Coffee, Beer, Night Staff, Etc.: Questions I Asked My New Care Home #31Days2022

Posted on by Astrid

Hi everyone. Today’s optional prompt for #31Days2022 is “coffee”. I was immediately reminded of one of the E-mails I sent to my assigned staff in preparation for my orientation visit at the care home I’ll be moving to on Wednesday.

One of the less important questions I asked was whether they have set coffee times and, if so, whether they brew regular coffee or “decaf shit”. I did point out, with a winking emoji, that it wasn’t like I didn’t want to live there if they served decaf all day, but that this’d mean I’d need to ask my husband to give me my Senseo back (if he even still has it) As it turns out, they serve regular coffee at least in the afternoon.

I asked some other questions too. Most of the first ones I E-mailed, were worded rather formally. Some of the other less important questions were about groceries. I asked whether the home contracts with a local supermarket or with a nationwide healthcare-specific superstore (the latter), whether they did chips and soda or (alcohol-free) beer on weekends and, if so, whether clients had to pay for those treats themselves. It turns out they offer these treats on Saturdays and clients don’t need to pay for that, but each client does have an account with the superstore in order to get extras, which they do need to pay for.

I also asked what my mailing address would be, since the home has a fake within-institution mailing address. Mail should be sent to the institution’s main address, with the fake address as an additional address line (I’m not yet sure how mail delivery people aren’t going to get confused).

More important questions had to do with the availability of staff. As it turned out, the early shift starts at 7AM and the late shift ends at 10PM, except on Saturdays and Sundays and every other Friday, when it’s 7:30AM and 10:30PM. That had me a little concerned at first, because I was worried I might not be able to get the right support at night.

Another important question was about the night shift. I knew that the institution night staff operate from a central office in the main building, but I wondered whether one night staff would be allocated to my home (and a few others) or whoever received my call, would come or send someone. It turned out whoever was in charge of receiving calls at that point, would send someone who was close by.

Thankfully, at my second orientation visit, I found out the door to the home is locked at night, so I cannot leave the home then. This is good in light of the 30 minutes or so between the late shift leaving and the night shift being able to fully step in. I am not in a medically fragile state, so it’s not likely I would die of a seizure or something within those 30 minutes. However, if I could leave the home on my own, it would’ve been quite possible that I’d wander around grounds all night. I am happy I will be as safe as possible in my new home.

I Give In: Following My Heart to My New Care Home #31Days2022

Posted on by Astrid

Hi everyone. The optional prompt for day 2 in the 31-day writing challenge is “give”. Again, this is a bit of a freewrite as I prepare for the move to my new care home on Wednesday.

You see, when I originally moved to my current care home in 2019, it was the first place that wanted me. I also had some rather odd preconceived ideas about the kind of place I needed to be in to get my needs met. I thought that, in order to get a high staff/client ratio, you needed to be in a home for severely or profoundly intellectually disabled people. After all, places I’d known before in the psychiatric system, had a much lower staff/client ratio and so did so-called “supported housing” facilities for those with milder intellectual disabilities. (I did already know that I wanted to be in a place for people with intellectual disability rather than mental illness even though I’m not intellectually disabled, because the intellectual disability services approach is far less training-focused than that on the mentally ill.) At the back of my mind, I did know about a few homes on the care agency’s main institution grounds that catered towards those with mild or moderate intellectual disability with severe challenging behavior, but I couldn’t get the right “care profile” (on which your funding is based) for that. Not at the time, at least.

So I accepted the room at my current care home. It didn’t feel that good right from the start, but what else could I do? I was hardly getting by living with my husband. And, indeed, I don’t know what I’d have done had I had to survive lockdown while living independently. Unsuitable as this home may’ve been, it was a much-needed step on my journey.

Once I lived in my current care home, where all my fellow residents have profound intellectual disability, it became apparent pretty quickly that I needed more intensive behavior-related support than my care profile would allow for. I was first very scared when I heard that my support coordinator was applying for the highest care profile – the one I would’ve needed for the homes still at the back of my mind. After all, at first, my funding had been denied altogether. Not just the highest care profile – any long-term care funding. Were they going to re-assess me all over again? It turned out not: either I’d get the higher care profile or I’d remain in the lower category, but my funding couldn’t be taken away. Within a month, we heard the good news that my funding got upped to the highest care profile. Five months later, my additional one-on-one support got approved.

Still, I didn’t dare give in to my wish to move to one of the “intensive support” homes on main institution grounds. Not consciously, at least. When no-one was looking, I did look all over the care agency’s website to see the descriptions of their homes, all while saying I didn’t want to move.

In fact, at my care plan review last year, I said I was 95% sure I wanted to stay here and those other 5% were because of the distance to my husband. My husband said I needn’t worry, as it’s not like there are dozens of places for me to choose from. Then again, I don’t need dozens to choose from.

The home I’m moving to on Wednesday, is again the first home that wants me. However, it is also the home that stood out to me on those searches on the care agency website. It is most certainly not perfect – I know that before I’ve even moved in. However, I have my hopes up that I won’t regret having given in to following my heart.

Finding My Way #31Days2022

Posted on by Astrid

Hi everyone. The first optional prompt for #31Days2022 is “way”. I thought of several titles for this blog post, but ultimately decided on this one. The rest just randomly flowed out of my fingers.

Only four days before I move to the new care home. I told my mother about it on Tuesday. Somewhat surprisingly, she didn’t react weird to the fact that I’m going to live on institution grounds. Not surprisingly, she did start talking to me about how I might be able to walk around grounds independently then.

I did, indeed, mention to the support coordinator and behavior specialist for the new home, when they came to assess my suitability for the home, that I may want to learn to take a little walk myself on institution grounds someday. Afterwards, my current assigned staff cautioned them against too high expectations. After all, I want to be “normal” pretty badly, but I still remain multiply-disabled in some significant ways.

I know that people who are “just” blind can learn to find their way around institution grounds quite easily. But I’m not “just” blind. For one thing, I am not even sure I could use my white cane in a manner that would allow me to detect obstacles safely, given my mild mobility impairment due to cerebral palsy. For another, due to autism-related executive dysfunction and other factors, my energy level varies greatly from one day to the next. So does my capacity to handle sensory stimuli. Consequently, I may be able to find my way for a short walk around grounds pretty easily one day and get hopelessly lost and frustrated the next.

I remember back when I was in the psych hospital, I voiced a similar wish to learn to take a quick walk around the building. An orientation and mobility instructor from the blindness agency came by, taught me a few times with very limited success. Before she was even finished teaching me, the staff decided it was my responsibility, so no matter my mental state, if I left the ward (even in a meltdown), no staff would come after me. I was then supposed to take my little walk, despite the fact that, in a meltdown, I wouldn’t remember where to go at all.

I know at least here in the Netherlands staff can’t legally restrain you once you’ve left an open ward, but that wasn’t the point, since I didn’t need restraining. Their point was that I was now somehow capable enough to find my way by myself and, if I wasn’t, it wasn’t their problem. This at one point led to my husband needing to drive over from the next town to take me back to the ward.

In a sense, I should know the new care home isn’t like the psych hospital, but I keep getting flashbacks. All I can hope for is that my current staff will do a proper handover.

Meh #SoCS

Posted on by Astrid

Hi all. Today’s prompt for Stream of Consciousness Saturday (#SoCS) is “me”. We’re supposed to either use the word as it is or find a word that starts with “me”. The first word that came to mind somehow was “meh”. And how fitting! I am sick to my stomach again. I will spare you the details but it’s not pleasant. And I’m supposed to write lots of things, as it’s the start of #31Days2022 and Blogtober and all. Oh well.

Last Tuesday when I was sick too, it lasted only a couple of hours, so I am hoping it will go away by the evening. That way, I could write a proper post once my one-on-one leaves at 8PM. That’s of course not the main reason I want my sickly feeling to go away. I mean, if I remain sick until Wednesday, will I be able to move that day?

Of course, I’m hoping I won’t give my sickness to anyone else either. I’m not running a temperature, thankfully. My husband thinks it’s food poisoning. My staff think it’s stress. I hope in any case it will leave my body soon (and not in the way it’s leaving my body now, honestly). Oh wait, that’s a bit TMI. Oh, see, writing it down either helps or it’s indeed getting better. Let’s hope.

TGIF: October

Posted on by Astrid

Hi all. It’s the last day of September (duh!) and I haven’t written enough posts this month. That is, if I want to aim for 300 posts in 2022, I’ll need to have written 225 now. I’m not sure that’s entirely true, since both October and December have 31 days and September has only 30, but oh well.

In any case, today’s optional theme for Paula’s TGIF is “October”. Paula asks us what our plans are for the month.

Of course, October’s main theme for me is moving to the main institution care home and settling in there. Today, I packed my first box. I also told all fellow residents I’m close to. The one in my own home at first hardly reacted, but now seems to understand to some degree. The woman in the care home down the road became a little emotional. I gave her a matching necklace and bracelet. The guy in the care home next to mine, the one with the chickens, reacted understandingly when I explained that the people in my new home are of a higher intellectual level. “So more like you and me?” he inquired. Yes, like that. I gave him the polymer clay sun, because he’s usually in a sunny mood. He gave me an egg he’d collected from one of his chickens this morning.

I already have two visits from my family planned in the first week of my stay at the new home. On October 8, my sister and her family will be coming by and my mother-in-law will visit me on October 11.

Besides settling into the new home, October will be a busy blogging month. I am participating in the 31-day writing challenge once again, although I won’t even attempt to do a landing page this time around. I usually just sign up for the prompts and to have some reason to blog everyday, even though I haven’t completed the challenge in years. There is of course also Blogtober, for which there are prompts this year too. I am not sure what I’ll do with those. All this to say, my cares about not having written enough during September, are really not all that important. Besides, no-one is going to come after me if I don’t write 300 posts in 2022.

Gratitude List (September 30, 2022) #TToT

Posted on by Astrid

Good morning everyone! I was up at 7AM today and am ready to blog. Today, I am writing a gratitude list. As usual, I’m joining in with Ten Things of Thankful (#TToT). Here goes.

1. I am grateful I was able to break the cycle of compulsive exercising before it got too bad. Last Saturday, I didn’t meet my exercise goal on my Apple Watch and, now that I didn’t have a perfect month anyway, I was able to let go of the need to meet all my goals everyday and just do what feels good.

2. I am grateful for my health. I’ve been having a sore throat for a week or so. It isn’t bad, just slightly annoying. In this regard, I am grateful I don’t have COVID. And yes, even though I don’t have any other symptoms, I took a test on Sunday just in case.

3. I am grateful for a comforting talk with the manager for my current care home. She was able to answer some of my more important questions about the new care home.

4. I am grateful my husband was content with the new care home and quite happy to see me move in there. In his own words, it is a “significant improvement” over my current care home.

5. I am grateful for muesli rolls. On Tuesday, we couldn’t find anything to eat for lunch that I like, so my staff offered to drive to the supermarket. I chose muesli rolls, which aren’t what I usually have. I am grateful my staff felt that these were within reason so the care facility would pay for them.

6. I am grateful for blueberries. On the same trip to the supermarket, we bought blueberries too. They were still reasonably priced even though I think blueberry season is over here.

7. I am grateful for the support of my staff as I navigate the stress of transferring to the new care home. I still had some worries on Wednesday and even on Thursday after I’d made my decision, but my staff are able to support me through them. So is the behavior specialist.

8. I am grateful my sister reacted positively to me moving to the main institution. She, in fact, said she will now be able to visit more often, as the main institution is close to Apeldoorn, where her in-laws live. She enthusiastically planned a first visit for October 8, the Saturday after I move in.

9. I am grateful for a somewhat relaxed text convo with my mother. I informed her that I’m moving, to which surprisingly she reacted pretty supportively. She did put in a few comments about the possibility that I could learn to walk around grounds on my own (which I might at some point, but it isn’t a given) and that I could help prepare food, but oh well. Both of these comments wouldn’t have bothered me had they not come from her, actually.

10. I am grateful for some weight loss when I stepped onto the scales today. I lost 0.3kg compared to last week, which is pretty much what I’d expected.

What are you grateful for?

Joy in September

Posted on by Astrid

Hi everyone. How is it the end of September already? I pretty much forgot the month is almost over, but since it is, it’s time for me to write an update on my word of the year: “JOY”. I am linking up with Lisa’s One Word linky. I am also joining the Word of the Year linky.

September started out with good news, as, on the very first day of the month, I heard that I was first on the waiting list for what I now refer to as the prospective new care home. This gave me some renewed energy, but also stress. I was warned that the wait might still be six months or so. “That’s super quick,” my husband said. Well, those who’ve read my blog over the past couple of weeks, know that it’s gone even quicker: tomorrow, I am to decide whether I want to move to the home and, if I want to (which I do), I’ll move next Wednesday, October 5.

Considering this, the whole month of September flew by in a bit of a haze, in which I was both hyper with excitement and overwhelmed with worry. I am still both as I type this post, in fact. Consequently, I hardly found any clear moments of joy that were just that. After all, things I did feel delight or joy over, were also laden with some level of anxiety or anticipation. For example, at my husband’s and my visit to Ikea, I was thinking about what to buy for the new home.

The month of September, of course, was also the month my iPhone and Apple Watch got their updates and I got really used to my Apple Watch. For the first few weeks of the month, I was compulsively moving to get far beyond my activity goals. This past Friday, my dietitian did caution me against it. The next day, with some emotional struggle, I let a day go by when I didn’t fill all my rings. That seems to have broken the cycle, as I’m now able to be a bit easier on myself. For example, yesterday I was sick to my stomach all day, so really didn’t feel like exercising. I am relieved I am able to permit myself these days now too.

For the month of October, I am of course looking forward to enjoying real food, as the staff at the new home cook homemade meals everyday there. I am also hoping to enjoy visits from family, as I have a few planned already for the first week at my new home. Other than that, I am expecting to have a lot of getting used to at the new home, so I’m just hoping to enjoy some everyday pleasures.

My Bedtime Routine

Posted on by Astrid

Hi everyone. I’m feeling a little stressed out and, as it is past 9PM as I’m starting to write this post, I thought I’d share about my bedtime routine in order to get myself comfy and relaxed for bed.

Usually, the staff come by my room at around 9:45PM to help me get ready for bed, like get into my pajamas and brush my teeth. I usually leave my socks on, as I’ll often want to stay up a little longer. The evening shift here at my current care home ends at 10:30PM, so the staff usually say goodbye then too and turn off my light. In the care home I may move to on October 5, the evening shift ends at 10PM, so I may want to move my bedtime back a little.

I can go into bed by myself, but sometimes I want the staff to stand by while I go into bed. I will pull off my socks. Then, I’ll grab my iPhone if it’s sufficiently charged and select a Spotify playlist to play on my music pillow. The music pillow is connected to my iPhone via its lightning port (and a lightning-to-audio converter). I love the Harp Lullabies playlist, the Guitar Lullabies playlist or some albums by Robbins Island Music Group or Dan Gibson’s Solitudes. I most commonly set the sleep timer for an hour.

I sometimes will have an essential oil blend in my diffuser too. Some aren’t very suited to sleeping, but I know of a number of relaxing essential oil blends, four of which I shared before.

I have a weighted blanket, which I pull up over me almost till my chin. I also will grab ahold of one of my soft toys. Sometimes, I’ll lay the tail of the lemur over my chest, while at other times, I’ll hold the dolphin or unicorn.

Sometimes, I need to shift my sleeping position. I can sleep in every position except on my right side, but my preference will vary. Once I’ve found a comfortable position, I’ll likely doze off pretty quickly.

The night staff does come by at around 11:30PM to check on me. This is mostly to prevent me sitting up all night without anyone noticing. I can also press the call button if I can’t sleep, but of course other than try to comfort me, there is little the night staff can do. That being said, I sleep a lot better now that I have the weighted blanket, music pillow and essential oil diffuser than before I had all these.

loopyloulaura

My New Home? #SoCS

Posted on by Astrid

SoCS Badge 2019-2020

Today’s prompt for Stream of Consciousness Saturday (#SoCS) is “home”. How timely! As those who’ve read my blog over the past week or so will know, I may move to another care home in a week and a half. The choice is up to me.

It is indeed the first home that wants me, like when I applied for long-term care and landed here. Well, no, in that sense it isn’t the first. My current care home isn’t kicking me out, after all. If I don’t want to move to the prospective new home, if I don’t think it’ll feel like home to me eventually, I don’t need to.

It feels liberating to be able to make this choice. I have been able to ask quite critical questions, some of which were answered already and some of which I’m waiting on being answered soon. For one thing, I want to know about the staff/client ratio. This is important should my one-on-one ever be reduced, but also for those times when I don’t have one-on-one support. The support coordinator told me there are three staff each shift, but I’m not sure that’s just for my group of eight or for the entire home, consisting of two of these groups. I so far only saw my group’s home and that’s quite large already, so if the three staff are for the two groups of eight, that’s going to be quite difficult for me.

Other questions have been of lesser importance, such as whether they serve decaf coffee or the regular kind, whether we need to pay for treats such as chips on weekends, etc. I feel quite satisfied with most answers and am pretty positive I’m going to make the move. With my visit on Monday in addition to last Wednesday’s, I should be able to make an informed decision about whether this will be my new home.

#WeekendCoffeeShare (September 24, 2022)

Posted on by Astrid

Hi everyone on this rainy Saturday. How are you doing? Take a seat and have a drink, as I’m joining #WeekendCoffeeShare.

If we were having coffee, I would start out by sharing that last Monday was my and my husband’s eleventh wedding anniversary. We drove to Steenwijk, a town in the far north of my province, where we had lunch and went for a short walk. Then we drove to Blokzijl, a small town not far from there, where we had another walk around town and my husband took a photo of me with a large cannon.

Then we drove to Ikea in Zwolle, where my husband bought a few things, I looked for a new desk chair, and we had dinner. Unfortunately, they only serve the vegetarian version of the Swedish meatballs now, so I had chicken.

If we were having coffee, I would tell you I got a new pasta machine from one of the staff – the staff who always gives us clients everything she finds at thrift stores. This one works electronically or so she told me. I didn’t tell the staff that any pasta machine is hand-operated by default and a motor is optional. This one does have a motor. I did E-mail another staff to ask her to bring her tool kit one more time to remove the fenders for me.

If we were having coffee, I would share that the dietitian showed up unexpectedly for an appointment yesterday. The reason was the fact that I’d lost quite a bit of weight and had been compulsively exercising a lot over the past few weeks. Although the compulsive exercising seems to have reduced this week, I did need a bit of a reverse kick in the behind. You see, I have a history of disordered eating, bordering on bulimia, and although my main means of compensating used to be purging, this could definitely become a thing with over-exercise too. I do need to monitor this closely.

If we were having coffee, I would use the rest of this post to update you about the prospective new care home. I didn’t write a coffee share post last week, so those visiting from there might not know this, but the client in whose place I could come at the home at the main institution, moved out this Thursday. I had my first orientation visit with the prospective new home last Wednesday, am getting another on Monday and, if then I want to move, moving date has been set for October 5.

My first orientation visit went quite well. The clients are quite verbally capable, although of course they do “live in their own world”, as the support coordinator phrased it. The apartment – separate living room, bedroom and private bathroom – is quite large, although I couldn’t fully grasp its size because the client who was moving out had a lot of furniture. My husband did ask whether I would have to clean the apartment myself, but I assume not. I asked though just to be sure.

I love the fact that there are a lot of sports and recreational facilities on grounds, although the staff aren’t yet able to say how we could fit those into my day activities.

A great positive of the possible new home is that they cook their own meals everyday. Yay for no more meal delivery service junk!

My husband is coming to have a look around the home on Monday too, so he may be able to ask his questions too. I am quite excited but still a bit nervous.

How have you been?