The Chronicles of a Caregiver

Make You Comfortable

One of my main jobs is to keep you comfortable wheather you are end of life care or if you are just an every day 1:1 client.    Some days all I do is cook, dishes and read and ask the same question "can I get you anything? Are you comfortable?"Once every 30 minutes. My main goal is to make my client comfortable

Im reading and I noticed Jane shifting in her recliner, shes trying to take a nap. She cant get comfortable. Her daughter offers help but she doesn't know what she needs. I read and observe the situation and boom a lightbulb goes off in my head.

An extra pillow so she doesn't have to hold her head (I mean I sleep like that too but she was clearly uncomfortable trying to sleep)  

She was using her hand as a pillow. (Even when I added the extra pillow she still used her hand but it still added extra comfort)

After I gave the pillow she fell back asleep.

Comfort isn't always about objects ie. Pillows, blankets sometimes it's psychological. Some people may disagree with me with this but I find "lying" or fibbing in dementia clients often help with comfort.

Ill give a few examples.

Firstly Jane lived in her house for 56 years. She now moved without consent. Somedays she believes shes been kidnapped, some days she believes she is in prison. Some days she even thinks she is at the beach and waiting to go home to her house. But let me tell you I'm not gonna be like no you moved this is your permanent house because thats just gonna stress her out. Im gonna go with her story about how she is at the beach. And that comforts her.

Though when she says shes been kidnapped and imprisioned thats a different story. The first time she said that to me I froze. I didn't know what to say. I sat down with Jane and just listened to her. Apologizing for her situation, apologizing that her family didnt involve her. Sometimes it works sometimes it doesn't.

That example is more of a complex lying but heres a simple example of lying that will help a dementia client out.

During our training one of our training staff members said that sometimes  dementia clients see things that arent there. Our works main example is. A client is seeing a huge spider on the wall and though there isn't one and they are in extreme distress over it. You are not going to tell them nothing is there. Go over and kill that imaginary spider.

Comfort for the client is so important because if the client isn't happy they can make your life a living hell. So if you are a caregiver or want to be a caregiver know that comfort is sooooo important.