Temporary bathroom

[Bill]

We are trying to find options for someone who is presently living on the couch in our main living room. On discharge from hospital she was told she could walk by the physios, and we live in hope that she will see sense and try.

Her house is in a state** and has no toilet or washing facilities downstairs, but she is convinced that she will be able to move back there in September to be back with her memories of her late husband. She is "difficult", very religious and believes in miracles.

I was wondering if anyone has experience of semi-permanent Portaloo type installations. I was thinking vaguely of something that could be plonked over the back door and be plumbed in to the water supply and drains to provide, at the very least a shower and loo.

** Piled high with rubbish, which I could clear, but needs such a huge amount of remedial work that I believe any competent builder would refuse to start on any permanent extension.

[Peter Parry]

Search for bathroom pods such as

Commonly used to turn hotel rooms in older buildings to en-suite.

[ARW]

Any chance that you could move her closer to God?

[Harry Bloomfield]

Bill formulated on Saturday :

A stair lift might be simpler?

[Bill]

In message , Harry Bloomfield writes

Or not? Any electrician would say the house needs rewiring, the stairs have a hairpin bend in the middle, and the bathroom has no shower. There's more, but it gets very, very depressing.

Anything suggested by us has been firmly rejected by the owner over the years.

[Bill]

Hmmm, very interesting. I hadn't heard the term bathroom pod before.

I was thinking of something like that, but outside the house, as inside the kitchen seems to me to be the only possible sensible space.

Thanks for the pointer.

[spuorgelgoog]

A friend-of-a-friend hired one while their house was being renovated.

etc, from most of the mobile cabin hire places.

There are also bolt-on pod extensions but these would need some foundations, planning etc.

Craning over a house is possible, but you may need to pay Openreach lots of money to move the phone wires while you do it.

A cheap caravan parked on the drive might be another option, or if she won't move from the couch a cheap motorcaravan, then you can drive her to the hospital etc and park her there.

Social Work should have access to a day centre where she can be bathed occasionally.

Owain

[Pamela]

If these things affect health, safety or having a basic decent home life then the council might help a lot although it's means tested and usually for those with a disability and provided they don't have a lot of savings.

[Bill]

In message , [e-mail] writes

Thanks for those url's. Very helpful.

Thanks again. I don't want to sound negative, but her house is the only one in the road with no drive, and she refuses to contact social services in case they want to inspect her house or our facilities here.

I'm going to try to secretly involve our mutual doctor at my appointment next week to try to get him to send more forceful letters than the four from him that she has ignored so far. That's why I'm trying to gather information about possibilities in case he, as a third party, manages to help by prising her out of her intransigence.

[Tim+]

Curious as to why she was discharged into your care. Was this just a Good Samaritan act or are you in some way legally responsible for her?

If you *hadn?t* taken her in, presumably the hospital and social services would have had to have been a bit more proactive about sorting out her home conditions to enable her discharge or make other care arrangements.

Not criticising your actions in any way, just pointing out that you seem to be in quite a pickle that shouldn?t really have happened.

Having dealt with a cantankerous 98 yr whole lived alone in a totally unsuitable house I can sympathise.

Tim

[Bill]

Thanks. My wife, who is extremely good hearted, is her nearest relative not in a nursing home. I am going behind her back posting here or talking to the doctor, but I will have to take some action soon. The real trigger was my wife having a broken rib and foot following a fall after being lectured at for a whole afternoon.

We think she was discharged from rehab because they were fed up with her. They wished us luck as she was wheeled out. I suspect they picked up how she was telling the doctors and nurses how wonderful they were while telling us and the rest of the patients how none of the staff knew anything, in her day they wouldn't have got a job serving in Woolworths and so on.

I do think we were let down with the discharge, but she told them that she was just coming to us for a couple of days while she sorted out her walking and her house. That was over 4 months ago.

[Bill Wright]

How long do you expect this situation to continue?

Bill

[spuorgelgoog]

Well, *you* can contact social services if you believe she's at risk, and you can invite social services to inspect your facilities, and tell them you've had more than enough.

Social services may then decide that she lacks mental capacity and make decisions for her.

You can also make it clear to social services that you are going to start being more bloody demanding than they can imagine. You're (or your wife) aren't going to be doing the washing/toileting/feeding etc, *they* can send carers round.

Perhaps if you and your wife could plan a holiday (as soon as her foot and rib are better) so Old Lady will be left on her own in the house? Because you're not responsible for her.

Unfortunately old people can be devious, cunning and downright malevolent once marbles are lost.

Owain

[Brian Gaff]

Oh dear, I was given a commode and supplied with a lacky every day to empty it when I was supposedly stuck downstairs with my ankle in plaster. I used my knees and my bum very effectively to get upstairs! Brian

[Nick Odell]

Sorry to read about the situation. I guess, given the average age of the readership of this group, we are all acutely aware that next time it could be me.

I just wondered how likely she is to start walking up and down stairs again, go out and do some shopping etc and if the answer is "not very" then I wondered if it might be easier to add a kitchenette upstairs than a bathroom downstairs and make the first floor her primary living area?

Is there a floor plan we could mull over? Maybe a similar house is up for sale and there's a plan on an estate agent's website?

Hope it all works out,

Nick

[Pamela]

Do you feel she is not trying? Is there a mental health issue which makes it hard for her to organise and schedule her activities? Her reliance on a miraculous event could be seen as dysfucntional.

Sadly she seems to have fallen through a gap in the system. On discharge in such circumstances the NHS staff should liaise with local authority's adult social services. I'm assuming the old lady does not have a fortune in savings to fund her own support.

Council care is so stretched these days that if a relative, such as your wife, is willing to look after someone then the council will be only too pleased not to provide that care.

However when determining the need for social care, and this is important, no relative is obliged to look after another and you can state in writing to the council your wish not to take on the obligation permanently. You could even consider having a carer's assessment which often gets overlooked.

Perhaps you might consider making a referral of the lady to adult social services who should provide a case worker to run with this. It might be slightly better if a referral comes from her GP who might also perform another medical assessment and perhaps a physio re-assessent too. If you asked for a GP home visit (because she can't walk), seeing her circumstances might make a useful impression on the GP.

[Pamela]

I would agree with all that (except the holiday maneouvre as it shouldn't be necessary).

In my experience, these are often coping behaviours because the person can be confused, frightened at the smallest thing, unable to make decisions and can't work out a way forward.

[tabbypurr]

she may be right on that point.

Showing her a solution is usually more effective. If she refuses to say what the problem is it doesn't help. Often people won't though.

A question: is it correct to say that only permanent accommodation needs to meet BR? If so one could make a shed into a temporary bathroom.

NT

[The Natural Philosopher]

Yes Pamela, in your case we understand all that.

[Roland Perry]

In message , at 16:00:03 on Sat,

11 Aug 2018, Bill remarked:

Have you tried the local church, who might have some short term volunteer support available, but also "words of advice" from the pastor that she might be more inclined to pay heed to.