In-home Care Visits

Last month Carol had her annual physical with our family doctor.  Physically, she’s healthier than I am.  I would kill to have her blood pressure.  Her cognitive abilities are still the elephant in the room.  We were supposed to see the neurologist at the end of June.  Due to “unforeseen circumstances” our appointment was cancelled.  This is the second time this has happened, so I’m a bit annoyed with the hospital in Pensacola.  But at least we got to see the family doctor.  We discussed the need for some in-home care for her for whenever I’m gone.  She suffers panic attacks whenever she’s alone in the house. 

My boys both work at the local airport.  They work anywhere between 4:30pm and 5:30am.  They do things like loading/unloading luggage, cleaning the planes, downloading the commodes, etc.  When I’m home [not TDY] I work fairly normal hours, but sometimes between when the boys go to work and I come home from work, she panics.  She doesn’t feel safe at home alone.  She suspects the “tree people” or other people around the neighborhood would try to come in the house.  The problem we have is that my work takes me away from home, but she can’t be alone at night.  We need someone to care for her during that time.  That nut is proving hard to crack.  For the time being, my co-workers are picking up the slack of me being off the road, but I don’t know how long that will last.

Our doctor referred us to a service for in-home care.  That place didn’t take our insurance, and our doctor referred us to another outfit that does.  They’re called Nurses On Call.  The doctor ordered the gamut of services – in-home nursing, physical therapy, occupational therapy, speech therapy, and social work.  Not long after that referral we received our first in-home visit from a registered nurse to assess Carol's needs.  We discussed how Carol sees "people" in the trees, and she told us of some patients of hers in the past who saw people not only in the trees but also inside the house.  She was glad to hear that the people only Carol can see haven't come inside, because some of her patients hurt themselves trying to avoid the imaginary people who come in the house.  That visit went fine.  She told us to expect other visits in the coming days.

A couple of days later both a physical therapist and an occupational therapist paid us a visit.  While the physical therapist was with Carol, I walked the occupational therapist around the house.  He was looking for potential hazards, like the shower, the stairs, the stove, basically anything that can cause any harm.  Since Carol was diagnosed with breast cancer, she hasn’t driven a car.  Carol doesn’t use the stove – she doesn’t cook.  Neither do I except on Thanksgiving and Christmas.  She fell into the shower (only once) while walking by it [she wasn’t feeling too good that day], and I was in the next room to pick her up.  But she hasn’t fallen in the shower.

The physical therapist put Carol through her paces.  He had her sit in a chair, get up quickly, walk to the other end of the kitchen.  He had her walk up and down the stairs.  He assessed her balance.  He assessed her ability to follow instructions.  She passed with flying colors.  Both therapists put their heads together and concluded that Carol doesn’t need their help.  She can do normal things like you and I.  On top of that, her long-term memory is good.  Her short-term memory is not so good.  Sometimes she can’t find the right words to express what she wants to say.  That’s where the speech therapist comes in.

While the visits with the nurse, the physical therapist, and the occupational therapist went well, the same cannot be said of the speech therapist.  She was friendly enough.  That wasn’t the problem.  To do her assessment of Carol’s needs, she did the same cognition test the neurologist did in December.  Only this time, Carol wasn’t quite as receptive to the questions.  As the speech therapist kept asking her questions, Carol became flustered.  There were some questions she couldn’t answer, and this frustrated her.  After a few minutes, she told the therapist “I’m done – my brain is full”.  I don’t know how speech therapists go about their business, and when she asked us if we had any questions, I didn’t have any.  I didn’t know what questions to ask.  Once the door closed and she was gone, Carol cried on my shoulder.  She said the therapist made her feel like an idiot.  I reassured her that she’s no idiot.  She hates what her brain is doing to her.  I do, too.

Last Wednesday I got a call from the same speech therapist and I gave her feedback on her last visit.  I told her that she might want to alter her approach because I don’t take very kindly to my wife being made to feel like an idiot.  She thanked me for the feedback and told me that she was scheduled to come see us that afternoon.  I told her that Carol was still too traumatized from her last visit, and that we’ll see her next week…maybe.

We saw the nurse again.  We told her about the fiasco that was the speech therapists visit.  She told us that Nurses On Call just hired a psychiatric nurse, but it’s going to be awhile before we see her.  She asked if the social worker had dropped by yet. “No.”  She provided the “where the hell is the social worker” feedback to her office.  Who knows, I might get a call from them soon.  She also gave us some tips on how to begin a heavy metal detox without breaking the bank.  But that is for another entry…