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Fantastic discussion here.... I had to laugh because my very first post on this site, many years ago, out of the gate, and I was attacked !!! Apparently I was the first PAID caregiver to wander into this place and was Immediately told I did not belong here.... it was for family caregivers.... Like Tom Petty sings, I won't back down.... so I fired back that I had as much right to be here as any one else... it got nasty, finally admin came on and said ALL CAREGIVERS were welcome.....hmm, does that make me a pioneer??

Anyway, I have been attacked a few times thru the years, don't regret any of the skirmishes.... it was a learning curve... for all of us.....so many wonderful insights have been shared here today.... all so positive and hopeful..... but when you stop and think about it..... for the most part, we get along and when wrong we apologize.... there are hundreds of folks on here, mostly women.... think about it... and we get along most of the time.....

One thing I appreciate is there are more paid caregivers here now, so I feel if I do need to vent, I will be understood.... we get tired, impatient, wear many hats, must stay professional, ect.... but it has helped me to see how many truly appreciate THEIR paid caregiver...Yes, lots of lousy ones out there, too.... but it helps others to know what to look for.... so thank you all for such a great 'conversation' about life.... it is life after all....some days we click and get along, some days we don't.... but as a whole, this is a great site to be a member of...
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:Ladee1, you ask if you are a pioneer. You can generally tell a pioneer by the arrows in their back. So, yes, I guess you are. Glad you've healed up and stuck around!
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I wish I had more time to read all the info here and ask questions...too little time, too many questions.
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The thing about chatting on forums is there's no give and take from visual cues: facial expressions, body language etc. You might make a comment meant to be humorous or sarcastic and hurt someone's feelings or piss someone off. I try to make sure my silly jokes and sarcasm are painfully obvious . Although some may say just painful.....

Also, I don't have a good memory and it's hard to keep people and their backgrounds straight. Like, "is that the gal that wishes her mom would just DIE already, or is that the lady that wishes her FIL would just die already?"
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I have the same problem, windy, especially if they don't fill out their profile. Or worse yet, I'll forget who a poster is talking about as I read down a thread. Or I'll forget what I'm talking about and lose my train of thought when I'm answering. Now that is bad.

One trend I've noticed online is that if a thread gets long enough that either a flame war will start or the thread will turn into a conversation among a few people. It's what we see here. I miss a lot of the spats because I tend to stop reading after about 50 messages.

Hmm... we're now on 65. I better stop reading before the fights break out or turns into a conversational thread. :-O
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Yea, I think we done got conversational round here, but that's ok as long as it's something other than my mother is a b*tch, I hate her, cant stand the urine smell , can my brother sue me, how do you get poop stains off the sofa.....

No offence to those of you who have asked all these very good questions.....
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As I've read the type of questions and complaints Windy refers to, I wonder how people came to have so much hatred and animosity, especially in a caregiving situation.

Later I heard the neighbors going at it again. The young grandmother gets into it with her daughter, who has a bad attitude and gets verbally hostile not only with her mother but with her own children. When the daughter was growing up, she got it from both mother and stepfather - yelling, hollering, insulting remarks.

The now grandparents didn't have good parenting skills, the daughter grew up without those same skills, and her poor kids will probably grow up in the same dysfunctionality that goes all the way back to the grandparents, and perhaps even further back.

These are learned situations.

I think some of the people here who spew such venom and hostility toward the person they're supposed to be caring for came from families with multiple generations of dysfunctionality.

It's really sad - how can these cycles be broken if someone doesn't get professional help?
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I probably shouldn't be such a wise a** about people's questions but lord, you do see it a lot. Garden, I think you're right, it can be generational dysfunction but also many valid cases of people getting stuck with horrible elders, or elders who have become a caregiving nightmare due to dementia etc. After going to h*ll and back with some old witch or the FIL from h*ll, I can't really blame any one for the "Death Wish" posts.
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Windy, I understand, and don't necessarily disagree. In addition, sometimes people post in the heat of an argument or a serious crisis. That's when an edit function would really help so that those complaints made in the heat of the moment can be modified when the person calms down.

I don't disagree that there are bad situations; sometimes I think I'm lucky mine isn't any worse than it is.

I still do feel though that there are often situations which are generational and are beyond help, without professional intervention. Those truly are sad, to know that people are living in such misery with family members and perhaps are unable to change things because of these ingrained behaviors and family dynamics.
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Oh, I understand the animosity people can feel, since I deal with a lot of internal turmoil myself. It is one reason I was drawn to this group. It was okay to talk about it here. I first had gone to a Alz support group. There was a nurse on that group that printed out a long Word file on how to talk to someone with dementia anytime anyone would say they were having a problem. It was like telling the person it was their own fault that they found things difficult. The nurse would print that file so often I started to wonder if she was mentally ill. I think she was just in total denial of the difficulties of dementia care. The main message to the members was "don't complain or you'll get the Word file." That was not good.

Some people have so much drama in their families that I don't really have any advice. All I can think is "goodness, what a mess you got." I'm glad when other people have some ideas, because I know the people need help.

I don't read the poop and pee messages anymore. I've been on the group for a long time now. The good thing is that there are people fresher than me that can handle the questions better. And what a blessing we have to have someone on the group that can handle Medicaid questions. I don't even read the Medicaid and financial help questions, since I don't have any experience with either. I do better with the "let's throw mama from the train" type messages. I understand those. :P
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Jessie, your last paragraph, read my mind. Well said.......

Yea, amazing knowledge some of these folks have regrading legal and financial stuff. I just hope they don't all die off before I need detailed advice!
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This is good.... I see the Aging.com now has a list of the support groups within the website on the main page for the Caregiver Forum Questions & Discussions :)

That way a newbie can check out the previous questions on whatever subject they need help on.
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Jessie, so you had a Nurse Ratched running the group? If she thought that people were having problems because of their own actions, inactions, etc., and recommended advice that inferred it was, she had no business being in a support group, let alone running it.

I can't help sharing this anecdote about drama, and drama queens. I worked once in a situation where I saw this on a regular basis. The young woman in question was probably in her early 30's, attractive, but needy and definitely High Maintenance. That interfered with her ability and focus on her work. Other secretaries naturally were tasked to jump in and bail her out when she either screwed up or went home early.

Once she was upset and casually commented she had taken multiple pain relievers - I think it was Motrin, Advil, or one of those. She took them on an empty stomach, became ill and had to go home, but not before letting those around her know how upset she was that she had to take pain pills.

Another time she was sobbing on the phone, become dramatic, and eventually also had to leave. By then I was getting used to seeing this and felt sorry for the other staff who had to work in the same area. Her antics were disruptive.

After a while I also learned to block out all the sobbing and drama - it happened just too frequently. But there was an amusing aspect as well.

She made a major mistake once that caused her attorney/boss major embarrassment, cost the client time and resolution and could have cost the firm that client. (That might have been the time when she and another secretary were online looking for mates - matchmaker. c o m I think was their favorite site then. Every time they found a photo of a hot guy, they had to run back to the other's desk and confer whether either or both of them should hit on this guy.)

When I could tell this was happening, I knew immediately that next day she would wear something very provocative to work and be all dramatic about the major screwup.

Sure enough; next day she came in with a very low cut tanktop and bent over every time her attorney came out to talk to her. He couldn't keep his eyes off her and wasn't able to complete the conversation about remedying her major screw-up. By that time it was almost hilarious. She was SOOOO obvious!


But at least all she did was threaten people with a piece of paper. Could have been worse!
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Okay, mea culpa - as I was writing the last post I was moving text around and accidently missed that the last sentence should have followed the comment about Jessie's experience with Nurse Rached.

So anyone reading, mentally move that comment about being threatened by a piece of paper up to immediately after the first paragraph.

Why, oh why can't we edit our posts??/
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JesseBelle - to a hammer, every problem is a nail! Ha! I have a manager at work that thankfully I do not work for, but you can't take anything to him. It's like he's not listening at all. The problem is your own fault. Ugg.

Online forums struggle with signal to noise ratio. We all come with our own baggage and biases, and that's how we read the words on the screen. There's also projection, where someone assigns their own feelings or suspicions to another unknowingly. Those people are hard to communicate with because they are so self-unaware.
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Jessie i had to laugh about "don't complain or you'll get the Word file." Too bad you all couldn't have gone out for coffee and left the supervisor behind.
I guess that's why I avoid all kinds of such group activities, every one feels compelled to toe the party line even if they disagree.
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The nurse may still be on the group. I haven't checked there in years now. She didn't run the group, but had made herself dominant. She had worked with many people with alz, so did have a lot of knowledge. Since learning more about dementia I have learned that the approaches of professionals and families are different. People tend to behave better for professionals than close family. I've also learned that people with dementia grow into the disease. It's not like they fall off a cliff into the disease. How to relate to someone with early dementia is totally different than how to relate to someone late in the disease. Also, people with dementia are of all types -- some nice, some not. So a one-size-fits-all does not work.

Oops, where is my train of thought? I lost it again. I had a conclusion to all this, but who knows what it was? I don't. I'm starting to feel like I'm floating through life. Maybe early onset? At least I'll know what to expect.
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Unteachable? At what age does one graduate?
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Learning is for life...my grandad used to say when you don't learn something new each day then the chances are you will find they are nailing down your coffin!
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It is October, coming up on the full moon and halloween. I have been unable to miss the disagreements, misunderstandings, and what appears to be outright attacks on fellow caregivers. Everyone is having some type of uphill battle of their own, and does not need to be attacked. Can we try harder to get along, be supportive of each other, and stop looking under every petal and leaf for faults in others, or for reasons why one should be judged or condemned ???
Try to get along, be polite, this is still a public forum, and after letting loose maybe an apology would suffice to smooth ruffled feathers (or damaged petals).
You, and each and every caregiver here are in my thoughts and prayers. You are each deserving love and consideration by others, imop.

Jude, I want to apologize for making the green with envy joke, that maybe what you were wiping off your face wasn't green. If you didn't think it was funny, then I apologize if the joke was at your expense. I am sorry.
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Apparently, since I am no longer a care giver, I just don't count anymore. This is not the first time someone has made note of that, another reason I find it hard to post, but still.... you can make a comment as polite as you want, if someone doesn't like it, well they can censor it OUT. Meaning, your opinion doesn't count, it is their way or thumbs out b*tches, get your butt on the highway.
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Jeanette, of course you are still a caregiver, of the best kind. After losing a loved one, you brave through that pain to come on here for support, and to give support! Like I said, of the best kind with experience. As a matter of fact, the website is under attack by trolls, devisiveness, and hurt feelings all around. At this very moment you are needed over on the latest troll question: "How can you blame others for what you have done?". Your being sensitive to real or perceived critism, if that is what you are experiencing, denies the fact that you are a well-loved and liked member of your community, of which you have been a leader. I care about you.
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Jeanette, counting you in for the long haul.
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Jeanette, I still love to hear from you, and you have years of experience to share. Really, since dad passed I also feel like maybe i am absolete. After all, mom is just frail, not incapaciated! But I still take "care" of her, and i feel like I have good advice based on my time with dad. and I count ALL of you as my friends. And like my face to face friends, we don;t always get along or agree.. but we do need to respect each other... and I do respect you, so don't go if that is what you are thinking!.. When I joined here there was one poster who I felt took an instant dislike to me because I was new and not a proven "caregiver". I was very upset by some of her posts ( she comes off as miss know it all.. still does sometimes..LOL) I decided to just let it roll, ignore her. And I;m glad I did because I got to know some wonderful people. Don't let one crabapple spoil the whole thing! Love you
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Without the tone of voice and facial expressions of communicating in person, misunderstandings can easily occur. I try not to word my advice harshly and try not to take offense when someone takes the time to offer me help.
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Considering our diverse backgrounds and the stress of caregiving, we get along extraordinarily!
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Well said Yoga!
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Jeanette, you just continue being you girl!!
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Thanks everyone for the support of each other on the troll thread:
"How can you blame others for what you have done?"
You all were asking, but hoping not to give the troll any more attention.
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I just love everyone's ways to make things right again.
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