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Post by lilyofthevalley on Mar 18, 2015 20:03:27 GMT
My DD is now 29. After many very difficult years she has settled down and become more stable. For the last six years she has worked as a carer in a nursing home and she loves her residents. Working at the home has been challenging with changes of manager, difficult personalities, changes of staff, use of agency staff etc. The last few months have been very stressful for my daughter. She and another colleague were found to have transferred a resident from her chair to her bed without using the required hoist. The resident was absolutely fine, no complaint was made, but they shouldn't have done it. The reality is that there are insufficient hoists available in the home and staff are constantly under time pressures. My daughter has had disciplinary action hanging over her for months. It has been very poorly handled. The stress of it all and the fear that she would be sacked from the job that she loves have resulted in her becoming depressed, losing her appetite and losing a great deal of weight. She is looking quite anorexic. She has suffered from eating disorders in the past. I had lunch with her today and she told me that the disciplinary proceedings are at an end. She has had a written warning. About a week ago she was told that the letter about the decision would be hand delivered to her home by the manager. It never was and then for several days the manager was unavailable. The stress of it all resulted in her self harming. I was shocked to hear she had bruised her arms using a hammer. She is such a lovely, caring young woman and she has been treated appallingly.
Lily
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Post by shadow on Mar 18, 2015 20:37:24 GMT
POOR GIRL - that's awful hope she can settle now its over - she has done so well
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Post by peartree on Mar 18, 2015 21:09:39 GMT
Oh Lilly I am sorry poor poor girl Could she leave Lilly, there are people who use direct payments to fund care in their own homes. She may find the "politics" less in that way.?
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Post by esty (archive) on Mar 18, 2015 21:41:10 GMT
Why do People NOT think about the stress they are causing?
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Post by mudlark on Mar 18, 2015 22:45:45 GMT
How awful for your daughter and worrying for you, yet how impressive that she could have lunch with you and tell you about it...I aspire to that level of trust from my DD.
but what a shocking lack of intelligence from her employer... appalling.
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Post by corkwing on Mar 19, 2015 9:55:12 GMT
Hi, Lily -
Sending you big hugs.
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Post by mayan on Mar 19, 2015 12:55:02 GMT
Just sending love and strength Lily for you both.
It takes so much for many of our children to gain employment let alone hold down employment and clearly your dd has done so exceptionally well for a number of years and she is clearly good at what she does in such an important role. It is very hard to have a warning on file especially so for our children as it can add yet more weight to a script that they daily have to try and rewrite. I truly hope she can find some resilience in thinking about all she has achieved and can put this badly handled episode behind her. If there was an available hoist I could think of a place to put that manager for not delivering that letter and bringing resolution more swiftly. I can however like you understand and empathise with the pressures that both the manager and your dd are both having to contend with these days.
Extra hugs for you Lily as it never gets any easier to be so painfully reminded of the fragility of some of our children even when adulthood is well underway. My dd will restrict her eating when she is highly stressed so can empathise with how distressing this can be. Your dd has you to confide in and your support has gotten her through some very difficult times - I hope she can do so again and that she can find her balance swiftly after this most unfortunate setback. Is there anyone else who she might take some support from to help her through? I know this may not be an option as my dd is very unwilling to ask for help especially when she is in peak trough so as to speak but I keep putting it out there in case the day comes when she changes her mind...
Just hugs and love coming your way
Mxx
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Post by lilyofthevalley on Mar 20, 2015 9:18:04 GMT
Thank you all for your replies. DD likes working in the nursing home. She is a sociable and extravert young woman and she likes the hurly burly of working with the interesting cast of residents and staff. I think it has parallels with her residential school! She is also very funny and is both entertained and keeps others amused. I recently asked her if she would be interested in trying stand up comedy as she does wicked impersonations. I could imagine her as a sort of Jo Brand. In fact it has been pretty amazing that she has had such an exemplary record at the home. She was always in trouble at her residential school. One of the reasons the home appreciates her so much is that she is always the member of staff who will offer to take key responsibility for the residents with the most challenging behaviour. She is genuinely fond of them.
The written warning will be on her file for a year and will then be removed. She has an appointment to see her GP and is going to ask to be referred back to a psychiatrist since she wants to go back on medication for her ADHD. She knows that the ADHD can make her very impulsive and this may well have contributed to the hasty decision to move the resident without using the hoist. The home knows that she suffers from ADHD.
She is a wonderful daughter and I am very proud of her. She sent me two Mother's Day cards, one from her and one from the dogs, and gave me a lovely bunch of flowers.
Lily x
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Post by mrbop on Mar 20, 2015 10:59:21 GMT
Sorry to hear this as it all sounds pretty over the top. I know the publicity over some care homes has meant whole sector finds itself under huge scrutiny and that tends to lead to very defensive management practices. It might be best treated as water under the bridge (and risks stirring things up a bit, hence to mix my metaphors; let the sleeping dog lie) but was the question of insufficient hoists dealt with in any way in the hearing? The employers have a duty of care to their employees in law to provide sufficient and suitable equipment with which to carry out the tasks they are required to. As a minimum it should have been a mitigating factor or was that aspect carefully avoided? Also with my managerial head on disciplinaries shouldn't hang for months, even weeks is dubious for something relatively straightforward, that is very poor practice, and delivering the letter to her home seems unnecessarily over-bearing and frankly absurd when it could just have been given to her at work. I hope she can put this behind her, she sounds like a daughter to be proud of - with a mother she is proud of too.
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Post by Deleted on Mar 20, 2015 11:31:55 GMT
So sorry to read this Lily. I know the care home have a duty of care, but it does seem a bit over the top for one misdemeanour, especially as tney know DD's history and she has been doing so well. Surely a reprimand would have been enough?
Hopefully DD will get back on track as she so obviously loves her job and was enjoying it so much. I hope this one mistake can be forgotten about and soon and that she focusses on the good she is doing in helping the old people and that she gets back to her cheery self and soon.
Hugs to you both xx
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Post by lilyofthevalley on Mar 20, 2015 18:57:56 GMT
Hello mrbop and JMK
I think the whole matter has been dealt with in a shocking manner. I was a manager in the past and have occasionally had to deal with disciplinary matters. I think it is outrageous that there are insufficient hoists for the staff to use. In my DD's letter there was acknowledgement about this, so it was a mitigating factor, but they have not ensured that this is put right. With pressures of time on staff, it is an invitation to them to cut corners. It seems to me that the managers of the home should be the ones getting disciplined. You would think that, when the home gets inspected, they would be checking for this. I also think it has been dealt with in a very heavy handed and punitive way. I would have thought that, in the circumstances, a reprimand to the two of them and addressing the matter at a staff meeting, possibly followed by a letter to all staff, and ensuring that all the staff are up to date with moving and handling training, and ensuring that the home has sufficient hoists available would have been quite adequate. It has been a form of mental torture to drag the whole thing out for months, then to say that the manager would hand deliver the letter to her at her home, which she failed to do, gave no apology or explanation, and then was unavailable for several days. And all of this knowing that my daughter has previously suffered from depression (she was off work for several months with it)and eating disorders, is known to suffer from ADHD, and they know she is adopted and had a very tragic past. I was quite surprised when she showed me the letter to see that she has been given 'a first AND FINAL warning'. I have never heard of this. I seem to remember that people got two or three before getting a final warning. Jeremy Clarkson certainly never got 'a first and final warning' or he'd have been sacked a long time ago!
I have to say that, throughout my working life, my greatest stress was always caused by poor managers, never by the clients that I worked with. I think this is a common experience, sadly.
Lily x
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Post by Janie2 on Mar 21, 2015 8:26:12 GMT
Hello Lily so sorry to read of your Daughters horrid experience. I hope she gets back on track very soon. Perhaps it may be a "blip" for her that she will soon recover from, help her to find the strength to not let it overshadow all the good work she is doing. Encourage her to pick herself up, dust herself down and get on with it all. Look after yourselves Spring xx
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Post by mrbop on Mar 21, 2015 18:48:51 GMT
My breath is quite taken away at this. I had wondered at a written warning being on file for a year as that seemed a bit long but the final bit connects that set of dots. First and final suggests severe error breach of rules and gross misconduct and that's not what I read into the above. Makes me wonder what is driving such an extreme reaction against someone with, as I understand it, an exemplary record to that point. Have they been dinged in an inspection or been reported themselves, or has the manager specifically? The manager's behaviour is highly unprofessional even without the specific circumstances surrounding your daughter and suggests she is quite weak herself as a manager.
Whilst I don't have the whole picture, having done many disciplinaries from the delivering end and had to jump through some fairly onerous hoops to make sure I was correct in what I did the whole thing raises a few questions for me: How was your DD accompanied/represented in the hearing? Is there an appeals process? I can appreciate your DD may just want the nightmare over with but a carefully worded letter of appeal might just set a marker that she isn't a doormat. It is wandering to the fringes of constructive dismissal territory and although the fact your DD did break the rules wouldn't help, if I were the employer I still wouldn't like to be trying to defend it.
Interesting that they actually acknowledged in writing the shortage of hoists as that does put them in a very dangerous place legally if they do nothing about it and a related safety incident occurs. I'd file that under "keep for a rainy day". Much as she loves the job are there alternatives reasonably locally?
Easy to pontificate, harder to know what is right for your DD, you know what she can handle and all I can say is hang in there, she sounds an asset to any employer in the caring services.
Take care of yourselves
Mr Bop
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Post by mayan on Mar 24, 2015 17:13:00 GMT
Very glad to read that your dd has approached gp and hope she gets the support that she needs on that front.
Mx
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Post by jollymummy on Apr 9, 2015 11:11:16 GMT
I cannot help but feel that there is a shortage of good care staff and she would probably get another job elsewhere fairly easily (although now she has a warning on her file that may cause a problem). I wonder whether it would do any good to check whether the owner of the home is aware of how the manager is behaving. PArticularly so if the home is owned by a large company. As Mr Bop says, she was foolish to put in writing about the shortage of hoists. Fairly certain his/her boss would not be happy about that document existing. Perhaps a report to CQC?
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Post by lilyofthevalley on Apr 11, 2015 4:02:54 GMT
Thanks for the continued interest. A couple of days ago DD saw her GP and asked to be referred for treatment for her ADHD. When she was 14 and things were dire I spent a lot of money getting a private psychological assessment done and was sent a comprehensive report. She never did get the therapeutic residential school that was recommended but the report was very thorough and spelt out her numerous problems and diagnoses. I gave her my copy of the report years ago and she gave it to her GP to photocopy. (It should have been somewhere on her medical records anyway). She has been referred to see a psychiatrist. So I hope she gets the help she needs. I also hope they will address her eating disorders and low weight. Unfortunately a side effect of ADHD medication can be loss of weight and she cannot afford to lose any more. I've come across this article on adult ADHD from the Royal College of Psychiatrists. I recommend the suggested books by Hallowell and Ratey and by Kelly and Ramundo. www.rcpsych.ac.uk/healthadvice/problemsdisorders/adhdinadults.aspxThe problems at her nursing home seem to be very much connected with poor management. There have been several changes of manager and it seems that inspections highlight failings of managment and not with the work of the carers. Lily x
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