My Mom is still fairly young but has been diagnosed with Lewy Body Dementia so I have her in a very nice ALF where she is just starting to get a tiny bit acclomated after a couple months, but she has fallen 3x and two of those times resulting in me being called in the middle of the night and taking her to the hospital. Thank God no major damage but I am petrified of her breaking a hip next time. Or worse! She is embarrassed to use the Walker I bought her and even has the aides put it up in her closet so she doesn’t have to see it. She told me she is too young and those are for old ladies. Any suggestions? 90% of the resident use a Walker so that’s not the issue.
At first I thought her reluctance was due to her being vain. My mother was very stylish. She was part of the Hollywood glamour era. She didn’t even go to the mailbox without her makeup on!
Actually, it was because she thought that a walker would get in our way and be an inconvenience to us. She didn’t want us to have to bother with placing in and out of the car and so on.
For awhile she did fine with a cane but as her Parkinson’s disease progressed she really needed the stability of using a walker. I became frustrated with her reluctance to allow me to purchase one for her.
Then, I decided to enlist the help of my friend who is a nurse. Mom loved my friend and they got along well. I asked my friend to speak with her about using a walker.
My friend told my mom how helpful it was when she was having trouble with her knees and used a walker herself. She raved about how much it would help her with balance issues and mom said that she would try it.
I was grateful to my friend and I was relieved not to feel like a nag.
I realized that mom wasn’t being vain and that she was thinking about inconveniencing us and wasn’t simply being stubborn.
My friend convinced my mom that it wasn’t an inconvenience to place a walker in and out of the car and that we were concerned about her safety.
I also had mom’s doctor speak to her about using the walker at all times.
Once mom started using her walker she loved it and it was a big help for her. This may not work for your mom but it is certainly worth trying.
There are many different kinds of walkers that come in all sizes to accommodate her needs. We bought her a nice rollator with a seat
that was also a storage space to place her purse in.
Best wishes to you and your mother.
Let the aides know they are NOT to hide her walker but to leave it out in full view from now on.
Good luck.
So see to it she has the cadillac of walkers.
Balance is SUCH a problem for the elders ( I know, I am one at 81 and often feel like a feather in the wind even tho I am active). Falls WILL happen to the aging whether without a walker or OVER a walker. My last two falls were backing up first into a rake, next into a mop. We just can't catch ourselves once we start to go.
It is a rare senior who, s/p several falls, doesn't want to accept that walker. You can only make it fancy, make it PROMINENT, beg, and on you go.
Falls can be the beginning of the end and we all know and have seen it. For my Mom it was. It went from falls to catheters to infections to pneumonia to more falls and so on.
The truth is that it is a harbinger of what's to come.
I hope others here have more useful info for you, and I wish you good luck. I am afraid it is hit or miss with having any luck with this. Do know, especially if you are dealing with DNR status, that trips to the ER, unless there is injury to the head, don't need to be done. But every facility will make its own decision. ALSO know that you don't need to attend each trip tot he ER. My own daughter is two states away. I will be on my own in that ER, and to be frank it's just as well.