Transcript
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We took care of my mom.
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My uncle stood in the gap for my grandmother, okay, and he actually became her real caregiver in terms of you know, he started getting a check Like even now he's still a caregiver, with what he learned from the help of my grandmother, wow, so he's still a caregiver for older people.
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So he turned it into a career path.
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actually, he turned it into a career path because he had no job.
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Well, come on now.
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Okay, we all got that out there.
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He stayed at home so long.
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How long was it that people start commending him for being there?
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Oh Like, hey, man, you're doing so good with mom.
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I'm like that nigga never left.
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Parenting Up never left.
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Parenting up, caregiving adventures with comedian day smiles is the intense journey of unexpectedly being fully responsible for my mama.
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For over a decade I've been chipping away at the unknown, advocating for her and pushing alzheimer's awareness on anyone and anything with a heartbeat.
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Spoiler alert I started comedy because this shit is so heavy, so be ready for the jokes.
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Caregiver newbies, ogs and village members just willing to prop up a caregiver you are in the right place.
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Hi, this is Zeddy.
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I hope you enjoy my daughter's podcast.
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Is that okay?
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Today's supporter shout out Tia Irvin, 6696.
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Quote.
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They loved on me, so I can love on them.
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End quote.
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Yes, when you return the love that was given to you, we agree.
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If you want to be the recipient of a supporter, shout out.
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Give us a review on Apple Podcast, youtube or IG the Comedians.
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Give us a review on Apple Podcasts, youtube or IG the Comedians.
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Care Series, rodney Perry's Caregiving Full Circle Giving and receiving Parents and our family.
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Here we go.
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It's about to go down, and what?
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Cut and start.
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I can do either one, because it's my podcast.
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I do whatever.
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Little shoulder, actually little shoulder.
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No, okay, now this ain't only fans not only not.
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Please don't do it with me.
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I don't want to be a part of it.
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I am here with my main guy, rodney perry.
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Okay, I'm before I I'm about to get emotional and start crying.
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He's supposed to be telling his story, but we know him from anything and everything Big screen, small screen, social media.
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What about that?
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Coming to America 2, though, man, that was sweet, that was nice.
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Johnson's Family Reunion, medea yes, yes, yes, that was nice, I mean.
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The reason Johnson Family Reunion, madea yes, yes, yes, yes, yes, yes, but go ahead.
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The reason no, I was going to say that the reason I do stand-up is because of Eddie Murphy, and I got to share the screen with this guy.
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So yeah, it was that's heavy.
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Pretty amazing couple of weeks.
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Yeah, yeah, yeah.
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What Couple of weeks.
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Yeah, yeah, yeah.
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What many people don't know.
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They know you the funny guy, they know you can host, they know you can headline.
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Yeah, do it all.
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There's a side of in your life with care where you have been cared for by family members and you have then been the you carry and the carer.
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That's a fact.
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And that's what we gonna chat on on this episode, right here.
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I feel like you gonna make me cry today.
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I feel like I'm gonna weep.
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Don't make me weep.
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Smile, please.
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I feel it coming, my heart is soft.
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Soften it up, baby, just go ahead.
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We got butter over here for that bread.
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So before we even get to that, I have to let the whole world know that we are in our fifth season.
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The podcast is global.
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We on all, all the little continents yes, well done and my comedy career started and got a huge thrust of energy.
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It's like a rocket boost custom because of mr rodney perry taking your improv class and then you actually answering, like when I call or uh, text you, everybody don't do that, everybody at his stage.
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When somebody is just starting, they don't.
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They say send me a DM or call me, you DM them for 12 years.
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How?
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about that.
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They ain't said nothing, they didn't even say stop, they don't even block you, they don't even give you enough.
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Block me.
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At least block me.
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That means you watched?
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You watched me one time.
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I mean jay smiles this is my guy, though this is my guy.
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Jay smiles was just dope to me, though, thank you.
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Like your vibe was dope, I mean, you know you, I don't want to make it sound like I just like everybody and some people might think that, but I'm really selected with other people that I really bring into my fold and it was an easy call for you because you was just your improv was so dope to me and you know you had that thing that says I'm a comedian, and that was at the very before I ever saw you perform.
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You want me to cry or you gonna be like I gotcha?
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You're gonna be weeping.
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Wow, okay, alright.
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Well, that's the end of this episode.
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Everybody wrap it up like that Roger Perry said I'm that fire.
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Okay, you know that, but your story?
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I want to start with the caregiving that you all have been providing over the last few years.
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We talk a bunch in the Parenting Up community about the fact that it is family caregivers that is really holding up the medical system, because if we all stopped doing what we were doing, stuff would implode.
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Hospitals would be overrun, the ER would be overrun.
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The doctors wouldn't even be able to handle it.
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We don't have enough nurses and doctors to do what my family is doing, what your family is doing.
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So share with them a little bit about what you and your wife and your kids have had to do to care for people in your family.
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We've had to do a few things.
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First of all, our parents bring us into this world and nurture us and give us those things, those tools we need to live a life right, and then, if you're lucky, you'll get an opportunity to take care of them.
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If you're lucky, if you're lucky, you'll get an opportunity to take care of your parent.
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If you're lucky, if you're lucky, you'll get an opportunity to take care of your parent.
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And so I had that opportunity to take care of my mother who got.
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She had a condition called COPD yes, which is a breathing condition, and I didn't even understand the chronic nature of it when I look back, because you know it was always, the C of COPD is chronic, right, so that means eventually.
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Okay, for real, I'm not even trying to be funny right now.
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Yeah, I'm today years old and my grandmama had it.
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Well, I thought that the C was chronic.
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I don't know what the hell I thought it meant.
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I just knew it was really bad breathing.
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Yeah, but chronic does.
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Yeah.
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Maybe.
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I mean my mother lived a pretty good life from a diagnosis till about maybe about seven, eight more years.
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Oh, that is good.
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So she had a good, decent run.
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Yeah, good run.
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You know I'm so easy, I talk about it so lightly now, but man, to watch her kind of deteriorate.
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And you know, provide the care Because she stayed with us for a point.
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And you know, to lose a parent is a whole other animal Right, because you know I remember cleaning up the house and I was cleaning up something and I found I came across a bottle of perfume that I had never seen.
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I was like what is this?
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And I opened it up.
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I smell it, this little perfume, and I was crying for six days that's your mama.
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That was mama perfume.
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Mama in a bottle.
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Who put this damn bottle out here, anyway.
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I know y'all could have put that up.
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Please somebody.
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But yeah, yeah, but we took care of my mom.
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My uncle stood in the gap for my grandmother, okay, and he actually became her real caregiver in terms of you know, he started getting a check, like, even now he's still a caregiver, with what he learned from the help of my grandmother, wow, so he's still a caregiver for older people.
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So he turned it into a career path actually, he turned it into a career path because he had no job.
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Well, come on now.
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Okay, we all got that.
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He stayed at home so long.
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How long was it that people start commending him for being there?
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Oh, Like, hey, man you doing so good with mom.
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I'm like that nigga never left.
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He ain't staying with mama, he's just still here and she happens to now be sick.
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Yeah, yeah, all right, I know we got some of those.
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So we did that.
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And now my wife we're taking care of her mother and she's dealing with some dementia.
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You never know what day it's going to be.
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She get up 4 o'clock in the morning ready for breakfast, because they said breakfast was ready.
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They said it.
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I don't know who the hell they is, but somebody in her head is like look, it's time to eat.
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Breakfast is ready, miss Karen.
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Go, lay back down.
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Please, does she believe you when you say lay back down, she will, she'll do it.
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Okay, but she do it.
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She'll do it.
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Okay, all right, but she was drinking so much water it was making her sick.
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Well, you got to explain that, so you can drink too much water.
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You're essentially kind of drowning yourself.
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So she would drink and we don't know.
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No, we don't, we don't know.
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I mean, we's give her some more water, she wants more water.
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She make that walk all day, every day, and so she might drink a hundred ounces a day.
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What?
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And it caused her to go into like like a shock, okay, and so we had to figure that out well, what did it look like, though, though?
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Because, first of all, I had never heard of this.
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It looked like sitting on the floor.
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She didn't fail, okay, you know, because she didn't drink so much water throughout the day.
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That's crazy.
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And so it was a thing that, and even when she went to the hospital, they didn't know how to curtail it, and so we kind of figured out.
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Now, you know, we just got to keep her in that room.
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She can't be moving around, walking around all day, without one of us sitting in the living room because her room is right off the living room.
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It's not funny.
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I know exactly what you mean, but listen, that's why I have a comedian of your stature here, so that people can understand all around the world.
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It's so much nuance man.
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Isn't it?
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Yeah, it's so much nuance and when you're a family caregiver.
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Yeah, and you're a family caregiver.
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We ain't never been trained.
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None of us are trained in any of this stuff?
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They ain't told me none.
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I ain't read no book.
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I ain't took a class.
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I ain't took a class.
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I ain't been on YouTube and I call you.
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Yes, you gave me some insight.
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You know, dealing with your mom and what, but everybody's different, very so.
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Marvin Hunter was a fabulous comedian.
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He dealt with dementia with his parent and his mother was really ornery.
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So my mother-in-law is not ornery.
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You know she's still the kind lady, okay.
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But you know my wife tells stories about like it's stuff she eats now that she never ate or cooked Really.
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Yeah, it's like she won't like fry chicken and steak.
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She's almost a vegetarian.
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Like when you start liking this, you ain't supposed to eat that.
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Man but those are the points that I'm so happy you're making, because I don't think the medical system always listens to us.
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Rodney, as family caregivers, you know they look at you, know our loved one, and they're looking at all the little stats and the numbers.
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We can say, okay, yeah, the blood pressure's fine and maybe the cholesterol is okay, but something is off, because my mama is now eating chicken and steak and she was almost a vegetarian for 30 years.
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So I'm telling y'all this ain't right Right, and they almost don't believe you sometimes, like we had.
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So she goes to the hospital for the water thing and you know, of course they start giving her caregivers to come by the house and check on her because they thought we was hurting her.
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And I'm like man ain't nobody hurting this old lady, y'all.
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She thirsty all day.
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And why?
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And why is she thirsty?
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We don't know.
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Right, I mean not y'all.
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But maybe the doctors could know, but they don't know they didn't understand why, and so they treating her like she a regular person and don't have something wrong with her, and so it's really interesting to watch.
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You know it up close.
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You know it's different and you need your caregiver to set in the gap to, even if you go to the hospital just to have an advocate, because what you don't want to do is go to a hospital and know nobody when your ass is asleep.
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Somebody needs to be spent.
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Spend him.
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Right, let me lay on the same ass cheek for five days.
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Somebody spend him.
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Okay, parents and up community Y'all who don't know what a spend him mean is your loved one is laying in the hospital too long and if they can't move they're going to get bed sores, they're going to break down and hip hurt and all of that.
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So you need to spin them over.
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Turn them over, spin me, spin me.
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But if your LO doesn't have enough cognitive function to say hey, you know, my side is hurting.
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I've been on my left side too long, put me on my right.
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I've been on my back too long, put me on my side.
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You're right, you got to have an advocate.
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Some people are just lazy and don't get me wrong there's some great medical people in America.
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You know we got the best medical system in the world, but at the same time, just like any other job, it could be people that aren't the best.
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Yes, and they could give your loved one substantive care if you're not advocating on their behalf 24-7.
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Yes, and I don't mind saying this, piedmont Hospital did not give my mother that premium care.
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How about that?
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And they should have.
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We were paying premium prices.
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Yes, sir, at that Piedmont.
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Yes, we were paying premium prices at that Piedmont, but because my mother was not complaining or saying anything, her Alzheimer's is advanced enough.
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They're like oh well, miss Mouse, we put the buzzer on your mom's lap.
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She don't know what that is, she don't know the difference between the TV remote or the call the nurse button.
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And why would she know when she needs to call a nurse?
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She don't even know what's hurting.
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What are you talking about?
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I need y'all to go in there like every hour on the hour, check on her, just look at her, touch something, poke something and see how she responds.
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But they don't always do that.
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They don't always do that.
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They don't always do that.
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The squeaky wheel gets the oil.
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Can I ask you this?
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Yeah, like dealing with your mom, like I was thinking recently, like they must be in bliss, like they don't know that they're not bad Right.
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They don't know it's bad Right.
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I mean, you know that she's maybe deteriorating, but does the person with the affliction Alzheimer's or with the dementia, do they know that they're?
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not what they once were.
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Well, first thing is I don't know.
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Yeah, that was just a great answer.
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That was a great answer I damn sure don't know.
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I damn sure don't know.
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I will tell you.
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What my advocacy and research and digging has shown me is that it depends on where they are in the spectrum of the Alzheimer's progression.
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Okay, Early on they know and they're pissed or sad Right, because they're trying to collect those thoughts and they can't.
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That's correct.
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And why me and why this happen?
