Gotta Love'em

I overbooked myself client wise today, met with five, along with trying to get 3 hours of paperwork done in one. Got half the paperwork done, and brought the rest home for the weekend.

The clients; all elderly today.

Client #1, 85 petite little lady, who last week thought I was the devil incarnate because I called her daughter in Texas and told her that her mother was sending up to $80.00 a week to companies who promised she was a winner, they just needed the funds for the shipping and handling of those giant checks, and to keep her in the running for the next sweepstakes. Of course daughter put a stop to it, and Mrs. Petite was angry at getting caught---on a side note these defrauders told this little old lady that she shouldn't tell anyone what she was doing, they might try to con her out of her winnings!

I should have realized yesterday when I set up the appointment that something was up with her memory, she was very sweet to me on the phone........today she greets me with the most beautifull smile, it lights up her entire face, making her beautiful, so welcoming, then she ask me if I knew D, "Of course, I am her boss."
"Oh that is you?" "Well, she is just wonderful, I don't know what I would do without her." (last week D was as evil as I)
We get busy with the paperwork, me shouting at the top of my lungs, plus repeating everything twice, because she cannot hear, and cannot afford to buy hearing aids........but doesn't she get it? She could have used the thousands of dollars she sent to those bogus companies. Anyway, she has forgiven me, especially since I went to Sam's and purchased a giant bag of Dum Dum pops for her to hand out to the neighborhood children when she sits out on her front porch watching the world go by. She is the "sucker lady" to the neighborhood children.

Client #2...75 year old woman........I am at an elderly apartment complex,with a security lobby, just outside the main lobby, where the visitor rings the buzzer to the residents apartment.
The doors are all glass looking into a lobby where the residents sit, visit, play cards, socialize. Five people are sitting in there. I ring the clients apartment. No answer, I ring again, and again, pull out my cell phone and call her, no answer. I finally knock on the doors and shout through the glass, do you know so and so? Is she home? Blank looks, I say the name again, they point to a woman sitting in a chair, "that's her!" She forgot I was coming.
Okay fine, I can deal with this, I explain who I am, why I am there, review our phone conversation from Wednesday, she pretends to remember, but I can tell she doesn't.
This woman, has to use a walker to walk, and with even that she has to move at a snail's pace. We go through the paper work, when we get to her health history, she says she is in perfect health, has no family physician, she will get one when she gets sick and not before. I point to the walker, "why are you using a walker?"
"Oh, I had hip replacement surgery 3 years ago."
"Have you had physcial therapy to work on strengthening your muscles, so that you do not have to use the walker?"........she shouldn't have needed that walker more than a few months.
"I did it for a few weeks, but I didn't like it so I stopped."
I am thinking, what the hell is this woman thinking? Why didn't her 3 children try to convince her to continue the therapy? She seems very content to live her life this way, after spending time with 90+ year olds, I look at 75 as quite young, and she has allowed the quality of her life to be controlled by how far she can go because of that walker. I find this so sad.

Client # 3....83 year old woman, looks amazing, fantastically healthy(she has major heart disease, but refuses to take her meds because they cost over $3000.00 a year.)
She has lost a son, and a husband, both by freak accidents........son was at a gym using the tread mill, he lost his balance, fell off, hit his head on another tread mill, lost consciousness, was taken to the hospital, but his head injury was deemed the least urgent, he died due to the head trauma.
Her husband at age 90, was out walking the circle of their cul de sac, a neighbor backing his car out of the drive ran over him, this was witnessed by the client and her son through the living room window, the neighbor pulls his car back in the garage, and goes back into his house. She calls 911, while son runs out to check on the father lying in the street. The neighbor later tells them, I thought I hit something, but wasn't sure what. I sat there dumbfounded........wtf? Who are these people populating our world?

Client # 4...67 year old woman, who spends her days visiting her husband in a nursing home from 7AM to 1PM, then she runs her errands, or whatever she needs to do in the afternoons, then goes home to play with Mr. Fidget, her chihuahah.
She at least is expecting me, we update her paperwork, as we are doing her health history, I mark off all the the diseases she has had, or has....my final question during the health history is... "Are there any illnesses or other ailments that have not been mentioned?"
She answers no. So we move on to finish up a few forms, and then I ask for her signature, she replies...."My signature is pretty bad, because I have Parkinson's." Jeeessh! I tell her, that is an important piece of infomation, and I am glad she told me, (this little nugget of info, plus a few others regarding her health are documented no where in her 5 year old file back at the office, when I ask her about this, she replies, no one asked the right questions) I again ask, "is there anything else, that you think might be important for us to know about your health?"
"Well.....I am psychotic."
I sputtered, trying not to laugh! I thought she was joking! She wasn't. I ask what her diagnoses is.......pychotic episodes along with severe depression......I ask if she is being treated with medications, "Oh yes, and she names the two."
"Who is treating her psychological problems?" She doesn't know........pulling my hair out by now!
I have somewhere around 85 clients, maybe 90. I am finally after almost a year, meeting most of them. I am constantly amazed at how intelligent people, allow themselves (or their children do not interfere) to neglect their health and well-being. For every two clients I meet that take very good care of themselves, I meet one hypochondriac, and three whose quality of life is awful, due to untreated poor health.

My last clients of the day....one of my favorite couples, both in their mid-80's, I am breaking the rules once again for them to do their weekly grocery shopping, but what the heck.
Anyway, it has been two weeks since I have seen them, he is feeling so poorly he doesn't want me to see him......he always wants to see me, so I am now extremely worried, but there is no way I was going to injure his dignity by insisting upon visiting him. Anyway he would see right through it.
She looks 10 years older, the circles under her yes so dark, she looks bruised. She is extremely worried about him, she hobbling along on a walker, living in a second story fire trap, that they have no way of exiting from if there were an emergency, she whispers her fears about him to me, I whisper back...call me anytime this weekend if you need me....breaking another rule.....she just tells me she needs to pray more, and has to stop being a 'doubting Thomas'. I give her a hug, whisper, "call me." and leave.

By now it is 6:30, while at the grocery shopping for the client I stopped at the local pizza parlor there, purchased 3 of the world's best salads, and two small pizzas, for the family dinner......this shows the lack of communication between hubby and I. As I walk in the door at 7 with my purchases, hubby and daughter are sitting watching a movie, eating pizza and the world's greatest salads!

I need a drink, no, I need at least 4 drinks, very strong drinks....