Opa's place -Where an old rooster visits with friends

[rrrmamma]

Opa, better safe than sorry. Hope you get to fish soon. Wish I could be fishing now. I will be in CA for several more days. They just moved Mom to rehab. She is still lnot able to walk or move about on her own. I am trying to find in home help for her.

 

[peepacheep]

Good decision Opa! 2x on better safe than sorry! If anything goes wrong it goes wrong real when the river is high. Better to fish another day. Our river levels and water clarity have been making steel head fishing hard to plan more than a day or two ahead. I have heard spring chinook are starting to be caught in the lower part of the river.

rrrmamma, I am not sure how things are set up in Cal. but locally here in Oregon county senior services agencies can be very helpful in lining up trained people to check on seniors just home from rehab. I know a number of folks that have worked at rehab facilities go on to being home health care workers. Hopefully someone at the rehab facility where your mother is at will have some info. Take care of yourself to!!!

 

[rrrmamma]

Thanks peepacheep, I am working from a list provided by the social worker at the hospital. The bigger problem is convincing my mom to pay for help; She can afford it. She isn't wealthy but has enough to take care of herself. She just doesn't want anyone in her home and won't move to Ohio with me or to assisted living at this point. It will take here awhile to understand what she needs.When this is done I really will need a fishing trip. Perhaps to Lake Erie. Thats where I grew up. Erie Pa.

 

[peepacheep]

rrrmamma, Glad the social worker has a list and I totally understand you with the convincing part. I am at that point with my mother also. My father died last summer after several very difficult weeks. Fishing, not necessarily catching, simply sitting in the drift boat, napping, watching wildlife, helped greatly. Decompression time is important. For a short while, 1/2 a life time ago, I lived in the south east corner of Pa., near Kennet Square. I would drive through 3 states in a 10 mile commute to work, Pa, Md, and De. Would love to see the Great Lakes someday!

 

[Chic-n-farmer]

As the saying goes:

"The worst day fishing still beats the best day working."

 

[Opa]

Aging is tough. All of the various maladies that start to assail our bodies can be very discouraging. However, I think the two hardest things to face are losing ones drivers license and the ability to live independent.

Not longer driving suddenly makes you dependent on others. After many years of coming and going as you please you now have to make lists of the things you need to do, how items you need to purchase so that when someone takes you you will be able to obtain them. If the urge to go visit a friend strikes you you now have no way to act upon that desire. Talk abo.ut a major change to one's life.

Yet as hard as no longer driving would be, no longer being able to live alone in your own home must be the hardest. You can no longer have your stuff placed around you in the way you want it. You have to rid yourself of most of the things that you have spent a lifetime collecting. Imagine how difficult it must be trying to decide what things are the most important and disposing of the rest.

Even having someone come to live with you must be terribly disruptive and unsettling. They are there to help you. To insure you have your medications dispensed properly. That you eat properly. Suddenly you are no longer making the decisions of your life. Things as basic as what you have for supper or what time you go to bed.

While all of this is done for their benefit, to insure they live long and healthy. It's still has to be a bitter pill to swallow. Accepting these changes that time has forced upon them is difficult. Some are able to gracefully transition to these final days while other bitterly resist it.

Helping your parent during this is something that isn't easy to do. Our own lives are changed in way we never thought possible. We find ourselves performing tasks that in our wildest dreams we never could have imagined. As I try to help my own mother I constantly must remind myself to be patient and think how would I react in her situation.

So for those of you dealing with one of life's most difficult challenges I can only offer the advice that you occasionally stop and remind yourself that you too will one day be in the same position. How will you handle it? God bless all of you in this situation.

 

[peepacheep]

Wise words Opa! It is a day by day process to go through as gently and to allow as much dignity as possible.

 

[rrrmamma]

Thanks Opa, I am going to print your words and use them when I am discouraged.. One day she will accept help and the next day is a battle. I do think about how helpless she must feel. Your wise words and support here have helped more than you will ever know.

 

[Opa]

Twenty one years ago due to a medical procedure my father fell into a coma. After a week he revived but no longer had a zest for live. Some of the things he had always done he could no longer do. He and my mother used to fish a lot. Suddenly he no longer wanted to go. Backing a boat trailer became an almost impossible task. But rather than admit he had problems he just gave up fishing.

For the next year it seemed as if every conversation with him contained a reference to death or dying. I knew that if he didn't get excited about life again that he wouldn't be around much longer. While he had given up hunting several years earlier, he and my mother would come to my house each November during the hunting season. They liked being here to listen to our stories and would help butcher our deer.

One day prior to their returning home I showed him a picture of a pontoon boat and told him of my intent to purchase it and keep it in a marina located about 5 miles from their home. Initially he didn't want me to spend the money but finally said it probably would make fishing much easier for my mother. I told him that in March we would go to the BassPro store in Springfield Missouri and purchase one on a good road worthy trailer. By picking it up there the savings in shipping costs to Kentucky would more than pay for the trailer.

While he feigned indifference about the boat, my mother informed me that every few days from November til January he would have the brochure out looking at it. Finally in January he called and ask if there was any chance of picking the boat up sooner as the fishing started getting good in February. I had just retired the previous December so there was nothing to prevent my getting it earlier.

I immediately called Basspro and ordered a pontoon boat specifically set up for fishing and two weeks later I headed south. I picked my parents up in Kentucky and then on we went for Missouri. An aunt and uncle lived on a lake just north of Springfield so we went to their house to stay for a couple of days. We picked up the boat, went back to the aunt and uncle's and took the boat for a test run in the lake they lived on.

When we got back to Kentucky there were still a few things I needed to do to the boat to make it as easy as possible for them. Items like sonar, electric anchor winches, rod holders, and battery chargers had to be added. I then took it to the marina where it was placed in a covered slip that allowed easy access from the harbor to the main lake.

For the next 12 weeks my Dad and I went fishing every day and it was truly one of the most enjoyable periods in my life. More importantly my father was excited about life again. Each fall I would go to Kentucky and pull the boat out and winterize it and then the following February I'd go down and put it back in the water.

When I gave my Dad the keys I told him he should try to use it enough to wear all the aluminum off the bottom and use it they did. Some days they'd get up early, fish for several hours, come home for lunch and to do what needed to be done around the house and head back out. This went on for seven years. Finally the last time I went to take it out he informed me that he was concerned about what my mother would do if something should happen to him while on the water. That perhaps it would be best if they no longer used it.

When we went to take the boat out of the water and he was negotiating through the marina I realized he could no longer handle the boat safely. When we go the the launch I got out on the dock, got the truck and backed the trailer into the water intending to go get in the boat and drive it on to the trailer. Much to my horror my Dad, who had never loaded the boat, was trying to do just that. In short order he had the boat on the trailer. The only problem was that only one half of the boat was on. With a chagrined look on his face he told me I guess you'd better do it.

After freeing the boat from the trailer I circled around in the lake and as I approached the trailer knowing it was going to load without a hitch, I let go of the helm allowing the wind to pull us to one side. Circling back for another attempt I again gave the helm to the wind. Finally I brought the boat in and with feigned difficulty managed to get it on the trailer.

That night at supper Granny inquired as to how it had gone. Dad proceeds to tell her that he had tried to load the boat but the wind was so bad that Sam had a hard time. I guess what I am saying is that when our parents have to give up something, we need to make sure that their dignity isn't included.

 

[theotherranch]

Opa, your previous post was wonderful to those of us whom have aging parents! But your last post was even better! And I agree so much that it is a hard line to walk that gives them the dignity they deserve and what should be the "right" thing to do. Thanks!