I can't do my g-damned job with my father calling every eight seconds
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Anonymous
| Have him call you once a day or call him once a day. Visit once a week. |
Anonymous
|
Answer when you have time to answer. Let it go to voicemail when you don't. Just remember at least once/day to check the VMs for the various messages he's left in case there is something important in one of them.
When you do talk to him, tell him you got the messages and summarize the things that he wanted, so that he knows that you aren't completely blowing him off. Elders in hospice want to know that they are heard. So, if you never acknowledge the messages he left, then he knows that you were just ignoring him. |
Anonymous
| Good luck. When I stopped answering during the day, scathing screaming messages were left multiple times a day. Their concept of time gets screwed up, and everything is desperately urgent NOW! The sound of a phone ringing gets my heart pounding. |
Anonymous
| Can you block him except for a couple hours a day? That is what I do with my mom who has Alzheimer's |
Anonymous
Your father is scared, lonely, and feels neglected. For $30,000 a month, he should receive more attention. |
Anonymous
| Block his number during the work day, and instruct the nurse to tell him "Larla's phone has to be off during the day, work rules! You'll be able to call her after 6 pm" or something like that. |
Anonymous
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My Mom with dementia did this. I would block her calls for most of the day. And I’d just delete her VM because by the time I listened to them, she’d have forgotten what her message was about.
I would set times to call him. Maybe once in the morning and once in the evening. Then block the rest of the time. Tell the caregivers to call from their phone if it’s something urgent. Also, he must be very lonely. Do the caregivers take him out on walks? Or are there adult daycares in his area? |
Anonymous
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OP I did the math and you are paying $40 an hour for 24/7 care. Not unreasonable for a registered nurse.
Hang in there and implement one of the suggestions made above to manage your Dad and your time in a way that works for you. Depending on the speed of his demise, this problem may go away sooner than you think. Elder care is brutal. |
Anonymous
| If OP has the time to complain to anonymous strangers about her dying father she should have time to answer his calls. |
Anonymous
Probably by using the assistive technology for people with disabilities built into his phone, no? |
Anonymous
| Flying in from not the pointville, but ALL phones for the last 10+ years have accessibility features that give audio descriptions of everything that's happening. Blind people use iphones, etc., all the time. It talks to you to tell you where you're navigating, then you talk to it to text, search, etc. It's a thing, anyone who's blind knows how to use this just as well as the rest of us use phones. |
Anonymous
| Can you ask the caregiver to hold onto his phone so he can only call at certain hours. Or maybe change who is coming, if they cannot manage to distract him and keep in occupied except for specific times that you indicate. Does your father like to talk about specific life experiences, maybe give them so prompts, ask about the time he returned from the war, ask about the time he and his friends played a prank at his HS, anything like that to get him talking to her that are stories you’ve heard many times ver the years. |
Anonymous
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My father has 24 hour care and doesn’t seem to know who I am.
Not sure which is worse? ☹️ I’m sorry you’re going through this OP. |
Anonymous
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First, op, I’m sorry. I’d fire the hospice nurse.. and hospice is the word that jumped out at me, not blind.. but then I am totally blind and I text, use the internet (how else would I have found the post and be responding to it now? I frankly found the ignorance displayed on this thread insulting, and a bit strange given that hospice was mentioned. I do everything that the rest of you do on your phones and in life as well.
To explain how OP’s dad texts and calls, he’s got a couple option. One is to talk into the phone.. all phones can do this now. Another is to use what is called voiceover or talkback, depending on if the phone is an Iphone or an android. Both are software that allows the phone to read whatever is on the screen, including the letters I am typing. I use voiceover and I text my kids, my husband, my friends, my kids’ coaches, the people I volunteer with, just like you guys reading this do. I texted this thread to my husband with a “can you believe this?” comment. It isn’t strange at all, and yes, for those wondering I do have and use earbuds so if my husband and I are exchanging sexy texts, the world doesn’t hear them. In an interesting twist for you guys, my parents are both sighted. Whenever they have problems with their phone they say “Here (insert my name) fix this for me” and I turn on voiceover, fix it for them, turn off voiceover and give them their phones back. I also do the same for their computers, and I got them a talking meat thermometer when I noticed my mom couldn’t see the digits on the one she was using. She’d put the one that only displayed visually, get frustrated (I could tell by the sigh) and then ask if she should “put the meat in a bit longer”.. (I cook too) and so one Mother’s Day a talking meat thermometer came with me to their house and it just so happened that I left it there. The next time I saw her, she had brought it to a barbecue to show to everybody. I remember texting with my dad about the James Webb telescope launch and he asked where we were watching it and I responded “youtube” and sent him the link and he was like “be sure to put it on the computer so the kids can see” and I responded with “we’ve got Youtube up on the tv now” and he was all kinds of amazed that a tv could also get to Youtube. I remember this because he woke me up with a Christmas morning text well before my little kids got up saying “wake up, it’s launch day!” And no, I can’t prove that I’m blind, how can I on here, but then again, *why* would I, nobody else has to prove that what they say is valid. I’m actually surprised you guys seem to be doubting that a blind man can text I was more concerned that he’s in hospice and apparently not getting his needs and comforts met by the people OP is paying. For you op, I’d fire the nurse or I’d stop taking Dad’s calls. If the nurse has a boss who isn’t you, contact the boss, though if you are paying for the nurse, then, well, you are the boss. I’m also sorry he was neglectful, you have my sympathies. Whatever you do, I’d not put your job at risk as mean as that may sound to some. |
Anonymous
| Why are you answering? Silence your phone during the day. |