Originally Posted by Dartgod:
Same with my maternal grandmother. I visited her a couple of times, but that wasn't my grandma laying in that bed. I never went back again.
The last time I saw her was at some point in '93. She finally, mercifully passed in the summer of '95. I remember at some point in between talking to my uncle and he asked me if I'd seen her. I told him "no, and I feel kind of bad about it." His response was "You'd feel worse if you had. Don't go."
Sadly, he died of complications from Alzheimer's a few years ago. My last visit with him wasn't quite as bad as when I saw her for the last time, but he was clearly on the way out and it was obvious. I kept in touch with my aunt, who regularly updated me on his ever-worsening progress, but I never saw him again.
IDK if you've ever lived with someone with late stage Alzheimer's but they're not there at all. Like less aware than an infant. My grandma had it and lived with us and at the end she was just a husk and completely unaware of anything around her, I was a total stranger to her. So yeah Hackman's wife dying and him just wandering around the house until he passed is entirely possible.
Really sad situation and a terrible way to go. [Reply]
My uncle had bought some kind of insurance that paid for up to 3 years at a memory care facility. He wound up at a super nice one with a 1 to 2 patient to worker ratio. There was a bit of concern about what to do if he lived past the three years, so they waited as long as possible to put him in. But he had some kind of fast-acting dementia and only lasted a year and a half.
My other uncle hit his head a couple times and had temporary stays in a medicare-supported memory care place that was like One Flew Over the Cuckoo’s Nest. We’d be there in the afternoon and there were still trays from lunch sitting around on counters. The staff were flat out mean to the patients even when we were around. I can’t imagine what it was like when no one was visiting.
I’m gonna Kevorkian it when I get that dementia diagnosis. I’ll do as many fun things as I can, but figure out when I need to do assisted suicide before I lose my faculties. [Reply]
Originally Posted by suzzer99:
My uncle had bought some kind of insurance that paid for up to 3 years at a memory care facility. He wound up at a super nice one with a 1 to 2 patient to worker ratio. There was a bit of concern about what to do if he lived past the three years, so they waited as long as possible to put him in. But he had some kind of fast-acting dementia and only lasted a year and a half.
My other uncle hit his head a couple times and had temporary stays in a medicare-supported memory care place that was like One Flew Over the Cuckoo’s Nest. We’d be there in the afternoon and there were still trays from lunch sitting around on counters. The staff were flat out mean to the patients even when we were around. I can’t imagine what it was like when no one was visiting.
I’m gonna Kevorkian it when I get that dementia diagnosis. I’ll do as many fun things as I can, but figure out when I need to do assisted suicide before I lose my faculties.
My grandpa went from pretty lucid with a bit of memory issues to not knowing what was going on day to day in the space of a year some change. It was pretty shocking how fast it was. By the end he didn't know what he had to eat the day previous. [Reply]
Originally Posted by suzzer99:
My uncle had bought some kind of insurance that paid for up to 3 years at a memory care facility. He wound up at a super nice one with a 1 to 2 patient to worker ratio. There was a bit of concern about what to do if he lived past the three years, so they waited as long as possible to put him in. But he had some kind of fast-acting dementia and only lasted a year and a half.
My other uncle hit his head a couple times and had temporary stays in a medicare-supported memory care place that was like One Flew Over the Cuckoo’s Nest. We’d be there in the afternoon and there were still trays from lunch sitting around on counters. The staff were flat out mean to the patients even when we were around. I can’t imagine what it was like when no one was visiting.
I’m gonna Kevorkian it when I get that dementia diagnosis. I’ll do as many fun things as I can, but figure out when I need to do assisted suicide before I lose my faculties.
You can set up small logic puzzles in front of a spear gun, and every day you have to solve the problem or face the consequences. That way you don't have to worry that you can't make the decision rationally. [Reply]
But as many posters here realize, old age stuff is a very mixed bag.
I went to my grandma’s funeral on my birthday. My grandpa died on 12/25. Timing wasn’t great.
Well gang…. My mom turned 83.
We went to her preferred restaurant…. Met her friends for 60 years, laughed, had dinner…. Christ, her friend’s husband had his THIRD bypass five weeks ago….
And then we went to the rehab center for my aunt, my mother’s sister…
This is the stuff I’m not good with…. Those two just talking…. And my cousin is there, but I have no connection…. But damn, they started going 40’s stories and I’m like, “wah?”
I guess I just wish we lived closer together so my mom could get together more often with her sis and close friends.
If I haven’t taken the long walk through the woods by then, I’d expect that’s the hope of most people.
Were brief, but sometimes we make friends, do something creative, have a family and sorta live on? [Reply]
Originally Posted by Rain Man:
You can set up small logic puzzles in front of a spear gun, and every day you have to solve the problem or face the consequences. That way you don't have to worry that you can't make the decision rationally.
My other plan is to hike around cliffs a lot. Hopefully I just fall off when the time is right. [Reply]
Originally Posted by scho63:
My sister just went to our older great cousin's 90th surprise party last week. I know surprising a 90 year old is stupid, not my idea.
Several wheelchairs, walkers, canes and crutches.
The photos my sister shared with me looked like the walking wounded.
Getting old ain't fun.
Best friend dealing with his 95 year old Mom and other best friend's Dad was in hospital for 9 days with pneumonia and now in rehab.
Originally Posted by scho63:
My sister just went to our older great cousin's 90th surprise party last week. I know surprising a 90 year old is stupid, not my idea.
Several wheelchairs, walkers, canes and crutches.
The photos my sister shared with me looked like the walking wounded.
Getting old ain't fun.
Best friend dealing with his 95 year old Mom and other best friend's Dad was in hospital for 9 days with pneumonia and now in rehab.
I've known quite a few people who live good, active lives into their 80s.
But man it's downhill fast from there. The 90s look like absolute shit. Just a bunch of people feeling pain all the time and watching their friends die. Their minds are slipping and the real unfortunate ones know it so they're just mad about it all the time.
I think I'd probably be fine checking out around 88. Kids would be in their mid 50s. Grandkids to/through college. I'm good at that point. Great Grandkids don't pay shit for attention to their great grandparents for the most part. Not gonna be much more traveling worth doing.
Gives me another 45 years. Yeah - that seems good. [Reply]
My mom suffered from Alzheimer's and dementia. Initially we hired a company to come to her home 4 days a week to cook meals and clean her home, but that fell through immediately when she wouldn't let them into her house. She had participated in all the interviews on a Friday but couldn't remember who they were when they showed up the following Monday.
We knew right then and there we had to move her into an assisted care facility. 14 years, two broken hips from falls later, she finally passed away at the age of 98.
Her life was reduced to sitting in her recliner or a wheelchair.
Conversations were impossible unless we showed her family pictures stored on my wife's Ipad. Even then you repeated the same conversation every 5 minutes, because she had already forgotten what had been said
The Hackman story is profoundly sad, but I completely understand how it can happen [Reply]
