02/23/2013 Saturday

Now that we are in appeal this was a relatively uneventful visit. We actually got to see mom and talk with her without being on high alert with something going on with the staff. They have managed to lose her blanket and several other things. That is something that just happens at SNFs.  You may as well plan on it. Even if you write their name on everything.

We found out from the director that sometimes you might get “customer service” reports from the various people handling your loved one. They want to make things pleasant and might give a “better than” report of progress as you pass them in the hallways. You have to be very careful what you hear from whom. Always ask the people in charge if you can figure out who they are, what you need to know.

We are in the process of closing down mom’s apartment. She was living on her own last November 2012 before the 1^st stroke and was a very independent woman. So, in the middle of all of the nightmare of balancing the government agencies (Medicare, Medi-cal, Ambulance Services, Hospitals and Doctors) and the games you have to LEARN and then play to survive, and the learning curve that you need to know in order to communicate with the Skilled Nursing Facilities and then the doctors on top of all that and THEN you might have an ounce of energy left to love your person who just had their lives turned completely upside down.  It’s exhausting and then you feel like but hey, wait, it’s not about me……

So, we sit here and we wait to hear our fate; will the little guy win the appeal and get to take advantage of her last few days in Rehab? and avoid being subjected to a three bed room (fr the rest of her life) next to another injured soul that cannot control herself and her attack on others senses?

This is my worst fear and nightmare, who would want to live this way?