Youth

Not all our clients are elderly. Injury can leave people of any age in need of help to shower and do the most basic household tasks. I recently had the pleasure of working with someone with multiple fractures. Happily fractures heal and this client gained so much confidence during her recuperation that she not only no longer needs us but has started her own business and is in a much happier state of mind than before the accident. I wish I could add a link to her new website - but that would hardly fit with my client confidentiality responsibilities!

Read our blog at www.cihomecare.blogspot.com

The Basics

Sometimes the care we are called on to provide is complex; sometimes it's the little things like help with personal care and house cleaning that can make all the difference. We've recently started working with a lady who does not have family in Jersey and whose ability to take care of herself and her home had slowly been deteriorating without anyone really noticing until she was hospitalised. During her stay in hospital it became clear that she needed help and we've slowly been helping her to clear up her skin conditions which had developed through lack of physical ability to care adequately for herself, and her home and return to a state of normality. It's amazing what a couple of hours a day of care help can do in terms of getting laundry done and personal care levels improved and so on. It's been such a joy to see her self-respect return in leaps and bounds!

Love conquers all

One of the things I feel honoured to witness is the depth of love some of our clients who are lucky enough to still have their partners with them obviously feel. Even when dementia has kicked in for one or the other spouse love still prevails - such as the husband who refused to be admitted to hospital without his wife...even though it was her unconscious outburst, due to her dementia, that had caused his injury. He only sees the wife he loved before dementia and still loves her so much he cannot bear to be apart. A week later we had another client who has become mentally ill after losing her husband of 64 years - suddenly and through pure grief. We and she are desperately hoping she will become well enough again to return home but sadly for the moment her needs are too great for us to help her at home and so the loss of her husband has left her in hospital. I hope to experience love like that. I look forward to helping her return to her home.

Beach cafe

It's a beautiful day today! I visit Enid three times a day. During her morning visit, Enid was telling me that she would love to get out in the sunshine. At lunch time, we now plan to pop down to the beach cafe for a bite to eat. A nice treat for both Enid and myself! 

Please note that names have been changed for the purpose of date protection. 

A busy day!

Nothing momentous happened today. I started at 7.30 at Doris' house. Doris needs help but is still quite independent. She likes me to put the kettle on and shout upstairs when I arrive. I then helped her to the bathroom where she's safe to sit and enjoy a shower while I ran around and emptied the commode and made the bed - but most importantly the first cup of tea which Doris likes to enjoy while getting dressed! 45 mins later onto Arthur who was up and dressed but needs help to come downstairs and take his medication as well as cook. He's weaned himself off hte full English now that he's less active but does still like scrambled eggs for breakfast! That more than filled the allocated 30 minutes for the morning visit and then onto Margarite....for a more leisurely one hour visit...a bath this time and a chat about the 'phone call she had with her daughter in NZ...

In between times the traffic, 'phone calls from the office. It was a busy day. Not a momentous day. But if a Carer hadn't been available it would have been a less momentous day for Doris, Arthur and Margarite...let alone the others on my rounds today. Perhaps it was a more rewarding day than I thought!  

Wafers!

Ice-cream! A wafer in fact! Peter had a yearning to go out and have an ice cream at the beach this afternoon. One that reminded him of his child-hood he said....apparently you used to pay 6d or a shilling or 1'6d depending on the thickness of the slice of ice cream you had between two wafers. And the trick was to lick all four edges to stop the drips - or so I was told. Sadly, three beach kiosks later, we had failed to find a wafer....we had to settle for a Mr Whippy with a flake! Apparently he's going to challenge me to find him a wafer another day! My friends will wonder what I'm on about next time I'm at the beach as I search for where to take him next time to complete the mission!

Garden tonic

Daphne has just returned home after a couple of weeks in hospital. Sadly this lady's had several strokes and was completely bed-bound in hospital. Daphne's obviously so happy to be home again! Two of us managed to help her into a wheelchair and take her out into her much loved garden today. It was clearly a tonic! Daphne walked back inside! Yet hasn't taken more than 2-3 steps for weeks. I could never do a desk job. How could I equal the satisfaction something like today creates?

(Please note that names have been changed for the purpose of data protection)