Hayes, 91, turned down a placement in a personal care home because he wants to stay in the St. John’s house he raised his family in.
“I’m like an old horse. I got to keep going,” he said Thursday after a morning spent patching clapboard on his shed and deck painting.
Despite his independence, Hayes requires care as he has a colostomy bag he can’t change or empty himself. But he can do basic cooking and washing. Since his late 80s, he has recovered from a ruptured bowel, a blocked bowel and a broken hip.
He daughter, Debbie, said his 28 hours a week home care was upped by 12 hours a day when a son who had lived in with him got sick himself and could no longer act as caregiver.
Debbie Hayes said a social worker convinced her father to agree to some testing and to get placed on a waitlist for a personal care home.
Tom Hayes didn’t want to go and turned it down because he said there’s no need to give up his house and without the little things that keep him going — such as household jobs — he would give up and die.
Hayes’ wife is in a dementia unit and there’s no option of him being paired with her there as he is at a lower level of care, his daughter said.
Debbie Hayes stays with him for part of each weekday, then cares for her grandchildren and goes to work at night. Another of Hayes’ sons pitches in on weekends.
With the extra 12 hours a day, they could get by, but Hayes said his night home care worker — employed by a private company — told the family that her hours have been cut now and his care will revert to 28 hours a week.
Hayes went to work full time at age 12 in his native Conception Harbour doing whatever he could to help the family when his parents got sick.
“More than full time. We done everything to get a dollar. Everything but rob,” said Hayes, who moved into town as a young man.
When the St. John’s airport was being built several decades ago, he was among the men cutting the wood hauled out by horses to clear the land. He also hauled fill to the site for the Goulds farmer he worked for at the time.
Among his other jobs over the years, he had a hand in building the library at Memorial University.
His eyes filled with tears Thursday as he remembered the day two co-workers were killed on one job site in the 1980s when concrete forms gave way.
“You never forget that stuff,” he said, his voice full of anguish as the tears ran down his face.
To be faced now with an ultimatum after a lifetime of backbreaking work is an insult, said his daughter.
“I don’t think it’s fair — not after working his whole life. When there was no work, he was still up at six o’clock in the morning, going around to job sites, putting his name in for the spring of the year to line up work to feed his family when spring came. And this is what it all comes down to. They want to take him and stick him away somewhere where he can’t do anything,” she said.
“He don’t stop. And that’s the truth. That’s what is keeping him going.”
Debbie Hayes turned to St. John’s Centre MHA Gerry Rogers for help.
Rogers said she’s pushing Eastern Health home support services to approve the hours he needs, because that’s what makes sense.
“He wants to live at home. He needs more home care,” Rogers said.
“This is what people want to do. We need a publicly funded, publicly supervised, publicly administered home care program. … It makes no sense to take the independence away.”
Besides independence factor, Rogers said in the long run, it’s just more economical for the province to help seniors stay at home if possible, rather than house them in long-term care facilities.
But the NDP MHA said government hasn’t responded adequately to the aging population crisis and should not be cutting back home care hours.
“I don’t think government has truly looked at the trickle-down effect of these decisions that have been made,” Rogers said.
Hayes, 91, turned down a placement in a personal care home because he wants to stay in the St. John’s house he raised his family in.
“I’m like an old horse. I got to keep going,” he said Thursday after a morning spent patching clapboard on his shed and deck painting.
Despite his independence, Hayes requires care as he has a colostomy bag he can’t change or empty himself. But he can do basic cooking and washing. Since his late 80s, he has recovered from a ruptured bowel, a blocked bowel and a broken hip.
He daughter, Debbie, said his 28 hours a week home care was upped by 12 hours a day when a son who had lived in with him got sick himself and could no longer act as caregiver.
Debbie Hayes said a social worker convinced her father to agree to some testing and to get placed on a waitlist for a personal care home.
Tom Hayes didn’t want to go and turned it down because he said there’s no need to give up his house and without the little things that keep him going — such as household jobs — he would give up and die.
Hayes’ wife is in a dementia unit and there’s no option of him being paired with her there as he is at a lower level of care, his daughter said.
Debbie Hayes stays with him for part of each weekday, then cares for her grandchildren and goes to work at night. Another of Hayes’ sons pitches in on weekends.
With the extra 12 hours a day, they could get by, but Hayes said his night home care worker — employed by a private company — told the family that her hours have been cut now and his care will revert to 28 hours a week.
Hayes went to work full time at age 12 in his native Conception Harbour doing whatever he could to help the family when his parents got sick.
“More than full time. We done everything to get a dollar. Everything but rob,” said Hayes, who moved into town as a young man.
When the St. John’s airport was being built several decades ago, he was among the men cutting the wood hauled out by horses to clear the land. He also hauled fill to the site for the Goulds farmer he worked for at the time.
Among his other jobs over the years, he had a hand in building the library at Memorial University.
His eyes filled with tears Thursday as he remembered the day two co-workers were killed on one job site in the 1980s when concrete forms gave way.
“You never forget that stuff,” he said, his voice full of anguish as the tears ran down his face.
To be faced now with an ultimatum after a lifetime of backbreaking work is an insult, said his daughter.
“I don’t think it’s fair — not after working his whole life. When there was no work, he was still up at six o’clock in the morning, going around to job sites, putting his name in for the spring of the year to line up work to feed his family when spring came. And this is what it all comes down to. They want to take him and stick him away somewhere where he can’t do anything,” she said.
“He don’t stop. And that’s the truth. That’s what is keeping him going.”
Debbie Hayes turned to St. John’s Centre MHA Gerry Rogers for help.
Rogers said she’s pushing Eastern Health home support services to approve the hours he needs, because that’s what makes sense.
“He wants to live at home. He needs more home care,” Rogers said.
“This is what people want to do. We need a publicly funded, publicly supervised, publicly administered home care program. … It makes no sense to take the independence away.”
Besides independence factor, Rogers said in the long run, it’s just more economical for the province to help seniors stay at home if possible, rather than house them in long-term care facilities.
But the NDP MHA said government hasn’t responded adequately to the aging population crisis and should not be cutting back home care hours.
“I don’t think government has truly looked at the trickle-down effect of these decisions that have been made,” Rogers said.
