A Daughter's Stories About an Aging Parent: Sharing Tips & Facts Learned Along The Way
Herman Wouk. Ken Follett. David Baldacci. Barack Obama. What do these authors have in common? They have all kept my elderly mother Ginny company at one time or another. Books have been Ginny’s go-to hobby for as long as I can remember. She really is a bookworm. She’ll check out three or four books at…
I’ve been thinking about Ginny’s future over the last week. Sometimes, she enters my thoughts as I’m fading towards sleep and sometimes she is my first thought of the day. Sometimes, I lay awake. So far, she has not exhibited additional dementia-type symptoms, so that’s significant, but a return of vertigo always looms. Plus, given…
It is lunch and tour day at The Groves. While I take mom to get her hair done, Betsy and Dennis drive to two other facilities for pricing and to get a glimpse of their interiors. Apparently, they are beautiful, however, their monthly cost is significantly higher than $2400.00/month. Additionally, neither offer “Medicaid beds.” A…
Ginny has a friend named Lois who has been in her condo complex for 25 years. Lois knows people. She had been on the board for many years and has always been a source of information for mom. They used to go to lunch and local plays together. They weren’t best friends, but she has…
Ginny called today. I should lay out the back story first. It begins about three years ago. She had a young woman named Carly as a next-door neighbor. Carly had a boyfriend who often stayed with her. Apparently, they would occasionally play music late at night which woke her up. Since sleep is a huge…
This is just a fun moment I thought I would share this holiday weekend. I think it was Mother’s Day 2017, and my ever-artistic mother Ginny was visiting from Clearwater. We were sitting out on our lanai one afternoon when she suddenly says “that is a beautiful sculpture” and I look at her totally confused.…
My husband Dennis and I are just completing a 3-day visit with my 88-year-old mother Ginny when she receives a notice from the cable company. They are converting their signal to digital for all Florida customers and her zip code is next. Apparently, she will need different converter boxes to pick up that new signal.…
When my mother Ginny moved to Florida in 2000, she was 70 years-old and had the money from the sale of her condo, an inheritance from her stepmother, and her monthly Social Security check. These funds were placed into a brokerage account and she received a check every month for her expenses. Over 17 years,…
I just watched the episode of the television show Roseanne (while it was still on ABC) titled “No Country for Old Women.” It’s about Roseanne and her sister Jackie arguing over who is going to take their 90-year-old mother, Beverly into their home. Beverly was apparently kicked out of her nursing home for being too…
Awful. That’s how we feel. We’ve had an issue lurking in the background for a while now and it seems like we can’t prolong it any longer. At age 87, we are going to have to convince my mother Ginny to give up her car. Ginny loves that car. When she moved from Cleveland, she…
