the story of the dirty pull-up

“Your mom’s been weepy and anxious since I got here this afternoon,” Nurse Ratched* said as I approached. She was writing notes in a binder that lay on top of the meds cart. I stopped beside her.

“She’s not feeling well. Maybe something to do with the food at dinner, or a BM. Anyway, she’s lying in bed,” Ratched said.

“Okay, I’ll check on her.” I continued down the third-floor hallway toward my mother’s room, the last one on the right.

Mom was in bed, as Ratched had said. The antique lamp on the pine side table we’d taken from her bedroom at home cast a soft yellow light on the pillow beside her head. Otherwise the room was dark. The colour of her cheeks matched the white facecloth that lay folded on her forehead. Her mouth was open; her down duvet was tucked under her chin. She looked as if she might be dead.

“Mom, are you okay?” No answer. I lay my hand gently where I guessed her right shoulder might be under the cover, and pressed lightly. “Mom?” Still no answer. I pulled the duvet down a bit. She was dressed in her cream turtleneck with the pink flower on the side and her purple cashmere sweater. “Mom, are you okay?”

“I’m a little shaky,” she said finally, her voice barely audible, her eyes still closed. I pulled the duvet down further. Her right hand lay a little below her waist, against the dark brown of her corduroy trousers; it was shaking violently. I’d never seen her shake like that. I touched her left hand; it was quivering. She’s not cold. I felt the cloth on her head: wet and cool.

“Do you need to go to the peeps, Mom?”

“No.”

“Let’s try anyway, Mom. I know you don’t need to go, but let’s try anyway, okay? It might help you feel better.”

“I don’t need to go. I don’t think I can stand up. I feel a little shaky.”

“I know Mom, but let’s try,” I said as lifted the duvet from her legs and feet. She had socks and shoes on. I helped her sit up. The shaking in her hands had subsided somewhat; she placed them beside her thighs and pushed herself up from the bed. Her small bathroom was three feet away directly in front of her. I switched the light on, and guided her forward until she was beside the toilet, and then I gently swivelled her around.

She unbuttoned and unzipped her trousers, lowered them to her knees, sat on the toilet, reached around behind, found a piece of stool clinging to her bottom, grabbed it and dropped it into the toilet bowl, leaving feces all over her hand. It was then I realized she didn’t have a pull-up incontinence brief on.

I took some toilet paper from the roll on the wall beside her and cleaned Mom’s hand. When I went to put the soiled tissue in the small garbage can next to her feet, I saw that the plastic bag liner was folded over on top of itself to cover something within. I bent down and “opened” the plastic bag. My free hand flew to cover my mouth and nose as my stomach heaved. The stench was sickening. I quickly dropped the ball of dirty toilet paper into the plastic bag, and folded it back over what was inside.

I straightened up. Took a couple of deep breaths. Reached over to the towel rack, removed the single blue washcloth that was there (blue was for “peri care;” white for everything else), turned the hot water tap on and soaked the cloth under the flow.

“I’m going to give you a bit of a wash, okay Mom?” I said before I attended to her hygiene.

Once she was clean, I got her undressed, into her nightgown and safely to bed. Then I went back to the bathroom. I lifted the bag out of the bin. It weighed three or four pounds. I put it in the sink and opened it. This time I was prepared for the disgusting smell. Nevertheless, it again made me gag. Inside was a soaking wet pull-up full of shit.

My chest tightened; blood rushed to my cheeks. I knew exactly how that shitty pull-up came to be in that bag. I remembered the morning I had found an incontinence brief in Mom’s ensuite ballooned to five times it’s normal size and full of water because she’d tried to wash it out in the sink. I had been amazed at how much liquid one of those briefs could hold. I’d felt such tenderness for Mom when I’d made the discovery. Now I was infuriated. I gathered the edges of the top of the bag into my hands, and tied them in a knot.

I walked out of the bathroom, said goodnight to Mom, gave her a kiss, and then went out into the hall, bag in hand. Ratched was still there with the med cart. I went over to her.

“What’s this?” I said, holding up the bag.

“I know,” she said. “I’ll throw it out for you.”

“I know? What do you mean, I know?” I wanted to scream at her. “My mother is alone in her room in the dark, in bed, fully clothed, but without an incontinence pad. She’s shaking like a leaf, she still has her shoes on, she’s in distress and you ‘know,’ but you’re not doing anything about it?”

But I didn’t scream at her.

“No,” I said. “I’m keeping it. My voice was calm and level. “This is unacceptable.”

“I don’t know what happened. It must be from the first shift,” she said. “I only came on at three o’clock.”

When I got home, I immediately composed an email to the family member in control of my mother’s care describing in detail what I had found and why.

“Nurse Ratched may not know what happened, but I do, or at least I can take a highly educated guess,” I wrote, and then continued:

“At some point during the day, Mom went into her bathroom and found that she had had a bowel movement in her pull up. How long it was there and when she discovered it is unknown, but it must have been quite awhile. She hates to be wet or have shit in her “panties”, so she took off her trousers, and her “panties,” and tried to wash the panties in the sink. When she couldn’t get them clean, she probably gave up and left them in the sink, because she doesn’t throw out panties. Then, because she couldn’t find new panties to put on, she put her trousers on without any panties/pull-up. All of this must have been really stressful on her because she has a hard time dressing herself now. I can’t imagine how humiliated she must have felt. She never goes without panties. This may have been what caused her to feel anxious and weepy.

Somebody must have found the soaking shitty pull-up in the sink, and put it in the garbage bin, then folded the ends of the over it to contain the smell. This kind of sequence is beyond Mom’s capability. Whoever discovered the dirty pull-up, did not bother to check Mom to see if she needed a new one. I know it didn’t just happen before I got there, because her trousers smelled like urine, which means she was without a pull-up for some time; how long I don’t know. All of this would have been REALLY upsetting, and stressful for Mom. Having panties on and being dry is extremely important to her. This kind of situation is unacceptable. It could have been avoided if Mom had a one-on-one caregiver with her as she should have every day.”

I closed with “I expect you will want to address it with [the Director of Nursing] personally, and to do whatever is necessary to ensure Mom has one-on-one caregivers with her every day to avoid this kind of situation recurring and causing Mom undue stress and discomfort.”

I sent the email that night. A few days later, the Director of Nursing met with the person in control of my mother’s care and his wife. Nurse Ratched was made to apologize to them. A few days after that, the Director of Nursing met with me. There was no apology during our meeting. On the contrary. The Director of Nursing threatened to stop me from seeing my mother. It was the first of several similar threats she made to me over the next three and half years. She also told me that if I didn’t stop complaining about the care my mother was receiving that the care would get worse not better.

Those are two of the reasons people stop advocating for their family members in long-term care facilities — they’re afraid the care will worsen or they will be barred from visiting. There are other reasons as well. Care advocates’ fears are justified. Family members really do get banned from seeing their loved ones as punishment for advocating on their behalf. The hours I was allowed to see my mother were cruelly restricted during the last eighteen months of her life because of my advocacy.

Eight months after the pull-up incident, I would come to know what Nurse Ratched had written in my mother’s file that day (a more readable version is below the pics):

 

Nurses notes 13/02/09: “Upon my arrival resident appeared depressed and sad. Restless. Down for supper. Continued to be restless, and getting up from supper table several times. After supper brought to second floor by another resident saying she did not feel well. Appeared anxious. [??] calmed. Brought to third floor to her room. Settled on bed for a rest. Daughter into visit at 1915. Found resident anxious and hand shaking. Vital signs taken blood pressure up, no temperature. Rechecked vital signs; blood pressure down, resident appeared calmer. In good spirits. HS care done, then settled to bed.”

No mention of the shitty pull-up. No mention of the stench. No mention of my fury.

Long-term care facility staff can write whatever they want, and leave out whatever they want in a resident’s file. What appears in the file or on the chart is the nurse’s or care worker’s version of events. But what about the resident’s version? Who sees their perspective? What is their experience? Who listens to their voice? Who advocates on their behalf?

It’s important to expose neglect and abuse. Often, it’s not easy. Just uncovering the facts can be extremely challenging. Sometimes it takes a very long time. Because people lie. Then they tell more lies to cover up their original lies. They hide the shit they don’t want others to see, just like somebody hid that shitty pull-up in the waste basket in Mom’s bathroom because they didn’t want to deal with it, or with my mom.

The thing is, when lies are told, the truth eventually unfolds.

* Not her real name

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Take my short survey on behaviour here.