I'm afraid this post is going to be along one and I'm feeling totally lost about where to post this or what to do.
My uncle has Alzheimer's, schizophrenia and Epilepsy. When I was a child, my family lost contact with my uncle because of varying reasons etc and after that I didn't really hear much of him, only remembered some good times we had when I was a child.
About 2 years ago, i found out that he had been in hospital after going through a rough patch and been homeless, on drugs, alcohol and every low point you can imagine. He was diagnosed with Schizophrenia and Alzheimer's at the hospital which he stayed at for about a year. He is aged 58. Then he was moved to a nursing home local to the hospital he was at.
When I found out all of this, I immediately went to visit him and he recognized me for some time, then forgot who I was repeatedly throughout my visit. My uncle and I got on really well and I spent hours talking to him about everything he wanted to talk about. He repeated things alot but I was happy to listen and enjoy his company.
I asked social services for my uncle to be moved to a nursing home closer to my home address so I could visit him everyday or at least every other day, because at the moment I have to travel 2 hours each way to visit him and it's very difficult.
The social services promised a placement officer to visit him. Then I heard nothing from them for almost a year despite calling them, emailing them etc, i had no answers from them.
I tried complaining and finally another placement officer got sent out to visit him, I was also present there. When the officer asked him questions if he wanted to move, he said yes and it was decided he would move, I was overjoyed.
3 weeks went by,.....nothing. I phoned the placement officer to find out what had happened. She said he was sometimes saying yes and sometimes saying no to moving so she had made the decision not to move him.
He has a brother who is local to him but only visits him once a fortnight, because he is disabled himself. However, he is happy for my uncle to move closer to me.
My uncle has got such conditions where he trusts not many people and is always fearful of staying alone, fearful of change. When I visit him, he tells me the staff don't treat him well and he wants to move, when the staff ask him, he says he doesn't want to move, because the way they ask him is making him scared and confused. They don't ask sensitively, they make it sound like no one will visit him and because of this he says no to moving, he is scared that if he says Yes to people he doesn't trust then they will take him away somewhere.
I am so frustrated, that the staff and social don't understand his conditions properly and base their decisions on one answer he gives without trying to understand his feelings. I want to give him a better quality of life, with a family life, social life and I want him to see my children grow up. As the nursing home he is in, he gets none of this.
Am I wrong in what I am doing? I don't know what to do, I have sent a letter of complaint to the council of his area, but I don't know what else I can do. How can a decision be made when his decisions are confused about this? He can make decisions like what food he wants to eat and what clothes to wear but he repeats conversation a lot. I know moving closer to me would be good for him and I would be able to care for him better, but the nursing home says that it's his decision and that he has the mental capacity to make the decision. But does he? when sometimes he says yes and most times he says no to the staff.
I'm sorry about this post being so jumbled. I've been trying to get him moved for over a year and a half now and i'm finding it frustrating and unacceptable. Is it really the right decision that the social have made for him? In a room, 24/7 with family contact maybe once a fortnight?
I'm at my wits end.
Why is there so much grief to try and make a single persons life better?
My uncle has Alzheimer's, schizophrenia and Epilepsy. When I was a child, my family lost contact with my uncle because of varying reasons etc and after that I didn't really hear much of him, only remembered some good times we had when I was a child.
About 2 years ago, i found out that he had been in hospital after going through a rough patch and been homeless, on drugs, alcohol and every low point you can imagine. He was diagnosed with Schizophrenia and Alzheimer's at the hospital which he stayed at for about a year. He is aged 58. Then he was moved to a nursing home local to the hospital he was at.
When I found out all of this, I immediately went to visit him and he recognized me for some time, then forgot who I was repeatedly throughout my visit. My uncle and I got on really well and I spent hours talking to him about everything he wanted to talk about. He repeated things alot but I was happy to listen and enjoy his company.
I asked social services for my uncle to be moved to a nursing home closer to my home address so I could visit him everyday or at least every other day, because at the moment I have to travel 2 hours each way to visit him and it's very difficult.
The social services promised a placement officer to visit him. Then I heard nothing from them for almost a year despite calling them, emailing them etc, i had no answers from them.
I tried complaining and finally another placement officer got sent out to visit him, I was also present there. When the officer asked him questions if he wanted to move, he said yes and it was decided he would move, I was overjoyed.
3 weeks went by,.....nothing. I phoned the placement officer to find out what had happened. She said he was sometimes saying yes and sometimes saying no to moving so she had made the decision not to move him.
He has a brother who is local to him but only visits him once a fortnight, because he is disabled himself. However, he is happy for my uncle to move closer to me.
My uncle has got such conditions where he trusts not many people and is always fearful of staying alone, fearful of change. When I visit him, he tells me the staff don't treat him well and he wants to move, when the staff ask him, he says he doesn't want to move, because the way they ask him is making him scared and confused. They don't ask sensitively, they make it sound like no one will visit him and because of this he says no to moving, he is scared that if he says Yes to people he doesn't trust then they will take him away somewhere.
I am so frustrated, that the staff and social don't understand his conditions properly and base their decisions on one answer he gives without trying to understand his feelings. I want to give him a better quality of life, with a family life, social life and I want him to see my children grow up. As the nursing home he is in, he gets none of this.
Am I wrong in what I am doing? I don't know what to do, I have sent a letter of complaint to the council of his area, but I don't know what else I can do. How can a decision be made when his decisions are confused about this? He can make decisions like what food he wants to eat and what clothes to wear but he repeats conversation a lot. I know moving closer to me would be good for him and I would be able to care for him better, but the nursing home says that it's his decision and that he has the mental capacity to make the decision. But does he? when sometimes he says yes and most times he says no to the staff.
I'm sorry about this post being so jumbled. I've been trying to get him moved for over a year and a half now and i'm finding it frustrating and unacceptable. Is it really the right decision that the social have made for him? In a room, 24/7 with family contact maybe once a fortnight?
I'm at my wits end.
Why is there so much grief to try and make a single persons life better?
