Tribute to my parents

My parents have outlived all their family members - my mother is almost 95, and probably has a sister still alive, though she is younger than my mother and has been in a nursing home in Western Australia for many years.  My father is 91, and until recently was my mother's carer.  They both enjoy pretty good physical health, but in recent years dementia has claimed my mother.  She is amazing really, and despite being rather strange most of the time, can pull herself out of it.  I've taken her to the doctor at a time when she was completely "strange" and she's sat in front of him and virtually convinced him that it was everyone else.  (It turns out that he had a major health problem that we suspect made him unable to see what was going on!)

My father has remained somewhat active - he still drives a car, though most of the family think he should have given that up a long time ago.  (riding in the car with his is scary!)  He still likes to play bowls, though, due to his care commitments with our mother, he's had very little opportunity to particpate in bowls.  Until recent years he'd been an active member of Lions International.  He still likes to read, but he's been quite confined to home for some time as my mother found it difficult to go out.

Until recently they would go on a monthly bus tour around Adelaide, but Mum was unable to get into a bus easily.  She found it hard to get into a car too, and did so with difficulty.  Eventually Mum found it just too hard to do, so one of their regular outings was eliminated from their activities - anyway Dad found it challenging as often he was the only male on the bus - and while he has been always good with the ladies, he rather enjoyed the company of guys.  

They have lived for the last 20 + years in their little unit in the southern suburbs of Adelaide.  Mum until recently had been involved with the local church, but her enthusiasm faded when the new rector introduced the modern singing in the church, and the old traditional ways of the Anglican Church were traded for the new trendy mode of attracting folk to the church.  Mum was not impressed.

Their neighbours have been OK - but only one in those years have they found to be very friendly with - a single lady who eventually moved into other care as her eye sight diminished.  In any case Mum and Dad would have liked friends their own age - but in the end they spent their days saying good bye at funerals as others left this world.  

Mum and Dad didn't like going to the movies.  I remember taking them to see "Australia" with Nicole Kidman and Hugh Jackman, which they did enjoy, but the audio was too loud for them.  Something that a lot of older people complain about at the movies, I've found.  Actually even I have often found the sound too loud.  Do movie theatres know they do that?

For the last two years my father has been my mother's full time carer.  He's done all the cooking, much of the washing, and they've had a lady come in to do the housework and take Mum out for a few hours so that Dad could do a few things alone.  Mum thought she did it all - how else would it all be done?  She'd talk about how busy she had been cooking and cleaning, but the reality is that she did none of it.  Dad was amazing.

Mum liked her wine - and Dad found it easy to indulge her.  Even drinking in the morning.  If Mum was "thirsty" she'd look for wine.  Coffee or tea no longer quenched her thirst, and we'd laugh as she'd have a glass of wine for morning tea, then lunch, and to Dad's joy would doze off in her armchair for much of the afternoon, and he could read or watch TV or doze off himself.  Mum insisted on going to bed early - and Dad went too - but he would lay in bed awake or read.  He valued his radio and would listen to the ABC all through the night sometimes.

Two or three days a week they would go out to lunch - Warradale Hotel, or Morphett Arms Hotel were their favourites.  Mum would always complain, but then say she enjoyed it.  Pretty hard to deal with on a daily basis, but that's the way it was.

Dad had already told my sister and I that he was finding it difficult to manage with Mum, and we'd set about finding her care, knowing that she flatly refused to leave home.  It was very hard to do - to get her out of the house, but in the end, with some trickery it was done.

The first step was an assessment by the ACAT team.  It is normally an annual event, and she was due around the end of October, but we managed to get them to reconsider and make it earlier.