I was a caretaker/driver for a retired poetry professor who was 95% immobile for a few weeks. Was supposed to be just a driver but her caretaker bailed constantly and what could I do, just leave her there alone to cry? I'm talking she couldn't walk at all. Not even to the bathroom; just stand up, turn around, and sit in a wheelchair. Anything more than 20 seconds on her feet and she was dying. And nothing in her house was set up to accommodate any of these needs. Not her toilet. Not her shower. Not her room. Not her bed. She had giant lymphedema growths on her legs and refused to admit she needed stop going to poetry readings that didn't know she was an immobile woman. Everything hurt her. Even breathing. She refused to buy a car that was modified for her needs, so every time we had to go somewhere we had to rent a car. And they would always bring the wrong car. And she would always scream about it, like someone had just stabbed her in the leg. It would take 4 hours just to get in the car. That meant out of bed, to the bathroom, get her compression garments on, find a way to the garage without dying and pray the rental company got there in the right car. So she'd be in the back of a car that was too small screaming daggers into the closed cockpit of a ford fiesta the entire 3 hour drive because her joints were so stiff she couldn't bend her legs. And the poetry readings, they were never ready for her. No communication at all. It was insane. She would just get a gig for a poetry reading and we'd be off, never mind the fact that there's literally no wheelchair access within a half mile of some of these places. My first day on the job we went to a reading in a city 2 hours away. She didn't tell me anything about her needs and when we get there, I had apparently forgotten the cushion on her wheelchair at her house. So she couldn't get out of it when she sat down because it was too low. She said "You killed me, you literally killed me". But you know what, I fucking figured it out. I got her to that god damn poetry reading on time and it took a over dozen building staff from 3 different city blocks to do it. Janitors using secret routes at 3am because we couldn't get out any other way. Security personnel unlocking doors that even they didn't have access to at first. Really eye opening job. People in her position need constant care or they quickly break down. Quickly. And when I got there she was in the final stages of neglect. Most stressful thing I've ever done. May god have mercy on anyone in the path of her poetry readings.
4 years