Grandma with cataracts still driving. What should we have done?
We invited my grandmother to New Year's day dinner at our house and she did come. We had reminded her to pack an overnight bag and stay the night. She has cataracts in both eyes and has a restricted drivers license. Which means she can't drive at night. Did she pack an overnight bag and spend the night? Nope, she bolted as soon as she could and drove home. We had reminded her 3 times that she cannot drive at night and her license states that. She responded with, "I can drive at night, I know how." We asked if she was prepared to lose her license and either hurt or kill someone because she can't see at night. She said that was none of her concern. What should we have done? What can we do in the future? Both grandmothers houses are not big enough to accommodate all the family for holidays.
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I even tried "therapeutic fibs" like saying if he were in a serious accident, where it was his fault, that he and Mom would lose all their life savings, and maybe even lose their house.... was that worth taking Mom to the grocery store because there was a sale on bread???
Dad and I would go around and around on that subject, which stressed me to no limits. I even recommended hiring a taxi, but no way would Mom ride in a car with a driver she didn't know [sigh].
During this phase of our parent or grandparent trying to keep whatever independence they have left, it won't be easy. If we take away the car, that means we need to substitute another means of transportation.
I was that transportation, but that also meant taking time off from work to drive them to 3 different grocery stores, and Dad wanting to go to Home Depot to roam around the store for an hour and at checkout all he had was one light-bulb.... [another sign]. Ok, it did get him out of the house so he enjoyed it.
Growing old isn't easy.
Encourage her to have the surgery, for quality of life if no other reason. Before surgery I had some white towels and underware that were brownish and dingy. I would bleach them and bleach them. Couldn't get them white. After surgery I realize the poor little things were white, it was my cataracts that I was looking through that made them look dingy. I also had a pair of slacks that I thought were one color. Turned out they were another color and I had been wearing the wrong color blouse with them. My doctor laughed and said one client was going to paint their house because it looked so discolored. He advised them to wait until they had the surgery before making a decision. They didn't have to paint.
She is a danger to herself and others.
Report her to DMV;
Disable her car. Arrange for Uber pick-up/drop off
Another alternative is change the timing of your dinner to a brunch and have everything end well before night.
She seems to be in early to mid dementia where they are in denial & stubborn about being told what as well as forgetful - they seem to be afraid at this stage of loosing control & can be acting like a drunk trying to show that they aren't so drunk where everything they do only shows it more -
Keep an eye on her with this in mind & it might be the time for the family to have a talk because there is more going on than some may have noticed
Immediately call: ministry of transport, her eye doctor & her regular doctor so that they can action taking that license away - meanwhile disable that car somehow before she drives off & gets lost then causes an accident
Two, you take the keys away.
Three, you find a hotel or an AIRBNB or you MAKE ROOM for her.
Four, someone goes and picks her up and brings her back home.
Five, you speak with her doctor or gerontologist and you have them speak with her about driving at night. It is not acceptable for her to put either herself or ANYONE else at risk. (Someone ran into me last year and I had a broken femur. What if this was your grandmother who had caused the accident?)
Years ago they did not replace the lens with cataract surgery. They wore thick glasses to see. I am in the early stages and can't wait to get surgery. I don't like driving at night and things blur at a distance.
I think all states have to initiate a law that at 80 to renew a license you must take an eye exam and a driving test.
I moved the car to a friend's garage until we could get it ready to sell, so the issue was resolved. About two months later, we got a phone call about 7:30 one morning and he was exclaiming "Our cars are gone!" He had forgotten the whole thing. He doesn't have dementia, but his short term memory is shot.
Once their car was gone, I would take them shopping once a week for groceries and to any appointments they had. This gave me a good excuse to be with them each week and see how things were doing. We had been friends for over 40 years and this was not a hardship for me. Adult Protective Services proved to be the best solution in this case. I learned later that it was their eye doctor that alerted the DMV to their failing abilities--not with eyesight, but with dementia and forgetting. Neither one ever responded to the letter from the DMV to come in for a driving test, so the revocation was automatic.
Your grandmother never entertained the idea of staying overnight. She came, she went home, she conquered: QED, she can drive at night, no matter what it says on her licence, because she did, and she's in one piece to say so, and she'll now be more convinced than ever that she is right and the rest of the world is wrong.
So unless you're prepared to shop her to the authorities you're wasting your breath arguing with her.
She insists on driving at night because it is convenient to her. From not checking tyre pressures through to speeding, parking badly, using cellphones, ignoring warning signs, aggressive overtaking, driving under the influence and, come to that, driving without insurance or with a nasty cold coming on, individual convenience is surely the very commonest reason for most bad driving behaviours.
And seriously, no surgery? Even if Medicare won't pay it, it's roughly $6K for both eyes. Well worth the investment.
Driving is just brutal, they can't give it up. My father, who stopped driving, won't sell his cars. He spends about a $1,000/year on car insurance too.
But, he's not driving.
Please do the research on cataract surgery so she knows what to expect and how she wants it done eg both eyes for distance or one each distance and close. Everyone I know that has had it done loves it but they wish they would have known about the glare created by the new lenses and that one of each would get rid of reading glasses.
Help her keep her license and independence as long as possible, it is so important to their wellbeing.
If not... Does Grandma refuse to have the surgery? If she's anything like my mom, she may be afraid of it, especially if she hasn't had much previous surgical experience. Or she may think it will cost too much (it doesn't, if Grandma has Medicare Part A and Part B, supplemental or private insurance).
My mom had cataracts for many years, and by the time she turned 78, they had ripened to the point where they had made her almost completely blind. She had no previous surgical experience, was scared to death of the operation, and besides, she said, "I'm not going to live that long anyway." Unlike your grandma, however, she had voluntarily stopped driving when in her early 60's due to degenerative joint disease.
I finally convinced Mom to have the surgery. Unfortunately, when she went in to have the preliminary exam, she couldn't see the eye chart, and they had to make their best guess as to the proper prescription for the implanted lenses, based on her previous glasses prescription. The end result was an insufficient correction, as she is extremely myopic, and has a macular pucker and had abandoned glaucoma treatment years before.
The surgery was also much more difficult than it should have been - I was watching on a monitor on the observation deck above the surgical suite, and even the clinic volunteer, who was watching with me, remarked that she had never seen one as difficult. It took more than twice as long as it should have.
So, as others have said, it's imperative that Grandma have the surgery. Waiting too long may cause unnecessary complications. Decisions on her ability to drive can be made after post-surgical evaluation.