{"id":4419,"date":"2022-04-12T23:51:21","date_gmt":"2022-04-13T06:51:21","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.newsmolo.com\/EDC\/2019\/?p=4419"},"modified":"2022-04-12T23:51:21","modified_gmt":"2022-04-13T06:51:21","slug":"commentary-victims-of-alzheimers","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/www.newsmolo.com\/EDC\/2019\/2022\/04\/12\/commentary-victims-of-alzheimers\/","title":{"rendered":"Commentary – Victims of Alzheimer\u2019s"},"content":{"rendered":"
Elizabeth Caffrey, Placerville, CA<\/pre>\n
Will the real victim please stand up?<\/p>\n
I help my partner with the care of his mother, who is in the last stages of Alzheimer\u2019s. A social worker has asked me to write this out of concern for the families of the victims.
\nI believe her problem is mine: We think the victim is not the patient.<\/p>\n
I don\u2019t find it particularly hard to help with the diapers. This is a two-person job even in the last stages of the disease if a patient does not wish to be handled. They can mount an amazing resistance to \u201cchange.\u201d And then, of course, the body is not doing what a body should do so there is a lot of work associated with that particular site which babies do not present.<\/p>\n
The social worker, as I say, is deeply concerned for the families (usually one person) who think they are appointed to do this work.<\/p>\n
My parents lived into their 90s without having this curse. I don\u2019t know how I would feel if they needed the above care. I can\u2019t imagine they would want to live through it. But wait. The victims, I believe, lose their self-respect long before the diapers enter the picture. Is this fair? No. But is it fair to their children who didn\u2019t ask to be here in the first place and maybe wouldn\u2019t seize the opportunity if they had been asked?<\/p>\n
As I said, I don\u2019t particularly mind the diapers. What seer said, \u201cYou can get used to anything\u201d? I mind the cannibalizing of a life. You can\u2019t leave a patient alone, long after they have ceased to be a danger to themselves. That happens when they are helpless. Then they need you around nearly all the time, or so the family member believes. Because what if something happens and they weren\u2019t there.<\/p>\n
We thought the patient was dying the other night, but she had a good breakfast in the morning. And so it goes.<\/p>\n
The social worker felt the government should be doing more for the families of Alzheimer\u2019s patients. With insurance, I suppose. But how do you overcome the need of some family member to do the job? They want to do it. You can\u2019t help them except by helping them. But their health suffers and you are the witness to it. No one is seeing to their needs. No one can because they are too deep-seated.<\/p>\n
ELIZABETH CAFFREY<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
Elizabeth Caffrey, Placerville, CA Will the real victim please stand up? I help my partner with the care<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":4420,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":[],"categories":[1],"tags":[],"featured_image_urls":{"full":["http:\/\/www.newsmolo.com\/EDC\/2019\/wp-content\/uploads\/2022\/04\/cris-amber-sherri-9-17-17.jpg",411,531,false],"thumbnail":["http:\/\/www.newsmolo.com\/EDC\/2019\/wp-content\/uploads\/2022\/04\/cris-amber-sherri-9-17-17-150x150.jpg",150,150,true],"medium":["http:\/\/www.newsmolo.com\/EDC\/2019\/wp-content\/uploads\/2022\/04\/cris-amber-sherri-9-17-17.jpg",411,531,false],"medium_large":["http:\/\/www.newsmolo.com\/EDC\/2019\/wp-content\/uploads\/2022\/04\/cris-amber-sherri-9-17-17.jpg",411,531,false],"large":["http:\/\/www.newsmolo.com\/EDC\/2019\/wp-content\/uploads\/2022\/04\/cris-amber-sherri-9-17-17.jpg",411,531,false],"1536x1536":["http:\/\/www.newsmolo.com\/EDC\/2019\/wp-content\/uploads\/2022\/04\/cris-amber-sherri-9-17-17.jpg",411,531,false],"2048x2048":["http:\/\/www.newsmolo.com\/EDC\/2019\/wp-content\/uploads\/2022\/04\/cris-amber-sherri-9-17-17.jpg",411,531,false],"darknews-slider-full":["http:\/\/www.newsmolo.com\/EDC\/2019\/wp-content\/uploads\/2022\/04\/cris-amber-sherri-9-17-17.jpg",411,531,false],"darknews-featured":["http:\/\/www.newsmolo.com\/EDC\/2019\/wp-content\/uploads\/2022\/04\/cris-amber-sherri-9-17-17.jpg",411,531,false],"darknews-medium":["http:\/\/www.newsmolo.com\/EDC\/2019\/wp-content\/uploads\/2022\/04\/cris-amber-sherri-9-17-17.jpg",410,530,false],"darknews-medium-square":["http:\/\/www.newsmolo.com\/EDC\/2019\/wp-content\/uploads\/2022\/04\/cris-amber-sherri-9-17-17-350x350.jpg",350,350,true]},"author_info":{"display_name":"News MoLo","author_link":"http:\/\/www.newsmolo.com\/EDC\/2019\/author\/admin\/"},"category_info":"News<\/a>","tag_info":"News","comment_count":"0","_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.newsmolo.com\/EDC\/2019\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4419"}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.newsmolo.com\/EDC\/2019\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.newsmolo.com\/EDC\/2019\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.newsmolo.com\/EDC\/2019\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.newsmolo.com\/EDC\/2019\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=4419"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"http:\/\/www.newsmolo.com\/EDC\/2019\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4419\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":4421,"href":"http:\/\/www.newsmolo.com\/EDC\/2019\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4419\/revisions\/4421"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.newsmolo.com\/EDC\/2019\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/4420"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.newsmolo.com\/EDC\/2019\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=4419"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.newsmolo.com\/EDC\/2019\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=4419"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.newsmolo.com\/EDC\/2019\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=4419"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}