Regarding the medical establishment and the general state of things for our elders--

Two years ago today, my father fell, his hip fractured. He'd been struggling along for quite some time, and the medical issues were getting to be too much for us, but this was a deciding factor. The situation was fraught; no beds, no surgeons, maybe having to go to Dartmouth (which Dad was adamantly against) or Concord... it was a panicky, scary few hours. Miracles do happen, and God hears us in our distress, I'm here to tell you. A bed opened up in St. J at NVRH, and a fine surgeon was available to help. 

Dad had to have a procedure done that involved "nailing" instead of a hip replacement; the bone was too shattered. Apparently, it had cracked badly in a prior fall, and his local PA had brushed it off as a bruise, and gave him more pain meds, blamed his pain on increasing levels of arthritis. Not so. The surgeon told us that there was relatively little arthritis in the joint, but the cracks from the earlier fall were apparent. He leaned too far, and the bone broke along those fault lines. And there's plenty of fault to go around.

Dad should have followed up, should have gone to have it looked at elsewhere, but, typical of Dad, he didn't tell me. He rarely told me anything. His medical issues were far worse than he let on at all, and he was diagnosed with vascular dementia. We were told that usually patients with vascular dementia lived for just a few years after diagnosis; he had been masking it for quite some time. Dad passed May 2 last year. After his accident, once in care and not having to try to function on his own, it became quite obvious how far along he was. It makes me sad, still, and a little angry. I could not make him get more help, and the system we have in the United States is little help. He was "his own person" until he was not; that said, he was the only one who could make his medical decisions, and he hid/lied about so much. And he had his "friends" who were enabling the situation as well-- that's all water under a huge bridge, but it still makes me unhappy. 

The outcome would not be any different, really. The dementia was too far advanced. His physical safety and general health may have been a little better, but I could not force him to go to assisted living, and he would not finish the paperwork for in-home help, and there was no private nursing care available. Let's be honest, it's a hard job, and we were in the middle of Covid, too. When I see the ads on TV for in-home care and so on, I laugh-- a hard, barking yawp-- because there is no help for those of us in rural America. When I hear about the GOP threatening Medicare and so on, it makes my blood boil-- our senior citizens, our elders, need the help. Families have to work, and the types of illnesses that our older folks have are way out of our ability to cope. We can't just "take care of dad" like they think we can. Nor can we afford the private care, even if it's available.

Instead of threatening to cut life-sustaining/saving funding, they ought to come see what they are thinking of compromising. They should be the ones having to make hard choices, having to fight with their fathers about getting medical assistance, having to do fouled laundry and to argue about bill paying and so on. They should make their fathers try to eat before the food goes moldy.

I miss my dad, but I am quite literally relieved that I am not fighting the whole damned system anymore. We need our Congress-people to make some home visits.

Take good care,

C