Smoke Free San Antonio TX

A trip over the weekend, to a smoke free city, did not change how memory care residents are sheltered from third hand tobacco smoke. There are very few smoking control signs; as they are no longer needed.

We toured five residential care sites. In each we recited my wife’s Alzheimer’s behaviors and my problem with third hand tobacco smoke. One memory care site questioned taking a person who hit back when hurried.

Texas licenses sites as 16-bed or fewer and more than 16-beds. A 16-bed site optimizes construction and operation cost.

No showers in the apartments; just one big, warm, shower room. The residents like warm showers. No problem getting them into the shower,

The kitchen is the focal point for the four-table dining and activity area. Every move the cook makes can be observed. Every food odor is detected. The cook knows them well enough that food waste is at a minimum.

The activity area looked just like Provision Living, when we moved in two years ago, and there was a full time memory care director. There is little problem getting residents to take part in activities or to eat their meals. 

Well-trained worker turnover is also at a minimum. A set of 25 cameras showed all areas except in apartments. There was a general practice of attempting a service three times on a shift; noting failure on a communication log; attempting the service three times on the next shift; and again on the third shift if needed (the need for proper tooth brushing for example observed by our dentist).

A more expensive site had an aromatherapy dispenser running in every apartment and scattered through out the public areas. They had no effect on my sense of smell or congestion! The other sites considered it a marketing fad. My lack of response was do to “the carefully selected pure oils we use.”

[I detected a change in odor between the hall and the living room near the entry door, this morning. This was a surprise. I was in a hurry getting to the 8:30 fitness class. Another person has had headaches since the latest odorant was installed and who can detect it throughout the day. Proper operation is for a detectable odor for one or two breaths; to promote a 10% increase in cash flow in a boutique.

Using a stronger, always detectable, concentration is common in homes, bathrooms, and elegant formal occasions. It is not recommended where people are already under respiratory stress, especially those with COPD (chronic obstructive pulmonary disease); an illness most often caused by the tobacco smoke needed to self-treat their nicotine addiction. They need to avoid fumes, toxins, second & third hand tobacco smoke and dust. WebMD]

Our best arrangement, if in San Antonio, may be with my wife in a memory care unit and me living with the grandkids, tobacco free, a few miles apart. We will check this out in April when I accompany the grandkids to the NASA rocket contest in Huntsville, AL.

We observed no overweight residents. My wife now has problems, recently more often, standing up from a chair. She cannot get up from the floor.

Current thinking is we remain in place and I fly to San Antonio 3-4 times a year for a 1-2 week visit. I was informed my wife got along well while I was gone but does better when I am here.

We have yet to find anything like the fitness program I take part in here. Again, it is easy to place one person, it is very difficult to place two with very different needs: residentialcarefortwo.blogspot.com.

My wife treated me almost as a stranger when I returned this afternoon, before an endless fire alarm drill that was most upsetting to the residents. She broke out into a smile more than once later when residents were commenting about the lecturing by another resident: her walking buddy and our former eye doctor.

[On the second day of my return, my wife knew who I was and gave me a big hug and grin before returning to her keepsakes.]

My wife did not eat breakfast for many years before coming to Provision Living. Trying to get her to eat breakfast, “to get with the system” failed. Times have changed.

My wife was found on the floor in our apartment the first two mornings that I was gone. Thereafter a caregiver got her up before her normal mid-morning time and out of the apartment to breakfast. No more falls.

Today she was finishing brunch with three other residents, as I returned at 10:00 from “Start Your Day with Stretching” followed by physical therapy. My trip to San Antonio paid off in the discovery of yet another adjustment to my wife’s ever changing behaviors.

This is getting too long. I have survived the hurt of going alone and not sharing the trip. It is Friday and I need to cheer up by completing our income tax returns.