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> My mother-in-law has had PD for ... well let's see ... fifteen years, I guess. > She started out with the shakes, and it's gotten worse over the years. > She has a lot of trouble communicating now. It's very hard to discern > what her wishes are. I'm not sure whether or not this argues for greater > communication earlier, when the disese is not so bad, because I don't think > that the patient can anticipate what he/she is looking forward to. > With time and patience, I *think* that we are understanding her desires. > > My father-in-law is and old-fashioned, reared-in-the-depression, > self-sufficient (and every-other-hyphenated-description-you-can-think-of) > type. He hates to admit weakness, and he hates to ask for help. > When help has been offered, he responds cynically, and lashes out > at the percived attack on his manhood. We (the family) have borne this > with great difficulty. Now, however, the situation is such that he cannot > care for her at home, alone. He will need a visiting nurse, or something > (currently undefined). He has reached his limit and asked for help. > > Is there advice in this story? I don't know. Everyone's case is different. > I don't think that we could have, in our personal situation, done > much to prepare ourselves or my father- and mother-in-law. > We try find out what my mother-in-law wants, and respond as appropriate > for that time. For my father-in-law, we simply kept offering help > and bear with his "abuse". This paid off for us: when he was ready to > ask, he knew we would be ready to resond. By the way, his call for help > was interesting: A one-line P.S. in a letter written for an unrelated > purpose. > > Maybe a good summary is: patience, an open ear, and gentle offers. > > ---------------------------------------------------------------------- > Gary Pajer [log in to unmask] > Schlumberger / EMR Photoelectric 609 799-1000 x6700 > ---------------------------------------------------------------------- > Gary, thank you for your thoughtful response to Bill. Your description of your father-in-law differs from the description of my father in many ways but the advice was sound and useful to me as I deal with my parents and my mother's PD. Judith