Keeping Watch

I always felt safe as a child knowing Daddy was keeping watch over me and Moma.  When he was in the Marines and Reserves, he kept watch over this country and others to make sure they were safe.  Now it is our turn to keep watch over him and make sure not only is he safe but he feels safe. 

The last part of the previous sentence is very important for people living with LBD as they often have hallucinations and delusions which can cause them to think there are bad people in their home threatening them and their loved ones.  We recently had a morning when Daddy woke up and we weren't sure if he was having a delusion or still in a bad dream but he was very anxious and shaking. He was convinced there were people in the house robbing them. Moma did a very good job of calming him down, sitting by him and continuously reassuring him he was safe.

When he was first diagnosed, Moma was still working and he was having more of the memory issues rather than balance issues.  He would sometimes go out to a neighbor's and not leave a note and she would come home and he wasn't there.  So, I saw a presentation for Blink on QVC and we got cameras for the exterior of the house.  Blink is app based so we get alerts on our phone when the cameras are activated.

Almost two years ago, we got cameras for his bedroom and the living room.  Since LBD causes sleeplessness, restlessness and the need to get up several times during the night, Moma moved to another room in the house so she could get sleep as it is very important for caregivers to get rest (you can't take care of others if you don't take care of yourself).  Having the cameras in the bedroom helped give her some peace of mind and also allowed me to help keep an eye on him when I wasn't there.

Even though we have moved to caregivers seven nights a week, we still keep the cameras as it allows us to see how he interacts with them and vice versa. While all of the caregivers have been professional, the videos have shown us those that see it as a job and didn't interact with Daddy as we would like so we had the agency replace them. We have also gotten some great tips from watching the videos for how to safely move him when Lewy is with him and he can't assist us. It also gives me peace of mind and warms my heart when I see how Toni and Genya are with him...you can tell they love and care for him.

Because Blink is app based, we also got a non-app monitor system so the caregivers can keep an eye on him as we do not require they stay in the room with him at this time...we try our best to give him as much privacy as we can safely do.  We just have the caregivers go in the room as soon as they see he is about to get up given he is a fall risk.  Toguard Video Monitor is the one we use as it is not connected to WiFi and has a good size screen.