Tender Face said:What strikes me in this whole thread is that none of us - carers or 'professionals' are comfortable with the truth, or about how much those we are caring for understand the 'truth', how much we should tell the 'truth', whether it is fairest to articulate or avoid 'the truth' ... when any 'decent' person has been brought up to 'always tell the truth'......
Is it just me, or is it that dementia and care for sufferers throws up so many moral/ethical dilemmas that makes this journey so hard??????
Karen (TF), hmmmph
You got me thinking there... don't think I'm 'trying to be funny' with my answer here... just a point I want to raise.
Let's chuck in a scenario.
There's a lady, 86 years old. She tells you that her mother will be wondering where she is. Also in that conversation, she tells you that she's just had her 21st birthday and this is her party... but why is the party fully of old people? and one of them has just told her that she's in hospital! And then she asks you to tell her what's going on.
Now, a lot of stuff there... but believe me, I can give you many examples of similar.
Now in that, if we want to be 'honest' there are the following bits of info you could impart... using whatever verbal/counselling skills at your disposal... but how do you explain the following:
- 1. You are 86.
- 2. There's a good possibility that your mother has passed away (although not always the case... so you check the notes to find out that is a FACT first).
- 3. You ARE in hospital... and the reasons for you being here are...
Now you can see how difficult this is.
If the person has 'insight' then it makes it a lot easier... you could explain issues of memory problems that the person could be aware of anyhow, and discussing it could support and reassure them.
Now, if you were going down the '100% Brutally Honest' line you might say the following to someone:
"You have been given a probable diagnosis of Alzheimer's Disease - this will affect your Memory, Reasoning, Judgement and Language - it IS a terminal illness, and we can try to stabilise it and slow down the proression - but in the end..."
You see where I'm going here - who would ever be so blunt (I wouldn't, I'll be honest - because I think that that would be cruel).
Hope my post here is valid folks.
N.