My grandmother almost completely lost the ability to create memory about 7 years ago. She can maintain a continuous bout of consciousness for a couple minutes at most. At first this meant that a typical conversation with her was answering the same couple questions a dozen times in a row. Now she has deteriorated to the point that she does not open her eyes, much less get up even for visitors and randomly stops breathing in her sleep. Last year she was suffering from indigestion and pain from over prescribed medication and begging that we just let her die. With less medication her physical health is nearly gone, but at least she is at peace. I don't think putting her in a home will do her any good.
Aside from being torn up by grief and feeling emasculated my grandfather is mentally fine, his hearing and arthritic hands are almost useless. He is an old southerner born nearly a hundred years ago. He is the kind of guy that is incapable of showing weakness, and right now he can barely stop crying. They do have people come in twice a week for housekeeping, bathing and medical treatment thanks to him retiring from an insurance company, plus their church brings them food on Sunday. The other days my grandfather makes sandwiches or leftovers because he doesn't have the strength or dexterity to cook or clean much of anything. While putting my grandmother in a home would ease his burden, he definitely could not stand to let her go. I don't know what he will do when she dies or is committed, probably suicide.
I don't have an answer for any of these problems. But my grandparents only present an emotional burden at the moment, however extreme it may be. I won't be asked to save them, my Aunt and Uncle are the ones that would handle that. I will be asked to save my sister and mother. I don't know if I can even if I tried. I spent most of the weekend with them, and we had almost nothing to talk about that wasn't horrible and depressing.
Author
Topic: Things that made you sad today thread. (Read 9443967 times)