Archbishop's web site Denver Catholic Register Parishes Catholic Pastoral Center
August 7, 2002
Caregivers need patience, support to best care for parents at home
Supervising parents returns loving attention they gave, caregivers say
By Jennifer Williams
Joan Hradsky, a parishioner at St. Michael the Archangel Church in Overlea, Md., regularly goes six blocks to the home of her elderly mother, Kathleen Meyers.
While Meyers cannot be alone, she doesn't want to live in a nursing home. Her daughter, son-in-law and grandchildren all pitch in to take care of her, cleaning her house, doing her laundry and sacrificing their time to make sure someone is with Meyers throughout the night.
Hradsky wants to help her mother as long as she can, but caring for her mother is taking its toll on her family.
"Every day I say how long can we do this?" said Hradsky, who works part time for the Archdiocese of Baltimore's League of the Little Flower.
She is not alone. Situations like this one are becoming more common for adult children who attempt to take care of older parents who have health problems.
"Caregivers who get help with tasks and relief from pressures are less likely to burn out and are better able to support their parents for the long term," according to the American Association of Retired Persons on their Web site (www.aarp.org), which emphasizes the benefits of hiring outside help.
However, caregivers aren't cheap. The site showed that, in 2001, in-home nurses and therapists may charge about $85-$90 per visit, although the cost may be defrayed by Medicare, Medicaid or other insurance. Home health aides who perform personal care and medical tasks can range from $10-$30 per hour, and adult day services cost about $50 per day. The annual cost of care in a nursing home in 1998 was estimated at $56,000 per year or $153 per day, according to the Health Care Financing Administration.
Christine Urbaniak of Baltimore had both of her parents, now both deceased, living with her at the same time. Her father had suffered a stroke, and her mother had Alzheimer's disease. She said she was lucky because she, her husband and son had just moved to a new home and had two open bedrooms. But Urbaniak had to quit her job in order to care for her parents, and her family had to adjust to a different way of life.
At first, it was difficult, and she felt trapped. She said plans could be changed in an instant due to her mother's mood because of her Alzheimer's.
"You can't just pick up and do something on the spur of the moment," she said. "You can't take a vacation unless you have an aide come in, and that means adjusting to having a stranger in your house."
She said it took about five years before she even took a vacation.
However, Urbaniak sought support in her family and through the Baltimore County Health Department.
"It can be rewarding (to care for your parents), but you need the good support of your family and health care agencies," she said.
Another challenge was accepting the idea of being a caregiver for her parents when they were the ones she used to look to for guidance and emotional support, she said.
Hradsky agreed that the role reversal is really challenging. "It's like having a baby," she said of caring for her mother. "I see the change in her. She is not the person I remember."
Urbaniak said she thinks having support groups are helpful, especially if the caregiver is feeling overwhelmed.
"My biggest piece of advice is to just take one day at a time," she said. "You meet the challenges as they come up, and don't think too far ahead."
Christina Pleva, a parishioner of St. Margaret Church in Bel Air, Md., knows all too well about taking things one day at a time. Her grandmother came to live with her family after she fell down the steps of her home and fractured her leg in several locations.
Pleva said the stress level has increased at her home, but at the same time she knows a nursing home would only sap her grandmother's determination to get better. She helps her parents take care of her grandmother's physical needs, from cleaning wounds to providing medication and making sure she gets her eye drops. Twin beds in the guestroom have been replaced by a hospital bed, wheelchair, walker and a commode chair. She said this is a lot for which her family has to adjust and wonders if she will be able to do the same for her own parents. "After everything they've done for me, it would be the least I could do to provide them with a comfortable environment in their last years," she said. "They raised me when I was a baby, so I can take care of them when they are older." - CNS
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