This week was an eye opener....

[Latimeria]

My grandparents moved to Florida 30 years ago to retire.  In the beginning, it was independent living where they had their own house in a retirement community and was quite awesome now that I look back at it now.  Only thing is when you start getting older and older, then that requires more care.

Their next stage was assisted living.  I'm a little in shock how these homes operate down there and basically have you hand over your savings for mediocre care at best and this is from an expensive (and quite rich) community I might add.    When my grandfather died, my grandmother kept going, but basically in a room without a view and not enough care in the facility due to COVID for proper care.  I took the family down to visit as the docs said she doesn't have long, so I was hoping she was lucid enough when we got there to hopefully give her one last great memory seeing her great granddaughter.  When she was "With Us", she was sharp as a tack and it was wonderful catching up with her and telling some old stories.  Then there are times she "Wasn't" and that made me sad to see everything slipping away.

We got her out for dinner at a restaurant the last night we were there.  That was a production to get everything hooked up as she only gets outside the facility about 2x a year.  She had an incredible time as well as all of her family that was there and will be a great lasting memory as the tock is quickly ticking.

I was (and am) a little nervous now when I get to that stage.  Thankfully I treated my body like a playground for all these years, so highly doubt I'll reach 96 to see this.

For you guys taking care of parents at home, I salute you.  I've never known more than now how important that is after seeing what I saw this past week.  I just needed to get this off my chest and will put a separate post with more fun stuff on another thread.

[KogaHead]

Went through that with both parents, on e of the hardest things ever to deal with.

If you need a shoulder to cry on or talk give me a call brother.

Great y'all got one last time with her.

[sasquatch]

Yep. Much respect to my sister for all she did for my folks.

Glad you got the time with grandma. I'm sure she loved it.

[jrodda]

A lot of emotions in there, really good of you to make the time and effort to take her out to dinner.

[vdisney]

Respect

[Tim524]

 Glad she got some ''Quality Time'' while she can still remember. At 96, she has seen it all, good and bad I bet ! Kinda puts things into perspective when you visit and see someone close to you in their last stage of life, bittersweet emotions I am sure!

[BenCantrell]

I'm really glad you got to make it over and do this Tom. We'll do some fishing next time. <3