Incontinence

Incontinence is not an easy thing to cope with in the home situation. It takes me approximately half an hour ( often more ) to get George ready for bed. I try to keep him as independent as possible and to do as much as possible himself. I will tell him to take off his shoes, one will come off. I then need to tell him to take off the next one. This is repeated for each article of clothing some of which he needs help with.

The catheter makes things easier in many ways: he no longer piddles all over the place, I no longer need to change the bed several times a week. It does have disadvantages too one of which is the possibility of infection. The catheter needs to be emptied regularly. The night bag needs to be attached each night and then removed and cleaned the next morning. I hold it under the laundry tap so the clean water can flow through and flush it out, this seems to work well.

Unfortunately George still wants to use the toilet to empty his bowel. He does try but unfortunately can't clean himself properly - have plenty of baby wipes on hand! another thing which is a real problem is that George somehow manages to get a lot on the floor, stand on it and traipse it over the floor! Carpet frankly, is not brilliant when dealing with this!

How anyone can think is similar to dealing with a baby I will never know. It is not. It has it's own set of problems which have to be worked around. It is different for everyone and all the carer can do is work out what works for them and keep their fingers and toes crossed.