Hallo,
My mum is 95 and in a care home.
She recently went to hospital for 10 days with a blocked bowel.
The hospital sent her back to her care home as they said she had weeks or a few months.
She is now in bed having care in bed. Being washed and fed all through the day.
She has picked up and now wants to get out of bed even though she has wasted legs and is very thin and frail. She has started to read the paper again and wants to know about politics. She doesn’t seem to be in palliative care situation anymore. The hospital doctors told us to go and make funeral arrangements.
Has this happened to anyone else’s parent?
I think my mother could live longer than a few months as she has a second wind in her.
I am delighted but I feel the hospital didn’t really want her there anymore!
Hello, Phoebe. I am sorry to hear about your circumstances. It is sad enough to have a loved one with limited time left, and having to wrestle with decisions does not make things easier.
Please don’t have bad feelings about the hospital. The prime function of a hospital is to cure illness, and of course there is the constant need for beds. It is common practice for hospitals to send patients back to where they came from in cases where a “terminal” condition has arisen but the patient has recovered sufficiently well to be discharged. Depending on the patient’s condition, the next step could be a nursing home, a hospice or even back to the hospital, depending on how things work out.
It is often difficult to estimate how long someone will live. It is great that your mum is recovering, more comfortable and mentally alert. I suggest that you let the care home decide when she is well enough to get out of bed. It sounds as though she will need much assistance with this at first. She will probably be unsteady and we don’t want her to fall, do we!
Feel free to stay on this forum and keep us in touch whenever you like. Best wishes!
Phoebe,
My mum was “up and down” throughout the last year of her life. One minute it seemed she wouldn’t last the week, then she perked up again, repeatedly.
As your mum is a very great age now, it is a good idea to find out details of funeral directors, so you can decide which one you want to use when mum’s time finally comes, in weeks, months, or even years. Make sure you know how much it will cost. Then tell the nursing home where mum is, so they know who to ring. It is so much easier to do this before, rather than after the event. Mum in law died suddenly in hre nursing home, and it caused all sorts of problems!
I would also suggest that you Googled “Signs of Dying” where you will find lots of information written by people who have worked in the hospice movement. I wish someone had told me this years ago. It will enable you to support mum so much better, especially as far as eating and drinking is concerned.
Having done both of the above, you can put it all in a drawer and forget about it until the time comes, and concentrate on enjoying mum’s company while you still can.