Mom Needs Help

Mom needs help.

So often, that is how this conversation begins. Five years and one week ago, following knee replacement surgery, my mother moved in with me and my husband to recover. To be honest, we were hoping it would lead to her wanting to stay here, as taking care of our own household plus hers was wearing on us.

We didn't know that day that her already-sketchy health would practically implode, and that she would not only stay but need rather concentrated care for all of this time. Let me back up to tell that story first.

On November 3, 2011 we went to the cardiologist and the pulmonary specialist to have my mom cleared for a knee replacement she desperately needed. She has both Congestive Heart Failure (CHF) and Chronic Obstructive Pulmonary Disease (COPD), so her ability to withstand anesthetic had to be confirmed. She had all the pre-op blood work done, the doctors agreed that sedation (twilight sleep) without a general anesthetic would be best and we went home happy that she would finally be more mobile. In recent years, we had had to move her bed to her first floor because of her difficulty making the stairs.

This move necessitated using an adult potty chair, since the only bathrooms are on the second floor and in the basement. That meant that each day when I came home from my teaching job, I would stop and empty the potty bucket and mom would get into my car and join me and my husband for dinner. Then, I would accompany her down the street (she could walk downhill more easily than uphill because of her breathing problems), and I would make sure she got safely into bed for the night with her night medications close by. But I digress.

On November 30, 2011 she had the knee replacement and all was well. After rehab that assured she could do a limited number of stairs, we picked her up on December 5 and she settled into the small room on our first floor that we had converted from our office to a bedroom for her. I had retired from teaching the previous spring and my husband was still teaching, so my routine was now full-time caring.

Two weeks later, when I came downstairs to give her morning medication and start my day, she was coughing. She said that she had been coughing all night and felt too week to sit up and have her breakfast with her pills. I called her PCP who advised taking her to the ER. I can't remember how we got her there, whether in our car or by ambulance, but she was admitted and found to have pneumonia. At one point, one of the cardiology associates said to me, "We can't figure out why, because she says there was no incident, but she seems to have lost about one-third of her heart function."

I didn't know when, but I knew there had to have been an incident. She was always one to downplay things like this. A stern look at her, and she caved. "One night I had really bad chest pains," she admitted. "Why didn't you tell me?" I practically yelled. "Well, I couldn't really talk or move." Okay, fair.

A bit of probing and she admitted that this had happened back in November, sometime between the pre-op testing and the surgery. She hadn't told us because she knew that they would not do the surgery, and she wanted the knee because walking had become so painful. So, an 85-year-old woman with multiple health problems and compromised mobility had had a heart attack, major surgery and pneumonia within one month. And in that order. Great.

Needless to say, her recovery was slow. Therapists and nurses came to the house. We struggled to figure out how to make all this work. And we were convinced that she would not last that winter.

Five years later, we have all taken a deep breath. She celebrated her 90th birthday this past July, and we have a routine that works for us. Most of the time. Her care is somewhat intense. She can't get dressed by herself, can't get even a drink for herself, but still manages to get through each day with as positive an outlook as she can manage.

We have learned enough about how to adapt our home and our routine to fill an encyclopedia. It is a problem-solving extravaganza that has been an eye-opener to our aging friends. And it has occurred to me that I should probably share some of the things I have learned so that they can help others.

I would stress, my mom does not have dementia. Her problems are most physical (she does suffer from depression and anxiety). Her big issues are mobility and dexterity. We have learned how to adapt our lives and our home to accommodate these problems. I am hoping we can help others solve similar problems.