Alzheimer's Disease Support Group
Alzheimer's disease (AD) is the most common cause of dementia and characterized by progressive cognitive deterioration with declining activities of daily living and neuropsychiatric symptoms or behavioral changes. An early symptom is memory loss (amnesia), usually manifesting as minor forgetfulness that becomes pronounced with illness progression, with relative...
I am so relieved. We (I) have been approved for up to 12 hours a week of in-home respite care for my husband. We were even able to chose the person to do it! She is someone my husband already knows and is comfortable with. This is through the VA.
A well deserved break for you and I'm sure it will provide you the extra boost to keep going. So....what are you going to do with your first break? I know all the "needed" things that will eat up this time, but I think you should take the first few times and just spend it doing something special for you!
I hope this works out well for you both.
After being stuck home with just the two of us for so long it is just amazing how great it feels to be able to go shopping, do laundry or just take a drive and know that he is safe and you don't have to rush to get back home for fear of what he might do if left alone (my hubby has gotten to the point he rarely wants to leave the house let alone the property).
I even used my respite care time to just go take a nice long nap, sometimes we need that more then anything else.
I know part of your respite time will be used to take care of things like shopping but try to find ways to pamper yourself with them too it is so important and makes you feel so much better, loving and patient when you get back home.
the VA My husband gets care thru the VA and they told me about
NH respite for up to 30 days, but nothing about in home . I would
LOVE that.
Judy
What it is simply is someone comes and evaluates your person with AD to see what their level of ability to care for themselves is and then based on that, and I think also what other supports you may have, they will give you so many hours a week of in home care.
That means someone will come to your home and stay wiht your person while you go out and do shopping or whatever it is you need or want to do and you will not have to worry because you'll know there is someone there taking care of them.
In most cases I've heard of how the hours you get are parceled out depends on you and your respite worker. There were times when I took all mine in the same day and others when I just used three or four hours so I could go shopping or to a meeting.
What level of care they will get also depends on their level of ability, most respite workers do not do things like bathing or heavy care, if your person needs that level then I think it is a different care system, I know when Alz. evaluated my hubby it was something of a double look, he does not need the heavy care yet but it will be there if/when he does need it. Not all AD patients get to that total care need before they die.
If you do not have a large family/friend support base I urge you to find out everything you can about in home help and start getting forms filled out, things can change so quickly with this disease and you don't want to wait until your just falling apart to seek help, it is so much harder to do when your already drained, trust me on that one.