I knew this would come up and I'd have to think about it. And now, here we go...
I currently have helpers who come on Tuesdays and Thursdays, from 8-2. They're working out pretty well, and it buys me a little time to get some writing done. Jeff is low-need at the moment, it's just that he can't be alone. So, while I'm trying to make good use of the 12 hours/week, it does kind of make me feel obligated to go somewhere else to get the writing done, since 2 people home with Jeff feels redundant.
At the moment my daughter who lives at home is finding she's had a fair amount of work-from-home assignments lately, and she also feels like she'd prefer to go somewhere else when these days overlap with helper days.
From about mid-December to mid-January I will have my two college student kids home. Not that they'll be here round-the-clock by any means, but they're here often enough that it's not hard for me to run out alone for an errand.
Then it goes back to just me for most of the semester, until summer.
Is it abnormal or unfair to the aides if I request a hiatus from having them during the month of kids-at-home? They are sent by an agency, so I presume they would get other assignments. The other side of the coin is that once we "know" a couple aides, it's too bad not to have them be available once we'd start up again.
I never had aides but I did do a lot of research. You can start and stop the service whenever you wish to. As you pointed out the only downside to this would be that the aides most likely would be reassigned and wouldn't be available when you wanted to start again. Is that important to your husband? Or did he adjust fairly easy?
Emily--I had your situation occur. My husband had two stays in geripsych units this year, the first being 2 weeks and the second, 5 weeks. Our aides "waited" for him to come home. They were from an agency, may have had some other assignments (I don't know), but they had bonded with us and wanted to come back.
I had been planning to put him in an ALF for a 2-week period and discussed it with the agency owner. She suggested I offer the main aide a small amount (about $25 total) for the missed work during the respite. I didn't think it was enough, but she assured me it would be. However, the respite stay never happened because I was told to place him directly from the hospital.
Perhaps you should discuss this with the owner of the agency you use and get their take?
usually the agency finds another job for them during the interim. but like you say if bonding is important then it may be a better option to keep them in place just reduce the hrs but continue have them come less timesay once a week instead of 3 times. this would probably be my option just reduce times needed but keep them in contact with DH,