The journey nears the end

I returned to Adelaide, where my father's health continued to decline.  He was in a small nursing home, in respite, but with hopes to go to another.  He'd set his heart on this home, but had not put in place the process to get there - in part due to his fear of losing his money, and refusal to accept the consequences of ageing.  But he had done volunteer work there - as a member of the Brighton Lions Club, and was well known in the area.

As a family we found the machinations of dealing with government agencies, nursing homes etc etc to be quite a minefield.  There seemed to be mounds of paperwork to complete, and misinformation from all directions.  We'd get a letter saying "a" would happen, and then a phone call that said that was not the case, but that "b" would occur.  We felt there was hositilities or at least misunderstandings between hospital/nursing homes.  Nothing went smoothly.  I wonder how traumatised people would become dealing with all of this.

Bit by bit - we moved onward through the mire, trying to accept the confusion of it all.  It was not helped by the fact that daughter number one was in Brisbane, daughter number 2 was in Adelaide but worked full time, and found dealing with the bureacracy of it all too much to handle.  And it was.

My mother is in a nursing home, and dealing with her and the issues surrounding father were difficult too.  Should we tell her? What do we tell her?  What will be the consequences of telling her.

It was the day that he died that we had told her that he was sick.  As I write this, we have yet to tell her of his passing.

For the most part everyone we have dealt with in the hospitals has been caring - but the manner that some of the 'admin' people have spoke to us has been somewhat off putting.  I won't go into it right now, but there are a lot of 'assumptions' - resulting in confusion.

One has little choice but to take a deep breath and plunge onward through it all - for the sake of the loved one.

The cost of it all - in money and emotional is high.  But should it be all so traumatic for the family?  Surely not.