My mom goes home on Friday after a stroke 4 mos ago that had her in rehab followed by a few weeks in the SNF. She's lived alone for 35 years, so this is a massive change, and will no doubt be a huge transition. I have been living, eating and breathing nothing else for the past few weeks. I'll be there all day Friday, meeting the caregiver, the nurse who does an assessment, etc. I'm thinking I'll stay over the first night. Is that a good idea? Or should I leave her alone with this complete stranger? So confusing. If I'm there, do I make dinner? Do we all eat together? I assume that in a few weeks a routine will be set, but just anticipating the first few days. Her BF will visit, but not until the following weekend, as he needs foot surgery.
Wow, I am amazed with your Mom's memory for names. I have a terrible time myself with names, and so did my Dad... my Mom was good with names.
For my Dad when he had 24 hours care, he had quite a few different caregivers and two of them really stood out as an excellent fit personality wise, similar background to my Dad growing up, and both had a great sense of humor. So I asked Dad which caregivers did he like, and they were the two I would have picked.
Even when my Dad moved to senior living, I had the two caregivers worked into the schedule as I wanted Dad to have a daily routine, since I couldn't be there daily.
24 care is on call...
I removed anything of value before they came to my mom's and wrote up detailed instructions which we read over together. Every day they entered notes in a notebook about mom and left it there for the next shift to read.
my mom had bad alzheimers but after a while was very happy to see the aid there in the middle of the night when she was scared and wanted to go home. Also early in the morning way earlier than I would have gotten there to make her breakfast . They cleaned too. Yes it is a learning curve to let go- it was extremely difficult for me...
This morning I spoke to my mom, who sounded fine. I spoke briefly to the aide, who said my mom had woken up at 2 am, confused, saying she wanted to go home. She was up for an hour. I found myself apologizing to the aide, since she is really not officially "on duty" over night. I need to let go and stop worrying about everyone!! If the aide isn't happy for some reason, she'll tell the agency, right?
Boy, this is a learning curve...
Oops, I thought wrong, my Mom was furious. How care an another woman cook a meal for my Dad [and for my Mom]. That wasn't going to happen in her house. And Mom thought she would need to set up the guest room bed for the overnight caregiver, to which I had a hard time convincing that that caregiver stays awake all night in case she needed some help. Well, that didn't fly well, either.
Xina, I hope you Mom's accepts the caregivers and everything goes smoothly. It will be a learning experience for everyone. Once my Mom went into long-term-care, I got back the caregivers for Dad who loved having them around, and they loved him as he was so easy going and took direction well :)
The caregiver won't expect to have dinner with you and your mom. You can invite her if you want to but most caregivers bring their own snacks and meals to eat.
Eventually a new routine will emerge and the chaos will simmer down. That's the time you can really assess your mom to see how she's doing. People coming in day after day tends to buoy spirits. New energies, smiling faces....a lot of elderly people like all that attention. After a while when all the visits and assessments die down you'll be able to get a clearer picture of how your mom is doing at home.
Of course, this is your mom, which is different. I think the idea, linked to one of your previous posts is, if YOUR attitude is one of "this is not a big deal, this is all set up and will work out just fine" then your mom will hopefully pick up on your vibe.
Who is this person? Is she an independent professional who will live at your mother's home full-time, or one of a team supplied by an agency? If the latter, when will the next handover be? - because you'll need to be there for that, too.
Either way, you'd better play it by ear but be ready to stay overnight unless you're confident that everything is going according to plan - in which case you take your leave politely but make sure you're "on call" in case of questions or emergencies.
Good luck! There are bound to be teething troubles, but I really hope this will settle down smoothly into a nice manageable routine. And your mother's spirits should soar! :)