My grandma is a stubborn old women who is about to turn 94 and lives alone in Fairfield, OH. The family is concerned with her mobility and safety within the home. No family member is able to check on her every day due to location and work schedules. The family is unsure of how to handle her care. She does not want to go into a retirement home. She associates leaving the home with failure and would want to stay living in her home as long as possible
Install grab bars if/where needed, make sure there are safe paths from room to room, get her a walker and "pretty it up" if needed so she doesn't resent using it. You can add ribbons or bows or even some pretty cloth around the legs where it won't interfere with movement or operation of the walker.
Remove throw rugs, add corded phones in every room, and create call schedules to check on her.
Next time you're able to visit, ask her which neighbors she likes, then surreptitiously visit them, explain the situation, provide your phone numbers, and ask if they would contact you if something's amiss.
Let the local PD know she's living alone.
Get a lockbox and install it onto the front of the house. Give family members the combination, and provide it to the PD or EMS if you have to call them. They'll be able to get in the house without any of the family having to come and let them in.
If you trust any of the neighbors enough, give them the combination as well.
Get a medical alert button she can press if she needs help. She probably will insist she doesn't and won't wear it for a while, but eventually she may give in. Dad initially didn't want to wear his but now wears it all the time.
And at 95 he still lives alone and goes out to work in his workshop, even after 2 hip fractures!
On a more expensive level, install a security system which provides in-house monitoring so you can check her remotely. Someone posted on another thread about getting such a system which I believe she monitored on her laptop.
Try to get Meals on Wheels - it will not only provide her with decent food and alleviate the challenge of cooking, it will also provide someone to see her if just for a few moments every day. Just a little bit of social life helps.
If she's a church goer, arrange to have someone pick her up regularly for services, and perhaps come to visit to surreptitiously check on her status.
In short, consider all the possible situations for which she might need help and try to identify solutions, or at least monitors, for as many as possible.
And hats off to her - I truly support her independent spirit!
All of her grand kids told me if I moved her, they would move me! Everyone in our family wanted to listen to her wishes and I'm so glad we did. Think of how you would feel if you told all your family you want to live a certain way and they decided you have to live their way instead. I think it is abundantly important for us to listen and do everything we can to honor the wishes of our elders.
In my mom's case, I checked on her often and her sister called her twice a day from afar. If my mom was out and hadn't told her sister where she was going, my elderly aunt would call me. In the worst case if we needed to, we could call a neighbor to check on her or the police, but that was never necessary.
One day, my mom went to sleep and didn't wake up in the morning. I know she was happy until the last day of her life. Today, I'm so glad we listened to her wishes and didn't let anyone unduly influence her to do something she didn't want to do.
She was NOT clinging to the past. She was NOT a pack rat. She was not dwelling on happy memories in the house. She was a happy, independent woman, often at the library getting books or attending exercise classes with friends. She passed a 1.5 hour on road driving test and intelligence test 6 months before she passed away, because we were worried that she shouldn't be driving (she snuck out of the house to get tested when we took her car away for a brief period when she was recovering from an illness). She passed away one early morning, after eating a bit of an apple and half a banana, at 93.
I hope the best for you, your family and most of all for your Grandma. If she tells you not to worry about her, try to listen to her. I know it's hard, because I worried about my mom every day. In the long run, I'm now happy that my mom got to do what she wanted to do and live the way she chose.
It is a difficult situation with no easy answers. Sometimes we just have to take things a day at a time and do what needs to be done as things change.
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