I care for a 90 year old lady who recently fell and got a black eye from falling. After she fell I made her she was okay notified her son and granddaughter of the fall took a picture and sent it to all of them. I even sent it to the care giver coming on after me who said that everything was ok soon after that the family decided a
they wanted to fire her for stealing money the Dr has said she's a fall hazard and this caregiver has seen her fall when she doesn't get her way she'll throw herself down now that she's bee
.n terminated she's hollering abuse knowing that it wasn't. I believe the sheriff wants to convict me. and send me to jail but so far he's only taken statements the family doesn't want me to go to jail they asked me not to quit the APS lady is getting one more statement from the family tomorrow then I'll probably get arrested if they know she's a fall hazard will they look at that or does it automatically mean I did it. I supposedly was rude and yelled at her I yelled to be heard because she's deaf what do y'all think.
Well the black eye happened because when I went to leave her shoes with her she grabbed the door stumbled and fell for the door stumbled and fell got a black eye they are having a hard time believing that but the family backs me up.
In your opinion does it sound like a prosecutor would do it?
They are in fact acting in your best interests as you willl then have proof if ever it is needed that you are indeed innocent, In addition it will also mean that if she is throwing herself down (mum used to do this a lot to gain attention) then they can enlist the help of professional to assess her furtehr needs. I do hope that brings you some comfort xx
If in all this time, nothing more has been done, then you are over reacting and probably not being a good caregiver in the process. I would want my mother's caregiver to be calm and collected. Perhaps you should look for another line of work. You may not be cut out for this after all.
An investigation is just that. An investigation. If you are indeed innocent as you so loudly and often protest, then you have nothing to worry about. My mom fell and hit her head on the nightstand with me standing just a couple of feet away. We took her to the ER where they sewed up the cut over her eye (which turned a lovely shade of blacks and purples) did a CT scan to check for internal injuries and sent us home. There was no APS involvement or sheriff's investigation. FALLS HAPPEN.
Not much else you can do in the meantime, but just take care of your charge in the best way you can. Don't let your worrying affect your job. If you're innocent, you have nothing to worry about.
Get to the doctor to get the meds you need.
2. You need to get honest with yourself and your psych care providers.
Your story here did not make a lot of sense, at first...If you had just been scared of an APS investigation even though you knew you had done nothing wrong and had good documentation, all the reassurances you got should have been helpful, but now it seems that you have not really been keeping your temper under control with this elderly woman. Now, Lord knows that is hard enough even if you do not have untreated or undertreated mental illness. That said, if all you actually did was yell at her once or twice, and its a first offense, and it actually goes to court, they would tend to be less interested in jailing you than in seeing that you get appropriate treatment. If the yelling was not abusive under circumstances that you can explain, well, the recording should help you and not hurt you. Earlier you indicated that the sheriff seemed to be out to get you - do you have good reason to believe that, and would he or she likely convince the court to give you maximum penalties? If you end up in jail it is not necessarily the end of the world either...but cross that bridge if and when you come to it. The husband of an office-mate of mine actually went to federal prison for nearly two years, probably for something he was not fully guilty of, but now he fully has his life back.
The reality though is that with a founded APS case on your record, you will likely need to find another line of work besides caregiving, and honestly, that might be for the best. Bottom line is that neither wishful thinking nor worrying will make this go away, and even the family being on your side, while a positive, will not be enough to shield you from all consequences if there is real evidence that you engaged in abusive treatment.
One small piece of advice that I do feel qualified to give - do NOT change your story up every time you are asked, and do not hide something you are afraid sounds bad if you really did not cause the injury, because a criterion for determining abuse is simply whether the story is consistent and can really explain the observed physical findings. I had a parent of a patient end up with a founded DCFS report once because of this - the story he made up did not fit, and all along the actual events indicated a pure accident, and for some reason he thought that they would be harder on him for an accident. I have also seen things go badly despite the facts of a case when someone was belligerent with the investigators and got in a huff because they thought they should not be investigated if they had not done anything wrong.