'“Grandma’s stuck in the toilet,” my daughter shouted. My husband’s mother, Pat, had lived with us since breaking a hip. We’d had differences of opinion, but got along okay. Certainly, she hadn’t locked herself in the toilet to make a point.
When I asked through the door what was wrong, she replied, “Is nothing private in this house?” Only then did I recall the cushion missing from her favourite chair and realised she might have had an ‘accident’.
Learning about bladder weakness from magazines and the Internet, I discovered that 1 in 4 women get bladder weakness at some point and about 1 in 10 need daily help to manage their condition – that’s a lot of people going through the same thing!
Our GP confirmed that it was extremely common. When I mentioned that Pat hadn’t been to the doctor about it, he said that less than half of those with bladder problems ever discuss it, so the condition frequently goes untreated.
Pat’s a tough cookie and so raising the issue wasn’t easy. However, when it happened again, I told her we could get help. She was extremely annoyed that I had noticed, though I insisted I wasn’t embarrassed. I let things cool off before taking her to the GP.
That’s when things improved. We ensured she had ready access to the toilet and chose the right size odour control pads. Then, just months later she became confined to a wheelchair. Suddenly I was in the role of care-giver – a new situation for both of us.
The increased level of intimacy required during the daily routines of washing and going to the toilet was challenging – especially for my mother-in-law. Maybe it would have been better if I was her daughter, but it’s an enormously sensitive subject. My husband helped, but used work and his gender as excuses to avoid intimate care.
Now the priority was to somehow get all the tasks done with dignity – both Pat’s and mine. With trial and error we got a routine going using incontinence pads during the day, that can be changed without her having to remove her tights, and incontinence pants at night that tear at the sides so they can be removed quickly and cleanly in the morning.
To get my husband over his reticence, I made him practice on me. Getting me up into the bathroom and then onto the toilet seat was hard enough but when I then told him to help me clean myself after going, he stopped the experiment! Even after thirty years of marriage, the idea of wiping my bottom felt really awkward for him.
Still, it made him realise that this was something me and his Mum were dealing with every day and that, whilst I don’t mind doing it, I do need a break every now and then and it’s not surprising I sometimes get irritable.
He hasn’t exactly taken on toilet duties yet, but he has arranged for our older children to take on more household chores and organised two nights a week when he and the kids do the cooking. And, I have an afternoon to myself once a week when I can go for walks, see my girlfriends for coffee or just browse the shops. We didn’t ask for this situation, but we’re learning how best to deal with it as a family'.