Paul Chambers🚧@paul@oldfriends.live
edited

tl;dr Just a general update about me with 8 subjects for #FediBusyBodies... lol🤭

1) #PaulsYard and #PaulsGarden is coming along. As far as production goes, this year will probably be a bust. Fall planting and early 2027 spring planting will hopefully result in a very productive year next year. Still have some work to do, like irrigation, but it will come in the fall and winter. (If we save $$)

2/ Still haven't got the place feeling like "my space" after we had to clear most of the house out for the floor replacement.

3/ Penny is doing fine from her Widow maker heart attack. Still has limitations but she survived it and is making the best out of the limitations. August will be two years already. The #Fediverse helped me greatly to get through it. The time she was in the hospital I was never alone because of you folks and Hashtag game players.❤️

4/ My recent Spinal Baclofen Pump replacement surgery went smoothly, pain minimum, and no sign of infection a week in. My overall health is stable but there has been some progression in my Parkinson's plus, Multiple System Atrophy, but not at the speed that is average. My progression is way slower and they are trying to figure out why to see if they can replicate it for other people with it.

5/ Taking care remotely of an 85-year-old aunt is a hard thing to do and we are preparing for her now to move in here at some point. We are finishing the new room from #PaulsRoof into a suite for her. Two 180 miles round trips per week in the summer is taking its toll on me.

6/ #SissyCat still won't accept #MillieCat into the family and a few months in, we are at our wits end. Sissy's overall demeanor has change.

7/ Got my self-hosting home lab setup with some #FediFriends help. Got a lot of work to do still but I already migrated MS OneDrive and Google Drive over to it. So the degoogling will be done

8/ Knock on wood, but there seems to be a truce in effect in #PAulsRaccoonWar. For whatever reason, they walk on the edge of my property, but are getting into two neighbors home. I am thinking our place is not worth the aggravation.

That's about it.

cobalt@cobalt123@beige.party

Replying to @paul@oldfriends.live

@paul As caregivers for my son with Alzheimer’s, mixed dementia and other issues, I’m wondering how you both can take care of her if she becomes unstable with falls or stays in bed, incontinent. It’s very challenging. And I think you live in a small place so it could be hard to recruit caregivers. Do you already have plans for this? I ask, because it really is a responsibility and takes a great deal of your time and energy.

Jul 6, 2026, 03:59 UTCen
Paul Chambers🚧@paul@oldfriends.live

Replying to @cobalt123@beige.party

@cobalt123 I appreciate the question and the concern behind it, but my wife owns and operates a small state certified home health company, providing in-home care to clients on Medicaid, Aetna, Blue Cross and Blue Shield, Molina, Care Source and others, in three Ohio counties. We have that covered if the time comes. My aunt also has really good insurance through her late husband that provides significant coverage.

cobalt@cobalt123@beige.party

Replying to @paul@oldfriends.live

@paul Wowie! You are all really in extraordinary circumstances then! If only your wife could help us find a couple caregivers here in Arizona! My son has home-based community services paid by Medicaid to the Division of Developmental Disabilities. He has qualified since 2017 for 24/7 caregivers but doesn’t need nurses.

The problem is the employee landscape changed markedly during Covid and after. Another problem: Trump. About 75% of caregivers here are immigrants and POC. They’re reluctant to leave their homes and drive very far, or rely on public transportation that is very limited and cumbersome to use here. Oh and as you can imagine, a job paid by the State is not competitive to local fast food and retail jobs.

Other than those glaring problems, how many people who consider doing caregiving will jump up and down saying Pick me! Pick me! for a client who is an adult with incontinence and Alzheimer’s and dementia?