Motivation...I Need Help!

I feel like getting my client motivated to get out of bed is my biggest problem. She is morbidly obese, and I can most certainly see that it takes a great deal of energy for her to get into her wc, even though the Hoyer lift does most of the work. I don't understand my client or her situation. I try to just listen and although I have wanted to say things to her, I know it's not my place. She seems to put up a front that she doesn't eat "bad" foods but oftentimes when I go in, she's not having the most healthy breakfast, and I wonder to myself is this is a client problem or a facility problem. One morning when I went in, she had a reg milk, chocolate milk and a cinnamon bun, and even though I didn't say anything, she reassured me that she wasn't going to eat that cinnamon bun. The last time I was there she had sugar free cookies in her bed, and she has a box of Cheez-Its on her nightstand. We don't even eat those in my house, but we always have Goldfish. She reminded me of a kid trying to validate why she had done something she wasn't suppose to one time. Apparently her blood sugar was high b/c her husband snuck in some cake. That made me wonder, "Is he just trying to provide some comforts from home, or Is he trying to keep her there?"

I wonder what happened at her meeting last Thursday concerning her care. She has been there 100 days with little improvement. It's hard me to understand how and why she is still receiving OT. She clearly has some awesome insurance or either a rich husband/children! I do enjoy spending time with her, but it's so hard to get her motivated to do anything related to therapy!!

After reading the article that I have a link to, I find myself hearing the same things we have learned about in class time and time again. One of the most important lines in the article was that clients with diabetes already know way more about the disease than you do, which is precisely why I didn't comment on the chocolate milk and the cinnamon bun. She already knows it's not good her or anyone for that matter.

I totally understand the importance of increasing her upper body strength so that she can hopefully transfer herself one day but I don't understand why she doesn't participate more in her self-care. When the CNA came in last time I was there, I was expecting her to give my client the wash cloth, but the only thing my client washed was her face. I feel like they should make her do some of that on her own and if she wants her sugar free cookies and Cheez-Its, she should at least have to go down to the OT lab and get them! This is the first client that I have come across that doesn't seem to want to get better. Honestly, I think she enjoys having someone to wait on her and being able to push her little red button whenever she needs something.