“let me tell you, it was a sliding scale of emotions. it was almost incredulous, to believe he was in front of us,” said hladkowicz, who visited with her daughter.
she said her dad appears to have declined cognitively since they last saw each other, and he’s in a wheelchair now — a new development that she said the long-term care home wouldn’t explain.
even her hourlong visit seemed to improve his condition, she said.
“we whispered to him, we touched him. we gossiped with him. we told him he is so loved and so wanted,” she said. “and by the end of the hour, he looked like a flower that had been watered with sun on him. it was a visceral difference.”
even so, she said, the visit was bittersweet.
the ministry of long-term care gave less than 24 hours notice in changing the rules, so some facilities are not yet allowing visits.
“there are lots of people who had visits booked in, and at the last minute they were cancelled because (long-term care homes) couldn’t get their act together or it was too soon for them,” hladkowicz said.
that was the case for laura rivest hartley of ottawa, whose mother is in a long-term care home in toronto.