I am finding our helper increasingly doing less and less when she comes to help mom. She does bare minimum and even some of that I find myself helping her with. She no longer resembles an employee. At one point she even noted in our log that she feels like "family". I find myself taking back the laundry duties, etc. I can see my loneliness is part of the problem as I find myself talking to her, sharing things and I will most definitely cut back on that. Any feedback? cadams
Mom's favorite caregiver is fairly lazy as well but I just try and overlook it - I'm sure she thinks she's irreplaceable and frankly I depend upon her
You need to develop the habit of asking her to do things. Like..on the way out to run errands...."while I am gone will you change Mom's bed and get all her laundry and sheets into the wash"? Things like that.
When you think about it...it is sort of the same way you would ask your sister to do helpful chores if she came and visited for a day or so.
I also have "family like" help coming in. This is how I solve it.
She just got lazier and lazier and I lived too far away to constantly supervise her.
Dad's two favorite caregivers were like family after a while, and I appreciated it. One caregiver had her retired hubby come over to chat with Dad to help give her time to do other things in the house. Dad enjoyed the chats. When Christmas came around, Easter, Thanksgiving, or Dad's birthday, the two caregivers always had something special for Dad, a gift or candy or homemade cookies, etc. Any time one caregiver went on a holiday trip, she always came back with something for my Dad, like a baseball cap :)
Let her know, no shame, no blame, just time for change.
Perhaps she will will hear you, and if not, then it's time to let her go.
And, i learned when I cared for an elder man for 3 years, helping him live and thrive during those years, when his only daughter lived across the country - I learned to watch for continuity, noticed when RNs came to handle an issue like bedsore care, and they just took current condition for granted, and the sore did not heal, but they just noted, "patient non-compliant" with their directions to leave the bandage in place for 4-5 days. I worried, and when I brought him for different reason to skin MD, I asked if he had any ideas - he showed me a different way to put on the bandage, leaving longer strips of skin tape, not just surrounding the bandage, which fell off, if he removed his trousers. Once I saw the improved method, I had to stand on my head with repeated notices to get anyone to change their methods, eventually I said, "I'll handle this part" and did the care as MD taught - and the wound healed.
I agree with perseverance, that different aides bring different skills, best to pay attention to what each one brings, and re-plan as time passes, noting how different talents make up a comprehensive whole. Other aides working with the same elder, were better cooks than I, sometimes better entertainers, and I had to learn some habits from them. But what I brought, kept the man alive, and motivated and cheerful, with any glitches being addressed, and informal remedies added.
Sometimes, I would have to remind the caregivers to do these things but I tried to make my expectations clear. It always irritated me when I had to remind them. I understand that some days were busy with just caring for Mom and that was ok but if the chores weren't getting done and my caregiver was just on her phone looking at Facebook, it bothered me.
I have judged myself as lazier at times - yet when I've seen some other aides, I have been appalled, for they brought so little - but often were the best at chatting with family or my company, and being the most respected.
I'd go by the reactions of the elder, the reactions you see when the caregiver arrives, or what you hear when they leave. That's not a 100% validation, for many elders have developed a habit of seeking reassurance by criticizing whoever is not in the room.
And some caregivers have learned how to act all cheerful when they arrive, so a forgetful elder brightens up to see them - but that same caregiver may neglect them through the day.
Maybe one thing to notice, if you hire someone, they are the ones involved, and the lists of chores are for you, while other work aspects are for the elder. Both needs are valid - yet there are times when the elder's needs change and evolve, and it matters to notice if a caregiver is able to shift gears when this happens, and that can be a good caregiver, even if some of your lists and chores are skipped.
Some successes are harder to see: I was fired for an arrogant attitude from a job, but I was the only aide who took as long as it took, to persuade the heavy woman with alzheimers, to actually get up for her shower - even it I was soaking wet often at the end of my time helping her in the shower. Other aides, just wrote "patient refused."
After I left, same patient developed major sores, because she was rarely having showers.
Some periodic questions and conversations - AND notes in an ongoing notebook left in the home - require those notes of all caregivers, for those notes provide the structure of their job, and also require that each arriving caregiver reads the prior caregiver's notes, and adapts their focus to areas indicated by prior caregivers.
One suggestion:
Just make a list of chores, or items, like you would for a brand new person coming in, and then post it in the room of the person they are taking care of and/or hand them a copy.
You can ease the awkwardness if you like by saying you found your original list, or found a guideline list online and thought it was a good idea to use to help keep everything in a 'good routine' for the patient.
If after the list is given as a refresher and things continue to be 'family like', just gently say there are a lot of things that need to be caught up on the list, if still not done in a day or two, then ask if they are up to the daily/weekly task list. (if not, you can reduce their hours to have someone else come in for the 'heavy lifting', but Mom can still have some hours with their favorite companion).
And as always, get out your mental scale and weigh the value of a trusted companion vs competent help.
You may replace them with someone who will do everything on the list, but may not be a good fit, or worse, may not be trustworthy. (we have had pills, cash, jewelry and keepsakes vanish, even when we were right in the house with Mom, including one helper who didn't realize I was in the side room, she left Mom alone in the bathtub and helped herself to my purse---- when I alerted her to my presence, she stumbled, fumbled then said she was looking for a pen.... it was also her last hour in our home and with her service company)
And no matter how much like family they are --- never let them have easy access to controlled prescriptions.
Use a pill organizer to put out the day's supply of pills, then lock the rest in a filing cabinet (we had one really good person that after about 4 months got lazier and lazier, and began to sit around watching tv or playing solitaire - then we realized pills were missing, I put them on a shelf in my closet, but more went missing in a few days, then I moved them to the back of my closet, that is when she knew we were on to her, she took the whole bottle and never came back, this was no kid, this was a 'very nice' lady in her early 50s, which is how she fooled us for so long until she wasn't managing her pill problem very well and exposed her issue by her lethargy.
I decided to hire next a friend of a friend thinking that I would not have a hard time with that since I did not know her personally. Well it was a short time and it started all over again!! This time I brought it to her attention, I told her that I was very busy at work and I was counting on her for help. I made a list of items that I expected her to do and hung it on the refrigerator. I think she realized and she did straighten up. the third Caregiver had listen to me complain about the others so this one I actually had no issues with until I found out that he was using my Moms credit card for personal use. Its very hard to trust caregivers. So if you find a good one I would treat them like Gold and make a list LOL
I think you can have a good working relationship but...they are employees and should be treated as such. Make sure they know what u expect out of them when hired. Have a "contract" that lists this and both sign. Nothing wrong with a "chat" just keep the personal stuff out of it. Don't treat them like family. A bonus during the holidays would show how much u appreciate them even birthdays.
I'm interested b/c I'm in the process of hiring private duty care and have a lot of reservations as well as concerns about getting through the "we're the best" attitude of some agencies.
Joysuthe
If you have a really good caregiver, an excellent match, you don't want to burn that person out. My Dad's two regular caregivers were with him for over a year.
I also had to realize that it was Dad's decision on whom he liked, and that was the most important thing.
I've decided I'm going to include a clause in any service contract that no photos may be taken of my father or the home, and that no Facebook posts are allowed about any aspect of his care. Doing so will be grounds for termination. I'm not going to tolerate anyone posting photos of my father or his house online.
When I've mentioned this to some of the people during preliminary phon discussions, the good quality firms haven't had any issue and some even said they prohibit home care workers from posting on FB. I don't know how they monitor, but at least they agreed with me.