I used to be a weight lifter, so I've been familiar with meal prepping all my meals on one day for quite some time.
Fast forward 6 years and with caregiving and constantly working overtime at my paying job, I do not have TIME for shopping, preparing, cooking, cleaning, and doing it all over again.
I get one day off from paying job per week, and the rest of my time is absolutely CONSUMED.
I found an online company that will send me vacuum sealed, wholesome, barely salted, fully cooked meals. I order enough for my entire household to get 2 meals/day 6 days a week.
It can be pretty pricey, but I was able to get the cost to $190-$230 for a family of 3 humans. YES, EXPENSIVE- but not too much more than groceries cost for my area, with no preparing and very little dishes or kitchen cleaning.
Do you guys have anything that has made such a POSITIVE impact in your care giving x life balance?
I am only caregiver for my bed-ridden mom who has a feeding tube and vascular dementia.
My Step Dad has Alzheimers Stage 4. I mow lawn. I made it simple for myself. I am getting things organized in each room again. I dont stress over things that have to get done. No family members come over to help. I had bad help in the past with housekeeping and caregiving. Had my own business. I have to take care of them. Not going on Medicaid. Would just be bad care all over again. Property is involved and not giving up the house. I do errands once a week. They have social security and pension. I have gotten much stronger going through this. Learning a lot. I have Visiting Physicians Association come to the house once a month for mom. I also have a pharmacy that delivers for free and is 5 minutes from my house. I have a beautician that comes to the house to cut hair. I go to Walgreens, Walnart and Jewel. And sometimes WholeFood and Tradef Joe's. I use to workout caregiving gives you a good workout. I drink protein powder.
I give my Step Dad Max Protein and Enlive to drink. He can still walk and do things for himself.
I do laundry everyday. Housekeeping not done as much.
I keep it as simple as possible now. I am going to sleep at midnight and getting up by 8:30am. I don't stress about anything any more.
Ditto for laundry — certain items on certain days, with hampers for each type of item. If I cleaned our house, I would have followed the same approach; however, I had someone do that every other week.
Also, making plans with a good home care agency for back up support in case one of them is hospitalized while we are away.
Having on line accounts for their medical providers so I can get test results, appointments, communicate with docs without having to be on the phone forever.
Other grocery stores in my area also offer a similar service, using their own website. Someone shops for you in that particular store.
I pay an extra $2.50 for curb-side pickup which is scheduled for a certain day and within a certain time frame. I need to buy $60 or more of groceries. The service also offers home delivery which is $10, but the order needs to be $100 or more. I also get gasoline points :)
I have been using this service for many years now, as I find grocery shopping B O R I N G since I hate to cook :P
I made a lot of soup and or stew. Easy to portion into 2 cup serving sizes in the little Ball Jars and put in the freezer. Easily thawed in the microwave. (When it was necessary I would puree prior to freezing)
Because it was soups and stews I shopped a lot of the close out produce, little bruises don't show up in a soup! so meals were pretty inexpensive done that way.
This sounds real strange but it worked.
When he started using tab briefs rather than the pull up type i would have him stand by the sink after toileting and put the brief on "backwards" so I was using his body to get the tabs fastened as tight as I could. Then another oddity..In the morning after his shower when dressing him I would put a pair of regular boxer brief on him OVER the tab brief. This held it in place better and he was less likely to have the tabs pop open. (It did help that the tabs were in the back though.)
Another strange thing I discovered.
When he sat on the toilet the barrier cream I used would sort of make him stick to the seat. I replaced the oblong toilet seat with one of the U shaped ones. I then placed a Tube sock on each side. He would sit down,. the sock would prevent the sticking and I could pull off the sock when he was done and wash it, I no longer had to scrub waterproof cream off the toilet seat.!
Pool noodles made great bumpers at the edge of the table so he would not bump his knees into the table if I pushed him in too close. The also padded the back bar on the wheelchair so it was not as hard. They also added padding on the arm and edge of the wheelchair so when he started leaning to one side I could prop him easily.
Just didn't want to take a whole Sunday being in grocery stores... yes, plural, because Mom would read the grocery ads and this store had a sale on can soup, another store a sale on bread, another on cereal. Target had the best price on cookies, etc. Mom was just use to doing that with my Dad once he had retired decades ago... it kept them busy.
Along came on-line grocery shopping. YES !! I set up an account for my parents, and a separate account for me. I could shop in my pj's. I could shop at midnight.
I had a choice of curb-side pick-up at the grocery store, or home delivery.
Of course, my Mom could claim the "food taste funny" even though it was the same identical product she would buy in the brick & mortar store. And heaven forbid if a brand name changed their packaging.... [rolling eyes].
KaiulaniK which company are you using for meals? We have some of the PlantPure entree types at the local grocery store, and I would totally have crates full of those shipped in if necessary -- whole food, no added oil, and delicious.
The funniest thing about not having time to shop is I work AT A GROCERY STORE!