for someone you need to be very careful because you'll find yourself wondering why the one that your caregiving for can't do some the things that other people are doing. You'll find yourself asking well, In my case, why can't Mama walk. Why can't Mama talk, Why can't Mama this, why can't Mama that. You'll find yourself begrudging the ones that can do all the things that the one your caregiving for can't. As far as the rest of the family, we all enjoyed Christmas, including the dog who we splurged on this year. Stephanie decided that she wanted to get the dog a doggie bed. For some reason or another, the dog likes to sleep in our beds and it just isn't room at times for the dog. Michael was a hard when you get for this year, because he's not a child anymore. He does have his own car, so Stephanie and I got him some stuff for it. Unfortunately, one of the things we had gotten him. He already had, so he needed to take that one item back. New Year's used to be a big deal when I was coming up. We're from a small town in West Virginia, where everybody knows everybody. When I was coming up the neighbors used to get on the front porches and bring their pots and pans and at midnight would just bang away on their pots and pans just make a little bit of noise for the new year. We also had a train yard down over the hill and the trains used to make the horns blow at midnight on New Year's Eve, New Year's Day. Since I've gotten older Yeah, although there are some noisemakers not everyone makes noise on New Year's Eve. However, I ended up setting off both car horns a couple times to bring in a new year. It was the only way I could think how to make a little bit of noise for the neighbors. The dog didn't seem to mind the noise he went out and barked at the cars. We thought that was so funny. Mom on the other hand, I don't believe even knew what was going on. I believe she slept through all of the noise, What little there was. I have also made a website change Baby Mountain Radio.com is now its own website, at HTTPS://babymountainradio.com as well as Caregiving for Dementia is its own website at HTTPS://caregivingfordementia.com. However, you can get to one from the other. I felt that Baby Mountain Radio was confusing, so I wanted to separate the show website from a network or production house website. Baby Mountain Radio.com will be where all of my online content will be. I have hopes of adding more podcast in the very near future. I'd like to take this time to say thank you for listening to me for the past 2 years. I was looking at the stats and noticed that I have not been as frequent as I thought I was. In 2019. I hope that I'll be more frequent with episodes. Again, the me say thank you for listening. Happy New Year's to all have a great year and will talk to you next week.

I'm a Baby

Fri, 21 Dec 2018 22:00:00 +0000

I'm a Baby Episode # 66 In this episode, I talk about babies. Were only a few days away from Christmas? And a lot of people are talking about the baby Jesus. Now I don't know whether it's all the talk of Christmas here to house, or if Mama honestly thinks she is a baby because of her dementia. This week here in the house, Mama has called herself a baby. You may find yourself in your 50s thinking about whether or not you want to have another child. I would suggest to you, though. Before you take that step move your elderly parents in, especially if they have a physical or mental problem to where they need help 24 7 365. You see, you may find yourself in a position that stuff and I've found ourselves in where was a baby, you can do what you want when you want, how you want, but when you're taking care of an adult. It's not that easy. You find yourself without time to explain to them what, why and how you doing things. From time to time you may wish you were of a certain age, but you want to go back to that age. No one would you know now. Everybody knows that that is impossible. However, in mom's case, she's a toddler mentally so she reacts as a toddler at times. You find yourself dealing with an adult with a toddler's mentality and that is not always easy to do. Now I realized that people have to work. But what I don't understand is how you can just put your parents in a nursing home and never, ever go see them. There are 5 of us kids left and 3 of us kids don't even bother coming around to see mom and haven't for about 4 years. They were around for the 1st 2 years, and Mama was Mama, but they have just up and disappeared. They don't even bother calling anymore. Now I realized that Mama can't talk on the phone anymore but still that's no reason just to disappear and not even see your mother, your parents at all. We're just a few days away from Christmas, and I'm not sure that were going to bother decorating again this year for Christmas. Because of the way Mama Reacts, but the problem of it is, is I don't know whether that reaction is a bad reaction or is it just the fact of the pretty lights, and the pretty packages. Or is it a reaction of fear? I'm not sure I don't know that I will ever know for sure. As for myself, I'm a big Christmas buff I like all the lights in the packages. But it's a lot of work for one person to put everything up. And there's not a lot of time in the evening when Stephanie, Michael come home from work to do a whole lot. So I'm not sure that were going to decorate again this year. I'm just not sure. If you're still reading, I would like to say thank you for reading this far as I wrap up the show notes. I would just like to say Merry Christmas and a happy new year to all. If you hit www.babymountainradio.com. You may run into it being down I'm working on the website, but it shouldn't take me more than just a few hours to do what I need to do. If you find the website down. Please, please keep trying to leave me a message. I'd appreciate it.

Frustrations

Fri, 14 Dec 2018 22:05:18 +0000

Caregiving for Dementia Frustrations Episode 65 In this week's episode of care giving for dementia, I discuss some of the frustrations that I find myself with taking care of Mama with her dementia. Some of the things that she does really frustrates me because their things that she taught me how to do. It's the simple things that we all take for granted that she can no longer do. When you're the caregiver of someone there are a lot of things that you do to keep them safe and healthy that they may or may not understand why or what you are doing. Now you think about it. If you had a mental disease to the point where you did not know what was going on around you and somebody was doing things to you, for you, with you that you did not understand what they were doing or why they were doing it. How frustrating would that be for you? I find it very frustrating trying to keep mom healthy and safe. When Mama doesn't realize what's going on. Mamas to the point where she can't walk, so she has to be picked up and moved every place that she goes, no matter why he's going. And at times you have to move her whether or not she's ready to be moved. In those times you may get some reaction from the one that your caregiving for. That's totally out of character for that particular person if they were in their right mind. You may fix a big meal for dinner and they don't want to eat. I find this very frustrating because I have taken all the time to fix the meal. More worrisome than that is the fact that if they don't eat enough to stay healthy very long. As you get older your body gives up some functionality. One of those functionalities of getting old is the fact that you no longer have the hearing that you once did. I understand that as you get older the part of the hearing that you lose are the high pitches. This makes perfect sense, because when Michael or I talked to mom, mom seems to be able to understand what we say, versus what the wife says. This I think is due to the fact that the wife has a higher pitch to her voice, then Michael where I do. This is frustrating, more so for the wife, because Mama can't hear much at all from her. I'm finding it little frustrating myself, because a lot of times I end up repeating and repeating and repeating what I say as well. Caregiving for someone is not always the thing that causes the frustration. I honestly believe the frustration is just a part of life. I was brought up that you didn't stay out after midnight unless you were working. This is something that has stuck with me all through my life. I'm finding this very frustrating, because the boy doesn't always want to come home before midnight. Some of the conversations I have with the wife. I feel like I'm on a merry-go-round and that's also very frustrating. Getting interrupted doing things is also very frustrating. I don't know about you but I'm also finding it very frustrating the way this country is headed. I find it very frustrating that you can't say what you want to say anymore in his country without someone getting their feelings hurt. So you see, it's not only caregiving for someone that adds the frustration to life, but other things as well. I don't have any real good solutions for the frustration that you may feel whether that be caregiving for someone or some the other situations of said in the above but what I have figured out is that if you just walk away for a time. The frustration seems to relax a bit, after giving it some time to work its way out. Taking time to be by yourself releases the frustration as well.

Putting Things Off

Fri, 30 Nov 2018 22:00:00 +0000

Care Giving for Dementia Putting Things Off Episode # 64 This week's episode once again brings us to the holiday season. I discuss the past 2 years of the holiday season, along with discussing whether or not once again to decorate for Christmas. Decorations seem to irritate mom with her dementia. Christmas has lost its meaning. Michael is all grown up so Christmas doesn't mean a whole lot to Stephanie and I anymore right now. Put things off, at times because you either have time and no money or you have money and no time to do the things that you want to do. So they get put off. And a lot of times they get put off permanently do to money. I'm finding myself putting a lot of things off right now and it's got nothing to do with having money or the time to do them got to do with taking care of Mama. When you're younger you put off a lot of things, thinking that you'll get to them eventually. The longer you put them off the more they can cost you. Stephanie and I've found ourselves in situations where if we to handle things a little differently if we had done things just a shade different than what we did we would not be in situations that we found ourselves into. Stephanie and I put off getting married for now that happened 10 years because we didn't think we could afford it, but if we to wait another year and a half another 18 months Stephanie's dad would not abandon our wedding. We put off buying a house for years, cause we didn't think we could afford it. We were living in an apartment and the apartment had radiator heat know really is no adjustment for radiator heat it's either on or it's off. There was no air-conditioning for the apartment and so we talk to the management and by the time we paid the rent paid the electric bill for the air conditioner and we wanted a dog as well. So by the time you took all 3 of those payments we had enough to buy this house. This house is not the Taj Mahal. It's not Trump Tower, but it is a roof over our heads. It keeps us warm. It keeps us dry and it fits into the budget. And that's one thing that I've learned a little bit from mom lived within your budget. You don't have to have the best you just need what you have to have. There's so many things that I want to do with this podcast with the name baby mountain radio, but I'm finding myself having to put those things off. Not only do to the fact of not having a lot of money, but taking care mom is priority right now. So I putting things off with doing a whole lot because of that. Mama could tell that something was going on long before anybody else new, including the doctors. She didn't know exactly what was going on, but she knew something wasn't right. So before she got too bad Mama had some things put down on paper for legal situations. However, there was one thing that she put off because she didn't think she or I you one would need it, and unfortunately that one thing that she put off has cost her a few dollars. Not a whole lot but a few dollars. Sometimes putting things off may not cost you, but it cost your children. Which may or may not be good? See their 6 of us kids and 3 of us have just up and disappeared for the past 2 to 3 years. And that hurts because you think they'll be around, and then all of a sudden they're not there and haven't been there. Several years ago, I promise mom that she would never see the inside of a nursing home. So you see, I don't care who it is or who isn't around as long as I am physically and mentally capable of taking care Mama. Mama is staying right here at home with me. I hope you enjoy listening to this episode of care giving for dementia.

Being Forced to Stay Gone

Fri, 16 Nov 2018 22:00:00 +0000

Caregiving for Dementia

Being Forced to Stay Gone!

Episode # 63

I just got back from DC pod Fest. I had to force myself to stay away from the house because I was mentally still here, still taking care of Mama. I found it very difficult to focus on the sessions at DC pod Fest because I couldn't get my mind to let go of the caregiving.

I want to thank Jennifer Crawford and her team at DC pod Fest for putting together a great event. The event was fabulously put together. The event was jam-packed full of great podcasting information. I'm already looking forward to DC pod Fest in 2019.

With that said, though I found it very difficult to focus on any of the sessions that I was attending because I couldn't get my mind off of what was going on here at the house. I was still caregiving for my mother even though I was physically gone. My mind would not leave the house.

One of the problems that the main caregiver for someone has is getting away from all the caregiving. In other words, you may get physically away. You may be able to physically leave the caregiving to someone else, but you are mentally still the one caregiving for that one. That's the situation I found myself in this weekend. Yes, I physically got away, but mentally I could not leave the house.

DC pod Fest was Friday evening and all day Saturday, I left the house at about 4-ish on Friday evening, because the event starts until 7 PM. So, at about 6:30 PM I called to check to see how things were here to house. I was told they were fine. Go and enjoy your event. So I get I enjoyed Friday nights event. Up until about 11 PM. When I found myself all alone, I was wondering what was going on. So I call home again to see how things were going on. Everything was fine. I was told she got her medicine and now she was sleeping.

I was ready to come home Friday night at 11 o'clock. Only through the support of the boy and the wife was able to stay and get some sleep Friday night, but I didn't get to sleep that I thought I would. Mama usually gets me up around 2 AM-ish and around 4:30 AM and wouldn't you know I got up around 2 AM-ish and around 4 AM-ish. I got up at 5:30 AM to go to the event for Saturday. I thought about calling but then I thought no they're in bed. Nobody wants to be wake up at 5:30 AM when a phone call.

I did fairly well. Saturday up until about 8 AM-ish and that's all I could stand I had to call and find out what was going on. I called about 4 times to see what was going on. And finally, the boy told me he said daddy quit calling she's okay, she's fine. Go and enjoy the rest of the weekend. Well, I didn't quit calling but without that kind of support. I've come home much earlier than I should have.

Sunday morning I came home around 9 AM and the wife was awake and had just gotten up, but the boy and mom were still sleeping. I was home about an hour or so, and Mama woke up. So I went out to the living room, which is her bedroom and as soon as she saw me her face just lit up. She had missed me. She was glad to see me. Then at times, she asked me who I am.

I understand while I was gone on Saturday, my brother and his wife came down to see mom for her birthday which was Sunday, and now I wasn't here, but in times past. Mama recognizes my brother's wife over my brother at times. Now the longer they're here, she gets to recognize my brother.

I guess that's one of the strangest things about this devastating disease called, dementia. Sometimes, Mama recognizes us and sometimes she doesn't. No matter how long it's been since she seen you.

Caregiver Gone

Tue, 06 Nov 2018 22:00:00 +0000

Caregiving for Dementia Caregiver Gone Episode # 62 This week's show, I've called caregiver gone because I am the main caregiver and I'm going to be gone for almost 2 days. Although I'm going to be fairly close to home. I'm not going to be right here to take care of Mama. With me not going to be home for 2 days that leaves Michael and Stephanie to take care Mama and they do things different than I do, and Mama's not used to that. Mama is used to me mom is used to the way I do things. So I'm worried that the change may be a bit hard for Mama. I have left the house for a couple of hours here in a couple hours there. Leaving either Michael or Stephanie to take care of mom, since mamas gotten sick. I haven't left her for 2 days. Every time I leave the house. I feel a little guilty because I'm the one that's needs to be taking care mom. This will be the 1st time that I've gone off and left mom for any length of time and yes I do feel extremely guilty. When Stephanie and I went to our support group for caregivers' One of the things that they tried to push for was taking care of yourself 1st. It was said. If you don't take care yourself you not going to be able to take care of the one you're caring for. That made perfect sense then and it makes perfect sense now. However, leaving for 2 days or leaving for any amount of significant time I feel very guilty, but I guess feeling guilty is just part of taking care of someone. You feel like you're not doing your job. You feel like something's going to happen to the one you're caring for If you leave them for any amount of time. Whether or not your taking care of someone, life goes on. There are things that happen. There are things that you want to do. There are things that you do that may or may not take you away from the one you're caring for X amount of time. Some of the things that you want to do cost money it cost you to do some things. And you need to decide whether or not taking a break from caregiving is worth it. DC pod Fest is this weekend and I decided to go. I've put the money out to go, but I still feel guilty even putting the money out to go to something where our learn something. I'll meet new friends I'll be able to see some friends from last year. It's a year later, when mom's a little worse, so the guilt a little stronger, but needing a break is even, a stronger need. It'll be interesting to see how things go with me. Not being here. When I get back what kind of attitude, well I come back to. Will they want to stick around or will they want to leave for a few hours. Only time will answer this question. Only time will help Mama get used to other caregivers.

Doing The Hard Things

Tue, 30 Oct 2018 19:27:46 +0000

Caregiving for Dementia Doing the Hard Things Episode # 61 In this episode, I discuss a few things that Stephanie and I are having a real hard time doing. The older you get more hard things there are for you to do. When you're in school homework is hard and the higher you get in school, the harder the homework becomes. Will this week's episode of care giving for dementia, I talk about things here in the house that are really hard for Stephanie and I to do. When I talk about things that are hard to do. I'm talking about raise your kids the right way. It's harder to turn them loose when they become young adults. Stephanie and I find it very hard to turn loose of the boy in fact, there are times when we telling he still can't do something, and he's like daddy. I've seen movies and I'm sure that you gone through a in your life to where someone has passed away, and there spouse doesn't want to go through their things. They don't want to go through their things because it's too hard. Well, I've had just a little taste of that this weekend. You see, Stephanie and I trying to get things ready for winter switching the summer close over to our winter clothes and were running on to some of mom disclosed that we know Mama will never wear again. Mamas lost so much weight that you will not get into most of her clothes that she got in the closet. Stephanie, I have very little room so we can't hold on to everything that Mama has we bought a new close and she's lost so much weight. She won't be able to where this year. So were finding ourselves making the hard decisions of keeping some of moms close throwing some of moms close away or donating some of them. And then there are some of those close that I just can't talk about right now. Because there Mama's favorite clothes, their close up, Mama wore all the time. In fact, there's one dress hanging in the closet that will probably be the last dress, Mama ever wears. Mamas made a lot of her clothes when she was younger I can remember coming home from school and finding mom on the living room floor with material in this tissue paper thing that was called a pattern spread all out through the living room floor. She take this tissue paper thing in panic to the material cut the material out and take the material over the sewing machine and so the pieces together. Mama used to make a lot of pretty close herself. I remember one time she made us kids pants and vests to go to school in. I'm glad I was a kid. Cause pants look so funny. But there's some close of mamas made here. Some of her winter sweaters she crocheted some bedspreads that she crocheted fact; I've got the last bedspreads she ever crocheted about 3 years ago. I don't want to get rid of those. I don't want to throw those out. I don't want to donate those but yet on the other hand, we can't keep everything. Then Mama has a bed that she bought before she got too terribly bad with this dementia. It's a two-piece bed. The main bed is too high for Mama anymore. The other piece was what we call of rollaway bed. It's a smaller and shorter bed, so it's easier for Mama to get in and out of then the normal bed. We're talking about decorating for Christmas this year at least putting up a tree. Because last year didn't feel like Christmas in fact, it was rather depressing, so we decided that were going to put a tree up this year. But in order to do that we have to take apart this bed and store it. So we can have the window for the tree. If we take this bed apartment and story it. I kind of feel like I'm doing Mama wrong. Cause its mamas bed. But we need the space for the tree; both of them can't go to the same spot, so I feel bad, I feel like I'm doing Mama wrong. After all, it's her bed that was talking about moving. It's her bed that storing away. So were left with hard decisions to make and the only way to make them, is to do what's best for you at the time.

No Name

Tue, 23 Oct 2018 21:00:00 +0000

Caregiving for Dementia No Name Episode # 60 I had too many names for this episode of caregiving for dementia. So I called this episode. No name because I couldn't pick one. One of the reasons why I didn't pick a name for this episode is the fact that one week we've taken some of mama's medication away from her. Which, has woken her up, to the point where she can now carry on a small conversation, or at least to the point where you could figure out what she's talking about, and to her appetite is back. Yeah, mama's appetite is back. There lies the question, are we doing the right thing by taking her medication away? I feel that we have because it's woken her up to where we can talk to her. She's now eating. And I mean eating. We have a serving spoon for food and last night we give Mama a spoonful of macaroni butter, applesauce, and a little bit of pork chop. Mama ate extremely well, she had over half a spoonful of macaroni butter she had a spoonful and a half of applesauce and she probably ate half of the pork chop that we cut up into small pieces for her. I am extremely excited about that. We started out with Mama not eaten anything at all. Most of the time, when we did get her to eat. It was a bike here and a bite there. We worked at up to 4 bytes here 4 bytes there and I believe we went up to 8 bytes, but last night. Last night she ate extremely well and were all tickled pink about it. Now we may pay for taking the morning medication away for Mama, we may not. We'll just have to wait and see. It's something the only time will tell us. We may have to deal with the more of an anger attitude more of a feistiness without the medication. But again, it's just something the time will tell. I was asked the question by her friend when I was talking to them about taking this medication away from Mama. He said. You may feel better about her waking up and eating. But how does she feel? That's a question that I could not really answer other than the fact that no one should sleep 24 7 365 and that's what Mama was going with all this medication. She won eaten because she was sleeping, she wasn't talking because she was sleeping, she's lost the ability to walk because she was sleeping. I've always heard that if you don't use it, you lose it, and that is so much of a true statement. Because Mama no longer has the ability to stand no longer has the ability to walk. For the time being, I have my mommy back. We are able to carry on small conversations with her appetite is back, with those 2 things alone. I don't see how I could be too terribly wrong. It's something that will just have to wait and see you can't cross a bridge until you come to it now, you might be able to see where things are going, but you can't cross the bridge until you come to it. So we'll just have to wait and see. If you leave everything up to the doctors. I honestly think that their answer is medication. The medication. However, and Mama's case makes Mama sleep all the time. So I may be wrong, I may be right. I'm not sure, but one thing I am sure of and that is that the medication at the doctors give mom for her dementia is making her sleep. That's it's plain as the nose on my face. And I would rather deal with a little bit of a nastiness and have Mama wake a little bit thinner wood for her to be sleeping 24 7 365. I hope you'll stay tuned for more episodes of caregiving for dementia for updates on mom, for updates on how she's reacting to having no morning medication, whether or not we've had to give her back her morning meds.

Making Sense at 22

Tue, 16 Oct 2018 21:00:00 +0000

This week's episode is about some changes that we need to make. We were at the dinner table. The other night and Mama looked at me and got angry was ready to fight. The boy looked at her, grabbed her hand and said grandma, grandma, calm down. We had come in from church and we were eating dinner and we were all sitting around the table and we were talking. All of a sudden mom looked at me and she got really angry and I didn't know why I mean we had been holding 15 minutes, so one anything we did or said. But she got this really angry look on her face and started yelling a little bit what she was yelling we couldn't say. But Michael looked at her and took her by the hand and said grandma, calm down, calm down, grandma and wouldn't you know, lo and behold, she looked at him and it was like a light switch immediately. She calmed down. This went back-and-forth couple 3 times. Maybe and Michael eventually said trade me sides, daddy. I looked at him and I asking what you mean trade you sides. He say come over here and sit, so I did. And when Mama looked at me from then on, the anger, the ready to fight look had completely disappeared. Michael looked at me. I looked at Michael. He said she can't see you. It's dark over here. And he was right. There's no light on one side of the table except for the kitchen like which for you and me is not dark, per say, but for an 85-year-old I would say it was dark. We do have a lamp sitting on a dresser, which is where Michael was sitting so Mama can see him with the light. I, on the other hand, was dressed in a black long-sleeved shirt sitting in a dark and corner. When I had moved over to where the light was. It was like a light switch. There was no more problem. There wasn't a problem with Michael sitting in a dark corner because Michael didn't have a shirt on, so he was white. So Mama could see him, and Mama could see me now that I had a light behind me and she was fine from then on. A few nights after that Stephanie and I came in again from church, this time I was in a white shirt and Stephanie was in a dark green dress, and lo and behold, Mama was ready to fight with Stephanie. Mama got that being ready to fight look and was going off on Stephanie. Stephanie went into the bedroom, changed her dark green dress to a white T-shirt type thing and lo and behold, Mama, calm down. Again, it was like a light switch almost immediately with Stephanie got out of that dark green dress,

Caught Between a Rock and a Hard Place

Mon, 08 Oct 2018 21:00:00 +0000

This week's episode is about being caught between a rock and a hard place with some more decisions about mom. Deciding whether or not to up some of her medication, whether or not to take her to the doctors for the flu shot. I talk about upping a little bit of mama's medication. There is a pill that Mama has that she can take 3 of these pills per day. If she takes 3 of these pills a day, all she wants to do is sleep. The whole purpose of this pill is for agitation. Now if I up this pill to the 3rd pill per day. All she wants to do is sleep. If she sleeps all day, that means I get no company I get no conversation. I don't get anything except a zombie. Mama is to the point now where every time she moves she hurts. Now, Mama always did hurt, but she hurt because of a high calcium count, which acts a lot like arthritis. If you've had arthritis you know what I mean. So then the question becomes, do we put Mama through the pain of moving around for the flu shot or do we not worry about the flu shot and save Mama some pain. I've talked in the podcast a little bit about the fact of having COPD and my doctor is constantly every year, asking about whether or not we've got the flu shot. Now for 7 years or thereabout, all 4 of us have gotten our flu shots because of my COPD. This year however, I'm considering not worrying about a flu shot for mom because of the way she hurts when she moves. Now I could go to the family nurse but I know what the family nurse would tell me. But if you left it up to the medical profession you'd be popping pills or taking a shot every 2 to 5 minutes for something or another. However I'm concerned a little bit about the fact of not giving her the flu shot, because the flu shot supposed to stop you from getting the flu, but it 86 years old, is putting mom through the pain of moving around worse not getting the flu? I don't know! Do I up the pill to stop the agitation that Mama has? If I up the pill I get a zombie, if I don't up the pill that I deal with the agitation and I don't get anything done. I've got the attitude of Mama comes 1st. They'll be time for me. They'll be time to get things done in time. But on the other hand, what's best for mom is the question. A question that I have no good answer for.

A Turning Point

Tue, 25 Sep 2018 21:00:00 +0000

In this episode, I refer back to several different episodes of caregiving for dementia about changes. If you would like to hear those episodes that I refer to, I put the direct links for downloads in the show notes. And yet in this episode, I bring you yet another change in mom with her dementia in this episode, I discuss a lot about drinking, Mama is forgetting how to drink. And it's a major turning point because when she forgets to drink altogether. We have lost any way of getting any nourishment to her at all. I also talk about my belief in the fact that I don't believe the doctors really know where this dementia comes from. They just seem to chalk it up to be an old. The problem that I have with that thought is the fact that you have 85-year-olds that are acting like they're in their 50s and 60s. And then you have people in their 60s and 50s with dementia like the 85-year-olds. So I don't believe just being old has anything to do with dementia. Once again in this episode, though I know that mom is not totally gone. You see, I've made up some T-shirts for the show in which I have used the cover art as front of the T-shirt, which is in fact, Mama 's high school graduation picture that we have altered to black and white. I was sitting out with Mama one evening working with her on her drinking and she recognized that I had a T-shirt on with a picture of a girl on the front she looked at that point in looked at me and said that girls pretty, I looked at mom and I said that you she pointed to shirt looked at me and she said yeah, I know. Now whether or not she actually knew that the picture with her not I don't know, but that 's a glimpse of Mama still be in there. Thank God that Mama's still with us. Here are the direct links for the episodes that I have referred to in this podcast. # 1 Losing History Episode number 14 # 2 Physical Problems episode number 20 # 3 Changes episode number 27 # 4 Christmas Changes episode number 36 # 5 and last but not least Losing Spunk episode number 51 I hope you enjoy this episode, or the past episodes of caregiving for dementia. Have a good week. Have a safe week and will talk to you next week. I have one last link I'd like to share with you for the international podcast day. https://internationalpodcastday.com/

Mental Illness

Mon, 17 Sep 2018 21:13:30 +0000

Caregiving for Dementia Mental illness Episode #56 There's not a whole lot of show notes for this one. This entire episode has been on the most severe form of mental illness. You ask what the most severe form of mental illness? Well, the most severe form of mental illness is suicide. Family has not only been hit by mental illness, but it has also been hit by the most severe form of menta l illness. In this episode, I talk a good deal about suicide, my opinion on suicide, my opinion on life. Suicide is wrong. When you have a society that believes that you come from an ape, you have a society that has no accountability for anything, it does. Suicide is a permanent solution to a temporary problem. I'll say that again, suicide is a permanent solution to a temporary problem. Suicide doesn't fix any problem that you may face in life. It's not a fix for someone not going out with you, it's not a fix for money problems, Suicide is not a fix. Death comes fast enough on its own you don't need to rush it along. Even after you die there's still accountability for your life here on earth. You can't live 80, 90 even 100 years and that's all there is to it. Life cannot be the end! I agree that life is hard. I agree that life has its problems. Lord knows I've had mine, but living through the hard times makes the good times even better. There's got to be someone in your life that you can talk to if you're considering suicide. If your problems are to the point that you considering suicide find a friend, a coworker, a teacher, your parents, even your kids find someone to talk to if you don't have anyone like that that you can share your feelings with, then the national suicide prevention hotline number is 1-800-273-8255 and you can always reach them as well by chat at www.suicide prevention lifeline.org. Give them a call. Give them a chat. If you don't have anyone in your life that you can talk to about your problems start a podcast about your problems. Talking about your problems, whether it be with someone or in a podcast really helps, I know this podcast is help me tremendously dealing with what mom is going through with her dementia. Find someone to talk to, find something that you enjoy doing, anything at all to distract you from your problems. But whatever you do, don't, don't commit suicide things will get better. They will get better with time.

Scared Caregiver

Sat, 25 Aug 2018 23:35:49 +0000

Caregiving for Dementia A Scared Caregiver Episode # 55 O:55 The Opening 0:56 – 5:40 I'm talking here in this episode about waking up at 3 AM after falling asleep for about a half hour in finding Mama on the floor, because she's rolling out of bed. I talk a bit about being scared because not only did she roll out of bed and onto the floor, but we found her lying in a pool of blood. You see, she broke her nose when she hit the floor and any time you break your Nose there is a little bit of blood. 5:40 - 6:30 Family wanting to call 911 and our discussion about whether or not we should call 911. 6:30 -7:10 Finding out where all the blood was found on Mama. 7:10 – 8:33 The family is fortunate enough to have a registered nurse in the family that you can call and talk to any time day or night. 8:34 – 9:50 Being panicked getting upset and upsetting the one that your caregiving for . 9:50 – 12:16 Mamas age having a whole lot to do with being worried that anything happens like her falling out of bed could be very fatal. 12:16 – 13:45 Worrying about whether or not mama broke any other bones evaluating mom for broken bones. 13:45 – 14:30 Being sore and being really slow. After falling out of bed. 14:30 – 15:36 comparing mom's comparing mom, breaking her nose and 85 to my own broken nose at the age of 16. Headaches, black eyes, looking like a raccoon. 15:37 – 16:42 Questioning how Mama fell out of bed. 16:42 – 20:00 things that happen after all the pressure is gone after getting mom cleaned up and coming down from everything. What we do, what we didn't do, what we may do what we may or may not do, that kind of thing. 20:00 – 25:02 after all the pressures gone and everything said and done, you start second-guessing yourself as to what you did what you didn't do. Being glad that it wasn't the only one in the house when this all happened, makes it a whole lot easier when somebody else's help and get it is to do it by yourself. It's kind of hard to hold someone up clean someone up and evaluate the situation. All by yourself. 25:02 -25:51 A promotional audio clip for September 30 a big day for all podcasters International Podcasters Day. 25:51 – 26:50 The close of the show.

Mama And The Day Elvis Died

Fri, 17 Aug 2018 20:06:00 +0000

Mama, and the day Elvis died Episode # 54 In this episode of : Care Giving for Dementia I share some stories of the summer time as a kid. One of those stories is how I found out that Elvis Presley had died. I have a story of a ride on a car hood. The story of how Mama taught herself how to crochet. As well as some camping stories that we did when I was a kid. When I was a kid you have heroes, people you look up to, people you'd like to be. Well for me one of these people with Elvis Presley. Not only did I like his music but also like quite a few of these movies. I was a huge fan of Elvis ever since I can remember and still are today. In this episode, I tell who told me, where I was at, and what I was doing when I found out that Elvis had died. I have quite a few childhood memories, some good some bad. One of those good stories I tell in this episode is about a car ride my brother took on the hood of a car. When I was coming up, Mama always was making things. Whether it be sewing something together, painting a picture with her aretechs or making something with yarn or threat. I have several of the bedspreads and things that Mama crochet one of which I could really tell she was losing the no how to crochet. I know Mama was losing the know-how because Mama was not his particular with this last one, as she always was. When I was just a young kid, my stepfather bought a camping trailer to where he could go hunting in the winter but in the summer time we took the camper, our bikes, and a go kart and went camping for the weekend. In this episode, I tell the story of some camping trips that we took with this go kart some of the rides and we had some the fun that we had with Mama and to go kart. I also mention in the episode that their 6 of us kids. Mama has 6 grandkids, not including my son, she has for great grandkids. Some of whom have come to see mom, and some have not. I talk a little bit about the ones who haven't been around whether or not mom would recognize who they are. She also has a grandson coming to see her now that she may or may not recognize only because he's not around all the time. He has been up to see her, but he's not here all the time, so she may not recognizing when he comes to the door.

Being Forgotten

Fri, 10 Aug 2018 09:00:00 +0000

1st off, let me assure everyone that Mama is still with us, so that is not the reason why I haven't put a podcast out in about 5 weeks. We've had some devastating changes in mom this past month, but for the most part she's holding her own. When your child, you don't think that one day your parents will forget who you are. I don't know about you but when we were kids. Every once in a while when we were talking to mom about something, she would end up calling the role, in other words, she name off a couple of us kids name instead of the one that she was actually talking to. I didn't think anything about it, it was just something that happened every once in a while. Looking back on it now, though I wonder if that wasn't the 1st actual signs of Mama having dementia. I've said before the podcast of Mama knew something was wrong, long before any rest of us did, including her doctors. This past month there's been some devastating changes in mom. I called it devastating changes because there are now times that Mama forgets who I am. I think that may have a lot to do with the fact that Stephanie's out of school for the summer. Stephanie's been doing a lot for mom throughout the summer, that has really given me a huge break. I didn't have to run every time Mama needed something. Stephanie was been able to take care of a lot of that for me, once we got mom to let her do some things for her. So I backed off throughout the summer, except for when Mama needed to be moved from place to place. Stephanie just doesn't have the muscle to move mom from place to place, throughout the summer, there's been times when Mama didn't want me doing things for her, she'd rather have Stephanie do some things for her. We now have 3 weeks and Stephanie goes back to work, and I'm wondering how much of a hard time, I'm going to have getting back into being the full-time caregiver for Mama, when Stephanie goes back to work. Even if I do have a hard time getting back into becoming the full-time caregiver it'll be fine. When things need done. They just need done. If the one that your caregiving for doesn't like it, then they just don't like it. You have to do things to keep them healthy for as long as you can. No matter whether what. We may have an interesting start to the school year. I'm sure it'll take time for Mama to get used to me taking over again. But I'm sure that eventually she'll get used to me again, she may or may not know who I am all the time. But she'll get to the point where she realized that I'm the only one here in the house with her. She may not like it for a while, but she will eventually get used to me again. I'm sure.

Care Giving Pressure

Tue, 26 Jun 2018 09:00:00 +0000

In this episode of caregiving for dementia I talk a little bit about caregiver pressure. Caregiver pressures to pressure that you have as you care for someone with any kind of physical or mental disability. I talk about life pressure and the pressure that you have that you put on yourself as you care for someone else. The pressure builds and comes to where it just explodes and you jump on anybody and everybody that's around. This was the case I found myself into with my son the other night I jumped all over him for something that he may or may not be able to control. I felt like he didn't care, wasn't doing anything to help the problem, was creating more pressure for me. When I leave the house for a few hours I get to feeling like I'm the one that needs to be there to take care of mom. I get the feeling that it's my responsibility not someone else's to take care of her. The longer I'm out the board the feeling gets that I'm the one that needs to be home so the pressure and the stress start to build. I don't always leave the house because of this stress that it builds the pressure that it builds when I leave. There's all kind of pressure there's all kinds of stress in life. Some of the stress and pressure is self-induced. Some of the other pressure is just life stress in general. It don't always get away from the pressure and the stress totally. A lot of the times things that you do to relieve the stress and relieve the presser adds a different kind of stress or pressure to you. I think that's a lot of the reason why it has taken me a year and a half to put out 52 episodes of this podcast because deadlines add pressure. Life has enough stress and pressure that we don't need to add stress to our lives of having a deadline for everything that we do in life. And don't get me wrong I'm enjoying this podcast I enjoy coming in talking to you. Meeting a deadline adds undue stress to an already stressed situation. I honestly think stress and pressure starts back at the first grade. When you start school, the teacher gives you homework to do by a certain deadline. The deadline is what starts the pressure of having something done on time. Pressure starts at a very young age and you try to find different ways of relieving that stress. For me I started smoking at 14. Made me feel big made me feel like a man. Now that I'm in my 50s I'm paying for that mistake of picking up the first cigarette that I enjoyed so much that made me and cough so bad. In your 50s and 60s sometimes even in your 40s you start paying for the things that you did coming up through life.You find yourself throughout life paying for things that you did as a kid. You find yourself in a certain spot or certain place for a very long time. You find yourself having to move out of that certain spot due to the fact of some things that you did in life. I've said all this just to say that stress and pressure of life can never really seem to get away from it all together. It seems to follow you no matter where you go what you do or how you do it. The things that we do to relieve this pressure of life doesn't always relieve that pressure altogether. It may relieve it for a time but you may end up paying for it later on in life. I don't always leave the house to get away from the pressure because it creates more pressure although it may be a different kind of pressure it's still pressure. I don't have any answers to get completely away from the stress the pressure of caregiving. I don't have any answers to get away from the life pressure. Yes you couldn't go away for weekend, you can go be by yourself for a while, but I have come to realize that the pressure still that of be there no matter what, where, when, or how you try to deal with it. We just got a deal with what life hands us the best we can, the easiest way we can and go on with life.

Losing Spunk

Fri, 15 Jun 2018 19:53:59 +0000

Losing Spunk Episode # 51 In this episode of Care Giving for Dementia, I talk a little bit about the time I got stuck in Atlanta, Georgia airport when I was 14/15 years old. The trouble I had trying to catch the plane from Atlanta, Georgia the Pittsburgh Pennsylvania just to come home for Christmas one year. And the fact that I would probably still be Atlanta, Georgia if my mother had not been is spunky as she was. You see, Mama was the type of person who just had this look, a look that told you, no matter who you were, that you were going to do, what Mama wanted you to do. I honestly believe that Mama could get the President United States to do what she wanted as well. She just had that look that meant she meant business, and you were not going to change her mind, no matter who you were. I also talk about the fact that this devastating disease called, dementia has taken the person that took on a big airline to get me home for Christmas has changed that person so much that she's afraid of her own shadow at times. Dementia has made her for afraid or scared of any and everything that she doesn't know and it seems to be getting worse. I'm realizing that we are definitely losing Mama Altogether, not just the ability for her to do things, and the ability for her to talk to us, to advisor us on things, but the fact is that we are losing her altogether. Although we are realizing that were losing her altogether. We are nowhere near ready for this to happen. There comes a time when life changes, changes everything that you're doing. We are finding ourselves in this situation, where we \ are going to be by ourselves in a very short time. A lot of it has to do with the fact that so many quick changes with mom. Some of it happening to do with the fact that the boy is now 22 years old and not knowing how long he's going to stay home. He's got his own life to live, how much longer the estate with mommy and daddy this, we don't know.

Family Emergency

Mon, 04 Jun 2018 09:00:00 +0000

I open this episode, with a dedication to Debra Lilly the family member how has pass away this month.

Things that you are doing don't matter a whole lot when it comes to family emergencies. Family emergencies, You can't plan for they come right out of the blue and what ever you're working on, no matter what it is or how important it is. You have to set aside in order to take care of the family emergency.

When you're caring for someone It's pretty much like having another child in the house. They need someone with them 24 hours a day, 7 days a week, 365 days a year. So when things happen that you need to believe the house, you have to find someone to stay with the one that your caring for. You can't just pick them up and travel to take care of the emergency or anything else. So we find ourselves in the same situation as we did in episode number 34. Not being able to do things you know you should.

I know with Mama with her dementia condition she doesn't understand what's going on around her. She's having trouble recognizing us and were with her all the time. I know that she does not understand what and why we need to leave to take care of this emergency.

After having the situation that we had an episode number 34, we have been able to locate a lady from the church that is willing to come and sit with mom when we need her to with ample notification. However, this family emergency happened and there was no time to notify this lady. So I needed to stay with mom.

With Mama's dementia she doesn't recognize us, sometimes, although she knew the rest of the family, with her dementia she no longer remembers who they are. She no longer knows who some of her own children are at times. So you can't just pick her up and go anywhere. You have to have someone stay with her because she's almost like a child.

Spring is here, summaries just around the corner and yours things in his house and around this house that I need to get taking care of. I'm having trouble doing these things because a mamas dementia. I know more go get started on something, and Mama needs something. I know more get back to doing what I was doing get concentrating on that and Mama needs something again. It's a day by day vicious cycle.

Stephanie and I've been talking about getting this lady from the church to come in one or 2 days a week. Now, though, that summer is here, Stephanie is out of work for the summer. We may not get this lady through the summer. However, this winter when Stephanie goes back to work, We may get this lady to come stay with mom. So I can get some things done that I want and need to get done. We're just not sure what, when, or even if will get this lady.

As you take care of someone they get to the point where all they want is you to be the one to take care of them. And I honestly think that's where mamas at. She wants me and only me at times. So anyone else who's trying to take care of her, has a difficult time doing so.

With the above being said though I honestly believe that Mama has my son and I mixed up. You see, there are times when Michael Junior can get them to do things that I've been trying to get them to do with a fair amount of ease. I'm not sure at those times, who she thinks I am. I'm not sure whether she thinks I'm my father, my stepfather or if she thinks I may just be someone trying to get her to do something that she doesn't want to do.

I've said all of this just to say that, Life has a way of throwing obstacles at you out of the blue. That was the case this week for the family. You see, Stephanie has lost her sister. And although they were not as close as they should of been it's still a very sad time for the family.

I asked myself this question. Is the family repeating itself? You see for the 1st 3 years of Stephanie and I marriage we were going to funerals every 6 months. We were going to funerals for either her family, my family or yes even friends of ours. Most of whom were at our wedding. You see, it's only been about 6 months between the 2 funerals now. It makes me stop and think whether or not history is repeating itself.

With having to family deaths so close together. It really makes me stop and think, mom is 84. She has dementia. It really makes me stop and appreciate the time that we've have. Cause you never know when you got a be out of time. Time becomes more precious with those you love the older you get.

One thing I do know, is that death is not the end. Death is only the beginning of the afterlife. Each and every one of us will face the judgment seat of Christ, and account for our lives. I also believe that besides being a moneymaker, the funerals and the memorial services or whatever else you may have their, that's more for your family members that you're leaving behind. So they have some way of saying goodbye to you. I don't believe it's for you because you're not there. Your in presence of God, accounting for your life.

Finally, I'll wrap up by just saying once again that this episode of care giving for dementia is dedicated to Debra Lilly the family member that we've lost, and although we were not as close as we should of been, to the rest of Debra's family that may hear this episode. I just want to say I'm very sorry, very sorry indeed for your loss.

A Dementia Rollercoaster Ride

Fri, 27 Apr 2018 22:12:33 +0000

Caregiving for dementia Episode # 49 A Dementia Roller Coaster Ride The 1st 11 minutes of this episode is about new equipment that I had to buy for the podcast. In this 1st 11 minutes I talk about a Sony digital recorder as well as the Logitech C920 webca

Dementia Music

Mon, 16 Apr 2018 20:11:25 +0000

Care Giving for Dementia

Episode # 48

Dementia Music

In this week's episode of caregiving for dementia, I talk a little bit about the truck, bus, van thing that I've been talking a little bit about. The condition of the vehicle a little bit about the costs, but mainly versus putting a shed in the backyard in which is that I think I'm leaning more toward putting the shutout, then the vehicle due to costs.

I started to call this episode Elvis Presley and dementia, because of the reaction that we have with Mama and Elvis's music on an HBO special on Saturday night. The reaction re-received without was totally different than any other kind of music performer that we played before.

We have tried playing different kinds of music for Mama, most of which seem to just agitate her. One of these types of music would've been our music, such as Bon Jovi, Whitesnake, and Journey. We have also tried though, Ben Crosby, Dean Martin, as well as net King Cole. And the only reaction we seem to be able to get that with anything at all other than agitation was Elvis is music for some reason.

Now my question is, is why Elvis is the same era as Ben Crosby that King Cole, Dean Martin, why did he is music have such a different reaction. I don't know. I think I am going to try to run some kind of a small experiment with her and music. The question of it is, as well. I have the same reaction to Elvis is music on say something like an album as I did on the TV special. Did we get the reaction from the TV special because it was something that she could see or was it the music itself? Again, I don't know.

Was it the music itself, is it music, is it visual, or is it just noise all in general. This is something that I need to find out. I'm hoping to get mom outside in the yard a little bit when the weather breaks to find this out. If it's noise in general that makes you react, then she should react to the birds singing out in the front yard. Will The Chipmunks the squirrels make her react the same way that she reacts to the dog? Why would she not react to other animals?

These are all kind of questions that I need to get answers to that. I hope to have some answers to as soon as the weather breaks. I hope you stay tuned. I'll keep you updated. So I hope you stay tuned to the episodes. It will be interesting. I'm sure.

Feeling Like a bad caregiver,son

Mon, 09 Apr 2018 11:44:39 +0000

In your teenage years, you don't always see eye to eye with your parents about your friends. A lot of the time you end up in a big argument with your parents over your friends, because your parents can see things down the road that you can't. These arguments are especially harsh, when argument is over a boyfriend, girlfriend relationship.

When it dawns on you that mom and dad knew what they were talking about, you are like wow, mom and dad did know what they were talking about. You realize mom and dad's all this coming.

Years go by and you're set in your lifestyle. You have your wife and kids. You even have a good career plan and your parents are getting older and a lot of the times, At this stage in life. Your parents can no longer stay by themselves. A lot of the times you don't have the time for your parents that they need due to your job and family obligations. In this stage of the game you start looking for adult day care centers, nursing homes, and that kind of thing. These kinds of places, However, are quite expensive.

When I think of nursing homes I think of it placed you really don't want to be. You think most of them are dark, scrounging, dirty places. Now let me be clear. It has never been our intention to just drop mom off in a nursing home. We not even honestly considering this.

There comes a point in life where you lose all control of everything that you do. The last little bit of control that you have is whether or not you shower/bath, take your medication when you need to. This seems to be the last little bit of control, Mama seems to have, and at times both situations end up into being small arguments.

I named this episode, feeling like a bad caregiver, son because mom is 85. And when we get into small arguments about medication and showering, she gets a little hyper for lack of a better explanation. And I get the feeling like the bad guy because it takes so much about overall she wants to do is sleep afterward and I know that a lot of heart attacks happen, you 1st get up. Therefore, I start feeling like the bad caregiver, the bad, son because I get to thinking about these heart attack when the person that your taking care of 1st wakes up. The only thing I can think to do when Mama gets all shook up is just tell her I love her, give her a kiss tell her I love her just let them know that they are loved. You did as a child and now that you're in your 60s 70s and 80s, they need to know that you still need him still love them.

There are times where I don't think Mama knows a whole lot. But then there are times when she knows everything that's going on. The times that she knows what's going on around her are the times that we need to love on her. The nursing arms are going to do that. The nursing homes on even a dope him up and stick them in a room somewhere where they're spending 95% of the time by themselves. That's one reason why we're not even considering a nursing home option. I plan on keeping mom with us, just as long as we possibly can hope that she understands that we love her that we care for and I hope that she never forgets that.

I want to send a big thank you to Miranda Jankowska from the UK for the grade email this week to let me know that this podcast is not following on dead ears. She's let me know that there are listeners out there and I dislike the thinker so very much for the nice email. Thanks for listening thanks Miranda, thanks to all.

Personal Appearance

Wed, 28 Mar 2018 07:41:04 +0000

Care Giving For Dementia

Episode # 46

Personal Appearance

When you were a child, you really didn't care about how your parents looked. However, as you got older, you started day care about how you looked because you started noticing the girls. When I started noticing the opposite sex, I started caring about how I looked in other words I cared how my hair looked, and how my clothes looked. As I grew up, Mama always used to tell me after getting my haircut how good it looked how good I looked. With dementia, you're not always sure whether or not the person is actually there. However, when you clean yourself up after all winter long looking like Grizzly Adams and you get a reaction from someone who has dementia, you can pretty much. Rest assured that you have not totally lost that person. I guess what I mean by that is, the boy and I cleaned up ourselves. After all winter long. I look like Grizzly Adams and the boys needed to shaving in a haircut as well. He was not quite as bad as I was, but all in all, we both needed to clean up after all winter long. In other words, we went and got our haircuts and we boast shaved. Now, for me one of the reasons why I decided to do this week is because the wife Stephanie wanted me to clean up for Easter, and like most men, I teased her for a good little while telling her I was not going to do it for Easter. But I decided to surprise her Friday night when she come home from work with a haircut and a clean shave. The boy got he is the week before. So we both got cleaned up for his mother, because she wanted us cleaned up for Easter. Now Michael got his cut the week before I did mine and with Mama and her dementia. She noticed that something was changed with him. However, when I got mine haircut and I shaved I got jibber jabber like you wouldn't believe. You see, when I didn't get my haircut when Mama was Mama. She always told me how good I looked how nice it was that I had got my haircut. Even with Mama's dementia, I got a lot of jibber jabber that told me that I have not completely lost my mother to this terrible disease of dementia. We have also been able to carry on a conversation with mom for the bout 24 hours due to the fact that we forgot to give her the medication. Now it was not a complete conversation, but it was a conversation. Nevertheless, you could figure out what she was talking about, to a point. So we this leaves me with the thought that maybe the medication is causing her to lose the ability to carry on these conversations. However, without these medications she becomes a handful so were caught between a rock and a hard place with the medications. We talk a little bit about dreams in this episode. You see, Mama seems to be waking up at times screaming. Absolutely terrified for some reason is this caused by dementia, the medication, or something else where unsure.

Taking Care of Yourself

Mon, 12 Mar 2018 18:13:11 +0000

Taking care of yourself episode number 45 of caregiving for dementia

When your caregiving for someone who has dementia or any other mental disease. You get all wrapped up in taking care of them. That you forget about taking care of yourself. Will this week I was able to get out of the house for about 6 or 7 hours on Saturday to take care of myself recharge my batteries and just to enjoy time to myself. I hope you enjoy listening as much as I enjoyed putting it together's episode number 45 of caregiving for dementia.

The Dementia Wall

Mon, 05 Mar 2018 10:00:00 +0000

The dementia wall is a wall that was built by the person who has dementia to help make that person feel safe. Much like the border wall will make the country safer. Dementia isolates the one who has it, so it's almost like you're reaching through, over, under, or around what I'm calling a dementia wall when you're dealing with someone who has dementia. From time to time, it's hard to get the one who has dementia to cooperate with you. When it's time for their medication at times, they don't want to take it. A lot of the times, it's a pain to do the slightest thing with that person. And for some reason a lot of the times, it's hard to get them started with a bath. This thing that I'm calling the dementia wall takes away the person's personality. It's almost like their a totally different person. Although at times, the personality of the person returns, for short time. When the person personality returns you can actually have a small conversation with that person.

Dementia No Talk

Mon, 26 Feb 2018 17:08:22 +0000

This week's episode of care giving for dementia is really not about dementia. However, I call it Dementia No Talk because of a couple different reasons. The 1st reason is because the more or the longer this dementia goes, the less talk, we get out of mom. The more jibber her speech becomes. But also because we've had a another school shooting here last week and now 17 people no longer have a voice to talk with. This episode is a lot to do with the shooting in schools my opinion on the shooting in schools how to solve it, how not to solve it. So I hope you enjoy this episode of care giving for dementia although it does not have a lot to do with dementia.

Dementia Who Are You

Mon, 12 Feb 2018 17:33:29 +0000

Dementia Who Are You? Episode # 42 In this week's episode of care giving for dementia. I asked the question? Dementia who are you? It's becoming more and more frequent that Mama asked the question who we are, whenever were talking to her. I also mention in this episode, when we were kids. Mama always used to call the role, and then she would say you know who I'm talking to, you know who I'm talking about. I also mention the fact that Mama seems to be a little bit more scared. And that's the reason why she's acting out so often. I also asked the question what's going to happen to me or Stephanie when we get to be mom's age. I question whether or not Michael will be there for us if we him. I also use a quote from Cliff Ravenscraft. I don't need easy I just need worth it. You can find Cliff's podcast, at https://www.cliffravenscraft.com. I asked you to please go to either www.babymountainradio.com or www.caregivingfordementia.com and leave me a comment. Let me know that you listen, and let me know if the podcast is helping you.

The Good, The Bad, The Ugly

Mon, 05 Feb 2018 17:58:14 +0000

In this week's episode of caregiving for dementia. We discuss the good things If there are any, the bad things, and the ugly things about mom having dementia. Some of the good things that we talk about our not knowing whats going on in the world, not happening to fool with the tax man. Some of the bad things we talk about in this episode is the fact that mom not knowing who I am and not knowing who she is. The ugly thing in this episode that we talk about his mom becoming more clingy to me more than anyone else in the house. We hope you enjoy this episode of caregiving for dementia which we call The Good, The Bad, and The Ugly.

Dementia Boredom

Mon, 29 Jan 2018 08:38:37 +0000

This week's episode is about being bored even though you're busy taking care of the one with mental disease. You do get bored even though there are things to do. You don't always feel like doing them because you're mentally tired, mentally stressed out, from taking care of the one that your taking care of. The times that you have to yourself is so few and far in between that you just don't want to do anything. You get tired of doing the same things you always do to keep yourself out of boredom at times. When you're not sleeping because you either can't or don't feel like sleeping your not always able to do a whole lot because the things that you do may or may not cause noise. So you get bored because the things that you normally do. You're tired of doing, or they make too much noise to do at certain times of the day. You may also get bored because everybody in the house is sleeping at certain times. You don't always feel like sleeping when everybody else in the house is. You don't play with the dog because everybody else is sleeping. Also in this episode, I mentioned making some trinkets for the podcast. I also mention possible listener donations through Patreon.

2018 Lookout

Tue, 23 Jan 2018 05:00:00 +0000

This episode of Care Giving for Dementia is once again going to be a little different. I mentioned to you last week that I would have some things to look forward to in 2018. Some new changes to the podcast that I think will help in the production of the podcast.

Dementia Violence

Wed, 17 Jan 2018 13:53:06 +0000

I named this episode dementia violence because I wanted to put my feelings out about the violence that you may or may not experience with your caregiving of someone with a mental disease.
I've heard a couple other caregiving podcasts and one of those podcast was on dementia violence and locking up knives in getting rid of guns and taking things to the extreme.
So I thought I would put my opinion out there because what books smarts people tell you is not always what happens in the field. You see my podcast doesn't have a lot of book smarts this podcast has field smarts, which is to entirely different things.
Hope you enjoy the episode dementia violence episode number 38.

Dementia, Christmas, Depression

Mon, 08 Jan 2018 08:38:43 +0000

We've talked about not decorating for Christmas because mom's dementia. But what we haven't talked about. Is that not decorating for Christmas, makes the house and makes the time feel like it's not Christmas time. When you don't decorate for Chr

Christmas Changes

Fri, 22 Dec 2017 17:00:00 +0000

In this episode of Care Giving for Dementia. We read Luke chapter 2, verses 1 through 20. This passages Scripture is the Christmas story. The birth of our Lord Jesus Christ.Which is the true meaning of Christmas. We also talk about a few things that the family will change this year for Christmas due to mom having This devastating disease called dementia.

Update To Episode # 35

Sun, 17 Dec 2017 15:45:58 +0000

This is Just an update to episode # 35.

Not Able to do Things You Know You Should Do

Sat, 16 Dec 2017 01:01:46 +0000

Caregiving For Dementia EPISODE # 35 Not Being Able To do The Things You Know You Should Do. This week's show notes are going to be short and sweet to the point, ladies and gentlemen, you see, we've had a death in the family. Fortunately, it was not m

Interruptions

Sun, 10 Dec 2017 18:09:54 +0000

Caregiving for Dementia Episode 34 Interruptions This week on caregiving: I want to talk to you a little bit about things that don't get done. When, you take care of someone no matter what the reason. There's, always things that need to be done that don't always get done. Like housework! Whether that, be the dishes , the beds made, laundry, or any other need to do housework. Now, when mom was in good health, she would clean the house and work. Mama worked up until oh, I guess, 1997 and even when Mama worked, and was steel able keep the house clean. Now it wasn't spotless, but it was clean. Now that Mama is not as well, Stephanie is working all day long. I mean she doesn't come home until evening because of transportation. Michael is working 8 to 10 hours a day. So that only leaves mom and I hear in the house, and the dog. So there are things, that yes need to be done, but if I try starting to do something, whether that be the dishes, laundry or sweeping the floor or whatever. 9 times out of 10 Mama needs something, and most of the time it is at the worst time. It doesn't always have to be housework. Many times, I'm on the computer and mom need something. I'm in a shower and mom need something. Or any other thing that we're doing, we need to stop and take care of her, and because of that, there's a lot of things that get put off until they just can't be put off anymore. There are things that I'd like to do that I'm not doing because it would take a lot of time to configure and I'd get deep in thought and Mama would yell because she needed something. Sometimes, that something, is she just wants to know that somebody else's in the house with her, that happening more and more. A lot of the time, she'll wake up from a nap and she gets really scared because she thinks there's nobody else in the house. No matter how many times you tell her that she's never in the house alone, it doesn't seem to sink in. When you're the only one that is taking care of somebody else, whether that your children or your elderly parents and you know they're scared, you do everything you can for them with them at any time. It also affects you a little bit also because, for a while you're trying to figure out why their so scared. A lot of times they can't tell you, what, why there's a scared. Singer, left with the feeling of that was weird. And for a while, you are worried about what it is that there is a scared of. Mamas, is to the point now, where she's scared of her own shadow at times. Mama is seeing things that scare her. A lot of the times, the things that she sees are caused by her hallucinations due to dementia. I've thought a lot about maybe hiring someone to do some of the things that I've been putting off. There are some things that need to be fixed, that Yeah, I could fix, but I get to fixing and Mama would needs something. I thought about hiring somebody just to help with mom. Which we did for a while, but that got expensive. I'm not sure even if I was to hire someone to help take care of mom, I'm not sure Mama would let them. I know there's times when Michael and Stephanie, both take care mom and evening, and Mama wants me. Michael and I had discussion last night. Michael was telling me that when he takes care of his grandma. A lot of the times when she wants something, that something is me. I tried to telling Michael that I can't be there every time Mama wants me. I've got a have a little bit of time every day for myself. The more time that goes by the worst Mama gets the more Mama wants me. I tried to tell Michael that she wants me because I'm the one that's here 5 days a week, 12 hours a day. I tried to telling that he needs to work with his grandmother in times like that. I also told him, though I knew it wouldn't be easy because Mama is so used to having me with her that it's really hard for her to trust someone else. Because they're not with mom is much as I am. I think that mom has trash issues with them when they take care of her. I'm trying to do my best, to work them into the routine in the evening and weekends. So that mom builds that trust with Stephanie and Michael so that I don't have to be there as much. I really hope that mom will build that trust with Michael and Stephanie so that I can get a little bit of a break every day without happening to stay up past midnight just to have a little bit of time to myself. I don't mean for this to sound like I'm complaining I'm not. But these are the things that happen when you take care of someone no matter who it is. One of the reasons why are called this episode interruptions. It's because while I was doing this podcast I have gotten interrupted by the telephone, Mama need go to the bathroom, as well as needing something to eat for lunch. So to wrap all this up. This is just what happens as you take care of your elderly parents or whoever it may be, that your taking care of. Don't forget whatever you do, don't forget yourself you need to take care of yourself as well. Cause if you don't nobody will. So ask yourself this question. If you don't take care yourself who's going to take care of the one that your taking care of? Stay tuned for next week's episode as we discuss what were doing and what where not doing for the holidays due to the dementia. Also a couple months from now I will be celebrating one year of podcasting. I'd like to have a little bit your input as to how we do that. If you'll go to www.babymountainradio.com and leave us a comment as to how we should celebrate our one year in podcasting. I would appreciate it so very much. Thanks again for listening to Caregiving for Dementia.

Family Trouble

Fri, 01 Dec 2017 23:30:00 +0000

this week on: Caregiving for Dementia. I have a lot of trouble trying to tell mom about trouble the other family members are having. You see any time that one of us has a medical condition or someone has died, whether it be a family member or a friend of

Thanksgiving Dinner

Fri, 24 Nov 2017 18:11:44 +0000

Thanksgiving Day Dinner episode # 32 In this episode we talk about the Thanksgiving dinner family members, including the dogs for both families. All 3 grandkids helping to prepare dinner, Including a 1st time turkey carving.

A Clearer Direction

Fri, 17 Nov 2017 17:00:00 +0000

Proudly Terrorized Part # 3

Fri, 27 Oct 2017 16:00:00 +0000

Proudly Terrorized Part # 3

Michael Junior is Terrorizing Us: One of the reasons why I named this series of 3 episodes Proudly Terrorized, is because about 6 months ago, Michael come to his mother and I and told us that there was some kind of a concert going on at the end of October, out in Las Vegas, that he wanted to go to . Now, for normal parents that would probably be a big deal to let their kid go from one end of the country to the other, but for us, we were okay with it, because back in 2011 we got a letter from the people to people student ambassador programs. Now how we got this letter, we don't know, how ,who what, where ,when yada yada yada. We have no idea, but make a long story short, Michael was invited to go overseas to France, England, and Rome. I believe he was about 14 at the time , 13, 14, in that range, so we decided to go ahead and let him go. We did all kind of checks and all kinds of protections and everything that we could do and all that,but the problem was with that trip itself. You see his mother and I had just seen the movie Taken. Now if you haven't seen any of the movies Taken. These movies are about people that go overseas and get kidnapped and that kind of thing, the wrong kind of movie to go see at the movies the evening or 2 before your child goes overseas. So that was a little bitt of time that was terrorizing for his mother and I being the daddy that I am. But we had mom at this time that we could talk to. She was a good comfort to both of us. In fact, she even Helped him go, and we had all kinds of things in place to where we knew where he was at certain times of the day, Which made us feel a little better about letting go, not just across the country, but overseas. Remember now, the boy is only 13, 14 years old. He's not a child, he's not a baby, but yet he's not an adult, either, so he comes back, everything's fine and dandy. He graduates from high school, which is another terrorizing moment in life because it makes you realize that your child is no longer a child that needs his mommy and daddy all the time, now he's not fully grown, but old enough to step out on his own, just a bit. All this is leading up to the fact that Michael Junior is no longer a child. He's a now young adult, yet he still needs mommy and daddy at times, but he's no longer depending on us for every move he makes. Now this week in the country, We've had this mass shooting out in Las Vegas. There's some kind of a concert at the end of the month that Michael wants to go to in his head made plans to go to for about 3 months at least in the same location. This is very terrorizing for his mother and I number 1 because these are only child number 2 because of the shooting. That was just out there. I mean, this guy killed 59 people and injured 500 people over 500 people, I believe. So I have tried my best to talk Michael out of going without coming plane out telling him that he can't go, I told him he shouldn't go, but I have not asking not to go and I won't asking not to go. He's he's 21 he's got to make his own life decisions whether or not they may or may not put them in arms way. I I'm really proud of in because he does have a heck of a head on the shoulders for being 21. Maybe I'm just being the over protective parent that needs to keep quiet and and letting do what he wants to do. I mean eventually he got a turn things like this over to God and let God take care of a. After all, he is 21, you can't make every decision for him. And I think one of the frightening things about this one is is that mom is not here mentally to talk to about it and to give us that mental support that she give us when he went overseas. She can't carry on a conversation, let alone give us any kind of advice about letting go across the country, like she did when he went overseas. Naturally still in the country. He sees closer than what he was when he was 13, 14, but he's older tell and we just need to be…… There if and when he needs us. I want my mommy to talk to about to give me that comfort that she give us when he went overseas, but unfortunately dementia has got are locked in this little world over own. I know she's in there somewhere, because we get glimpses of her, but she's not there 24 / 7, 365, the way she was when he went overseas. These are the kind times that I really miss mom. I guess that due to dementia, this is how I'm going to go through the rest of my life. Not being able to talk to her in situations like this to give me that comfort to give me that backbone that I need to let him grow up in the way that I know he will. I mean Stephanie and I've done a great job. I think with raising Michael with mom's help. He's turned out to be a great young man. When he was little, I thought maybe he'd be the world's next Elvis Presley. But now that he's 21 has no interest in preforming music, that wish in mind as changed. Although my hopes of him, become an Elvis have changed. I do believe that no matter what he does in life with the attitude that he's got today he will do something great in this world. I have had some great conversations with him, on politics, and religion, and now then, with the shooting in Las Vegas and he's left me with the impression that he's got a good head on his shoulders and I need to trust in his decisions that affect his life. So with all that said, the only thing I can say to him, and about him, is that daddy is very, very proud of him. I'm also terrorizing myself by doing this podcast. I have 27 episodes out. This is number 28 and one of the things that is terrorizing is the fact that you put yourself out for all to see for all to hear what and how you react to things. I started this to keep track of mom and her dementia. The process of dementia and for a while I was calling the show the dementia episode this episode that one of the things that you learn when you do podcasting. If is to talk to other pod casters who had been doing it longer and take their advice and what they tell you and all this and either apply it or not, and what the podcast that I listen to. I have ran on to what's called The Podcasters Roundtable.( @ Www.Podcastersroundtable.com ) with Ray Ortega, Dave Jackson from WWW.school podcasting.com and Daniel J Lewis from www. the audacity to podcast.com. I can't get enough of this podcast I am learning so much from this podcast. That's amazing. I not only just have one pod casters that I listen to, but now with the podcast Roundtable. There are 3 of the meta-time , plus a new one and can listen to the 3 that have done this for years and the new one that they bring on you learn so much about podcasting. The equipment what to do, how to do how to monetize how to make money, how not to make money where to host your feet what where not to so I mean that they're going through everything and these 3 podcast is a been podcasting for years. Can you imagine if you were singer were in a rock band just starting out, sitting down in a room with Elvis Presley, Gene Simmons, Paul Stanley and then giving you advice on how to sing, how to perform. I couldn't. Well, okay, I think that's probably about enough of being terrorizing. So if you are looking for other podcasts to listen to the 3 that I've mentioned in this podcast are great podcasts. I have learned a lot just listen to the 3 of them on the pod casters Roundtable. If you get a chance check them out. I think you enjoy your podcast. And speaking of enjoying podcast. If you enjoy this podcast, please leave me a comment, an email, on www.baby mountain radio.com

Proudly Terrorized part # 2

Wed, 18 Oct 2017 13:32:39 +0000

In this part of proudly terrorized, Michael Junior and I talk about his trip to Vegas. Why he's going. How he's getting out there. And the fact that he is not afraid of going out there due to the shooting that we just had out there couple weeks ago. W

Proudly Terrorized Part # 1

Fri, 06 Oct 2017 16:00:00 +0000

The Michael Delaney Show Episode # 28 Proudly Terrorized Part # One Starring: Michael and Stephanie Delaney This is the 1st part of a three-part series that Stephanie and I are calling proudly terrorized. In this 1st part Stephanie and I talk about her feelings on the shooting in Las Vegas due to the fact of our boy wants to go to Las Vegas it in the month for another concert. Yes, a concert much like the one where we had the shooting. We also talk about her feelings. Not being able to talk to mom about it due to dementia. We also talk about the fact that Michael has went overseas back in 2012. The things that we did then are not the same things that we can do now due to the fact that he is 21 years old. We also ask at the tail end for your comments on www.babymountainradio.com. I also leave a little teaser about next week's episode, part 2 of Proudly Terrorized at the very end of this episode.

Changes

Mon, 25 Sep 2017 04:00:00 +0000

The Michel Delaney Show Episode # 27 Changes New neighbors Having the law called Mom not eating very much Returning to childhood state Losing the ability to talk Listening to another podcast Unable to share Trying to keep mom from falling Having a Big Dog Our support group Preparing care giving 5 steps to prepare for Care Giving Dying before the one you're caring for Time for me later is the wrong idea No 2 people care give in the same way Asking for some feedback

Dementia

Fri, 15 Sep 2017 16:00:00 +0000

DEMENTIA

Episode # 26

Show Notes

Talking to other Podcasters about the content.

Is my content good enough to keep going

Podcasters who have been podcasting for years are reachable folks Cliff Ravenscraft http://podcastanswerman.com/ Daniel J Lewis https:/

Demendia Episode # 25

Fri, 01 Sep 2017 16:00:00 +0000

In this week's episode of dementia, I talk a little bit about changing the show around due to the fact of losing some content. Dementia has slowed down to the point where the content is drying up. Without going through other people's notes and other p

Dementia Episode # 24

Fri, 18 Aug 2017 23:38:36 +0000

Dementia Episode # 24 Show Notes 1. Taking care of Stephanie 2. Still playing around with Mama's meds 3. Stephanie getting ready to go back to school 4. I'm coming down with a head cold 5. How I've been recording the podcast and the fact that you ma

Dementia Episode #23

Fri, 04 Aug 2017 17:00:00 +0000

1. Not having a whole lot to talk about this week 2. Thinking that after you get to be a certain age. The doctors are going to over medicate you 3. Mama's has done 380 after taking have of her medication away 4. Mama not being hard to deal with, yes, sh

Dementia Episode # 22

Sun, 30 Jul 2017 21:16:26 +0000

Dementia Episode # 22 Show Notes 1. Almost didn't put this episode out 2. The support group 3. Update on Mama Eating habits are getting better 4. The IPad episode may sound a little different 5. Some new software for the IPad 6. FaceBook Groups & th

Dementia Episode # 21

Fri, 21 Jul 2017 15:25:03 +0000

Dementia Episode # 21 Retracting a statement from last week's episode my own forgetfulness a report on Mama Mama not knowing that societies crumbling, due to a public magazine targeting our children and sex Here's a link to the article in teen Vogue t

Dementia Episode # 20

Fri, 14 Jul 2017 16:00:00 +0000

Dementia Physical Problems Episode # 20 Taking a bath After taking a shower/bath Family members on both sides end up in the hospital Summer projects here in the house, that are still waiting Not telling mom that her family members in the hospital Stephani

Dementia Episode # 19

Fri, 07 Jul 2017 15:56:14 +0000

Dementia Episode # 19 Show Notes Explaining some of the feedback I've gotten about the podcast Giving mom credit for the name of the company/network/podcast Paying closer attention to mom this week A different way to prepare the food Refusing to put mom

Dementia Episode # 18

Sat, 01 Jul 2017 04:37:56 +0000

Dementia

Episode # 18

Show Notes

Unapologetic for last week's episode

Thank you to the wife

The talk between pod casters.

My own health issues

mamas eating and sleeping habits

a ruler from kindergarten

listening to other pod casters and one was talking about growing up as a child

having the best of both worlds is a kid

losing the family stories that you heard as a kid. Not having anyone to go to to know the truth of those stories

things that Michael should and shouldn't know/Stephanie knows

dementia locking doors to memories

reading the Christmas story on Christmas Eve

not decorating for Christmas this year

Mama not being able to tell Michael your daddy did this your daddy did that

siblings telling the family stories

my stepfather and I

3 out of 4 parents

dementia robbing mom of her grandkids/great grandkids

Mama sisters

losing track of thought and being able to regain it

not searching for the truth, this close to losing mom

your health, your actions affect your kids

starting family traditions of your own

telling kids in your stories

tell your kids you love them

Michael's responses a lot of the time to his mother and I when we want to love on him

the wife walked in the detail in and said I should of said when I was talking about love on them to add a hug on them too.

Dementia Episode # 17

Fri, 23 Jun 2017 18:48:05 +0000

Dementia

Episode # 17

Welcome to this week's episode of dementia, this is episode 17. This week Michael's under the weather I'm Stephanie his wife. Michael and I both are blowing out of our minds due to our stats of this program, we just cannot believe how many of you folks are listening. We would like to thank you so very much for all of the listening.

This week's episode is going to be quite different due to Michael's health. But we wanted to let you know a few select things.

Mama is doing quite fine all in all. We had another day of work done on the house, where we had to leave the house for about 8 hours and she did really good. The next day, however, she made up for having to get up so early and staying up all day that she slept all day until dinner, and she got up for dinner and right back out to bed she went. She must've been extremely tired is all we configure.

Our boy Michael Junior is back home from his camping trip to the modern day Woodstock. He seemed to enjoy his trip very much, but was also glad to get home into his own bed and was really glad to take a shower.

I unfortunately still have not been able to figure out all of the IPad's functions. I'm still working on trying to figure all of that out for this podcast, but once I get it there will put an episode out from the iPad and we'll see which one is better sounding for the podcast.

One other thing that Michael wanted me to let you know is that, the DC area is having a Pod Fest in November 2017. He's looking forward to it. It will be his 1st ever pod camp. Hope to see you all there. We'll keep you posted as the information becomes available to us.

Sorry if this episode sound like it was read. But It was, because I'm not used to speaking in the dementia podcast. Anyway, we both hope to see you next week for a much better episode of this thing. We were living with called dementia.

One last thing Michael wanted me to ask if any of you all could go to iTunes and leave this podcast, a review apparently they seem to help. Thanks again for all your listening and thanks in advance for the review in iTunes.

Until next week this is Stephanie behind the mic this week ,for Michael, for the podcast on dementia have a great week, Enjoy life, We'll see you next week.

Dementia Episode # 16

Fri, 16 Jun 2017 20:58:54 +0000

Dementia

Episode# 16

The bought me a father day gift

The Republican shooting the ball field

ways to let steam off without using a handgun

not in the podcast but here's a link to learn how to podcast www.podcastanswerman.com/learn-how-to-podcast/

reference to the game call of duty

diseases are taking enough of our people

good news of the Republican shooting at the ball field not affected mom and all

not getting things out of shooting a bunch of people except being killed yourself

not all the people at the ball field being adults

the older I get the more I care about things like this

being unable to talk to mom and getting a straight answer

trying to get mom interested things

not understanding people going out in public shooting a bunch of people

Mama raising us kids

dementia is affected mom's family so it may not look good for a couple of us kids

forgetting some things myself

this statement talking to yourself you're okay it's when you answer yourself you have problems

being frustrated

the elected president being the president

feeling bad for the 10-year-old boy on the ball field

the breakdown of society

God gives us certain diseases

fighting diseases in the world

accidents do happen in life

the good thing about having dementia

backing the president no matter who is in the presidency

Dementia

Episode# 16

The bought me a father day gift

The Republican shooting the ball field

ways to let steam off without using a handgun

not in the podcast but here's a link to learn how to podcast www.podcastanswerman.com/learn-how-to-podcast/

reference to the game call of duty

diseases are taking enough of our people

good news of the Republican shooting at the ball field not affected mom and all

not getting things out of shooting a bunch of people except being killed yourself

not all the people at the ball field being adults

the older I get the more I care about things like this

being unable to talk to mom and getting a straight answer

trying to get mom interested things

not understanding people going out in public shooting a bunch of people

Mama raising us kids

dementia is affected mom's family so it may not look good for a couple of us kids

forgetting some things myself

this statement talking to yourself you're okay it's when you answer yourself you have problems

being frustrated

the elected president being the president

feeling bad for the 10-year-old boy on the ball field

the breakdown of society

God gives us certain diseases

fighting diseases in the world

accidents do happen in life

the good thing about having dementia

backing the president no matter who is in the presidency

Dementia Episode # 15

Sat, 10 Jun 2017 01:45:08 +0000

Dementia Episode # 15 Show Notes Not being able to tell us this and that about the washing machines because of dementia. The boys needing to take a break from work to be with the family do other things. Mama's reaction to being woke up. I don't know a

Dementia , Episode # 14

Fri, 02 Jun 2017 14:15:22 +0000

Dementia Episode # 14 Losing History 1. Trying to arace history 2. Not being able to tell the grandkids about history 3. Saying no to elected officials 4. Being upset because of a disease taking my mother and the family history with her. 5. I think a lot

Dementia Episode # 13

Fri, 26 May 2017 16:00:00 +0000

Dementia

Decisions, Decisions, Decisions

Episode # 13 Show Notes

Trying, Â not to make the episodes directly about mom.

Â Redoing the recording of this episode.

Update on Mother's Day phone calls.

Missing a great granddaughter's graduation from high school.

Talk to the family about the adult day care.

We found some support groups in town that are going to have some meetings coming up here next month.

Apparently dementia causes hallucinations.

Being cold all the time because of dementia.

Adult day cares, nursing homes, and other people not taking care of the temperature to suit mom.

Dementia Episode # 12

Fri, 19 May 2017 18:58:08 +0000

Dementia

Episode # 12

Adult Day Cares

Trouble recording the show
I asked the question what's wrong with today's society
Taking care of mom is my responsibility
Having some work done on the house is what give me the idea of adult day care for mom
Having some work done on the house is what give me the idea of adult day care for mom
Not putting the dog in either car
Options for taking care of the dog due to the work in-house
Mama doing really good the day that we had to work that even without her medication
Mama not really having a reason to get up out of bed in the morning
Googling dementia bringing up nursing homes and assisted living facilities
The pricing of adult day cares versus having someone come in and stay with mom for 2 days a week
A 4 hour tour of one of the adult day care centers
Mama worrying about Dalton the dog being big enough to take care of himself
Not allowing Michael to dry with grandma on his own
Being able to do things in and out of the house if we get it adult day care
The trouble that I had recording this episode and being able to put this episode out today
Being afraid of talking about dementia a little bit
Getting older, being a pain in the you know what your kids not being a joke and doing something about having Michael take care of us when we get old

Dementia Episode # 11

Sat, 13 May 2017 19:35:32 +0000

Dementia

Episode# 11

Motherâ€™s Day With Dementia

Apologies for the lateness of the show !

Sunday being Motherâ€™s Day and being a kid on Motherâ€™s Day
Letting holidays go by the wayside due
Being fair to the wife on Motherâ€™s Day
Choosing the right gift for Motherâ€™s Day for someone with dementia
The way four a us are treating mom on Motherâ€™s Day due to dementia
My brother and his wife not being able to make it for Motherâ€™s Day
Mom putting the other 3 through college
Black sheep of the family
Mama put stuff on hold
Having mom physically but not mentally for Motherâ€™s Day
Looking for anything from the other 4 kids on Motherâ€™s Day
Mama isnâ€™t able to carry on conversations on the phone
Thanking the other 4 are ignoring mom because she sick
Talking to my older brother and his wife of 45 minutes
Mama been up all day doing things
Things Iâ€™m doing and trying to help the boy save a little money
My older brother and his wifeâ€™s flowers come from moms Motherâ€™s Day
Taking mom to Walmart for Motherâ€™s Day
Staying concentrated on the episode
Taking time with mom on Motherâ€™s Day
A Little something for the wife at the tail end of the show in the song

Dementia

Fri, 05 May 2017 19:28:26 +0000

Dementia Episode # 10 1. A different set of problems that we can't talk to mom about. 2. Taking a ride in the truck. 3. Waking up angry. 4. Still worrying about the dog. 5. Still being afraid of her own shadow. 6. A little girl has showed up. 7. Wanting

The_Michael_Delaney_Show_Episode__9.mp3

Fri, 28 Apr 2017 18:32:58 +0000

The Michael Delaney Show Episode # 8

Fri, 17 Mar 2017 15:27:50 +0000

http://babymountainradio.com/

Download Episode!

In this episode the wife joined me for the first time on the podcast.
We talked about how mom and dementia is affecting our family especially Stephanie herself.
We also talked about doing things together to help mom.
We also talked about family members being a big help.
There are also family members listening to the podcast that give me some great feedback on the episodes of the podcast.

The Michael Delaney Show Episode # 7

Fri, 10 Mar 2017 20:03:38 +0000

Dementia Episode # 7

Finding yourself in the same situation 35 years later.

Not being able to go to mom with problems any more.

Talking to Okey & Joy

Not handing situations right

Nursing home

Apology to the wife

Not understanding mom's sleeping so much

The Michael Delaney Show Episode # 6

Fri, 03 Mar 2017 17:00:00 +0000

Show Notes for Dementia Episode # 6 Getting my hair cut and shaving The lights and sun light adjusting the light in the room The old lady Wanting to go somewhere Worrying about the dog The making of the bed Eating / feeding the dog Mom's weight Day to d

The Michael Delaney Show Episode # 5

Fri, 24 Feb 2017 17:00:00 +0000

Show Notes for Episode # 5

Of the Michael Delaney Show on Dementia

Mom's eating or not

Mom's attitude with Joy and Okey

The bills getting paid or not and how much.

My head cold and not feeling good

The Michael Delaney Show Episode # 4

Fri, 17 Feb 2017 17:00:00 +0000

The Michael Delaney Show Episode # 4

2/17/2017

Up Date on Kaiser Web Site
Renting a rv for a trip to West Va
Sound Bites
Feb 14 2017 Valentine's Dayv

THe Michael Delaney Show Episode # 3

Fri, 10 Feb 2017 22:54:46 +0000

The Michael Delaney Show

Episode # 3

In today's show we cover the following

I have some shout outs for the gamers of call of duty III

Gen Death, Fear, Cliff Ravescraft

Mom / Kaiser, Mom's fall, Mom seeing things and people.
The Super ball
Presidents Trump's Ben

The Michael Delaney Show Episode # 2

Fri, 03 Feb 2017 05:54:48 +0000

The Michael Delaney Show Episode # 1

Wed, 01 Feb 2017 13:27:55 +0000