Far Away Daughter

Where you are

Your time

Your time zone

Where she is

St. Louis

St. Louis, Missouri, Central time

Two clocks, one house.

For the daughter who is not in the room

Mom is in St. Louis. You are 500 miles away. Here is what you can do from where you sit.

The neighbor called about the garage door. It was open all night. Mom laughed it off on the phone, said the remote is sticky, and asked about the kids. You have a flight booked for three weeks from now, a job, a family in a different time zone, and a feeling in your stomach that has not gone away since Tuesday. This site is for that feeling and for the logistics underneath it.

The National Institute on Aging says that if you live an hour or more away from a person who needs care, you are a long-distance caregiver, and lists what the role includes: money, arranging in-home care, giving the local caregiver a break, planning for emergencies. A job with a shape can be worked from a kitchen table in another state. Every page here gives one of those tasks a St. Louis address.

Three moves

Tonight, this week, your next visit

  1. Tonight, ask for one specific thing. A photo of the pill organizer. The dates on the milk. The NIA says a call, email or text is not always the best way to tell whether an older person needs help; Stop 02 is what a voice hides. If you cannot reach her and fear she is hurt, that is 911 for her address.
  2. This week, write down the six numbers below and make one call. The Area Agency on Aging for her address is the front door to meals, rides and caregiver support. Decide who in St. Louis has a key. Stop 04 builds the circle.
  3. Next visit, look around without inspecting. Two days: the car, the checkbook, the pantry, one outing, a conversation that starts with her. Stop 03 is that weekend; leave with Stop 08's folder half filled in.

The timetable

Eight stops, in the order the worry usually arrives

Each is written to the exact question people type at 2 a.m., and each ends with what to do tonight and what to leave with her doctor.

  1. 01The NIA's long-distance caregiver starter list, annotated for St. Louis.long distance caregiving checklist
  2. 02She sounds fine on the phone: twelve things a call cannot tell you.mom sounds fine on the phone but isn't
  3. 03The holiday visit: a two-day look-around that is not an inspection.visited mom for the holidays and something is wrong
  4. 04Eyes on Mom: building a local circle in St. Louis from 500 miles away.someone to check on my mom in St. Louis
  5. 05The hospital called and you are on a plane: what to do from the gate.hospital called my mom was admitted I live 500 miles away
  6. 06Move her closer or bring help to her? The questions that actually decide it.should I move my mom closer to me or hire help
  7. 07Cameras, sensors and check-in calls: what is kind, what is creepy, what she must agree to.camera for elderly parent living alone is it okay
  8. 08The out-of-state daughter's St. Louis folder: papers, numbers, who has a key.how to set up in home care for a parent from another state

Someone in the house before you can be

Tell New Plan Care where she lives and someone will call you back

This form goes to New Plan Care, the paid placement above, and nobody else. It is not a match service and ranks no one. Name, phone, her town: all a first call needs. Or Call (314) 405-0887.

or Call (314) 405-0887

We ask for a name, a phone number and a town. We do not ask what is wrong with your mother, what she takes, or anything else about her health, and please do not type it here. Those questions belong with her doctor.

The fridge door

Six numbers to tape inside the folder

None are paid, none mind that you are calling from another state, and each links to the public page it came from.

Two sister desks

If your worry has a different shape

Between Mom and Kids

For the daughter raising children and managing a parent at once, whose guest room and marriage are part of the decision.

Burned Out Daughter

For the daughter who has been the one for years and has nothing left. If the monthly flight is breaking you, start there.

What this site is not

Read this before you trust anything else here

Not a clinic, and not a directory that ranks anybody. Help at home is non-medical: company, meals, laundry, a ride, a reminder to take the tablets already in her labeled box, a person in the house at night. Nobody here can tell you what is wrong with your mother; her doctor can. Every number here links to its public source, listed with the date opened on the sources page. The only paid name on this page is the labelled advertisement above. Everything else is public numbers and unpaid pages.