"My parents are in Paramount Senior Living at Fredericksburg right now. They do not have any problems with it. Their problem relates with the beginnings of their dementia and COVID. They can't seem to understand what COVID is doing to everybody. They think it's just them who can't go out, and it's just the facility that's not allowing them to come and go as they please. They can't go out to dinner anywhere, and they can't have visitors come in to see them all the time and anytime they want. They can't get it into their heads that COVID is going on, and it's really pretty much the same for every assisted living facility. Paramount has had an issue, but they have been clear now for about three or four weeks. For whatever reason the health department has not yet closed their case, so they're still under some restrictions within their facility as far as activities and communal dining. My parents can't seem to understand that's not Paramount's fault, that's just the way it is, and that's the biggest issue.
They are a great facility. They're doing a wonderful job. They are up against a hard wall with the health departments and everybody doing with all this COVID stuff, but they go out of their way and they do anything they can to make the people happy. It's just difficult when you have elderly folks who are in the beginnings of dementia and they can't seem to understand the simple stuff. They are both in assisted living. My mother is a little more assisted and my dad is technically a care level one because he needs medications and somebody's gonna make sure he takes his medications, because if left to him, he won't do it. Mom needs a little bit more some assistance in showering and dressing, but she's mobile. She's up on her rollator and can go up and down the halls and do whatever she wants. They're keeping an eye on them to make sure that they don't get injured. You can't keep anybody with them 24 hours a day, so in the middle of the night he'll get up to go to the bathroom and fall and end up in the emergency room. A week and a half later she gets up and falls and ends up in the emergency room or she has a UTI or something.
If we go away from the COVID they have all sorts of things. They have entertainment that comes in there every couple of days, they've got some group or singers coming in, bingo, and games, a little contest going on, and all sorts of activities that are great, and my parents have enjoyed it. They like it when people come in. Sometimes there are professionals that come in and sometimes it's Joe and Fred and their two wives from the local Baptist Church who come in and sing a few songs for them. Everybody seems to enjoy it. They've got all that; however, they can't bring anybody in the building now. Those activities are really cut back at the moment.
The food depends on the day you talk to them. If one of my relatives or a friend calls and talks to them, "Oh, the food is great, their food is wonderful." If I talk to them it's like, "Oh, we always get the same old thing." My mother is not a great fan of pasta and they have some form of pasta a lot. There is a planned menu. They have a whole auxiliary menu that they can order anything they want off the ultimate menu. If they don't want whatever it is that they're having tonight they could go, "I want a hamburger," and something else, and my parents have been hard to recognize that. They had to complain and complain until they finally said, "If you don't like what we're having, you can order any of this stuff off the menu," and they're like, "We didn't know that," although they had been told that numerous times. That's not a Paramount issue, that's a resident issue.
The staffing is very friendly and very helpful. The nurses call me whenever there is any issue or problem medically. They will give me a call and I know about it instantly to make sure that I know what's going on. They let me know whenever any medication changes. They have a nurse practitioner who is in the building several days a week who basically now is my parent's primary care physician. She keeps tabs on them and then gives them the medications they need and writes the prescription for them. They get their pharmacy to deliver everything there to them, and the nurses make sure everybody takes things. The staff is wonderful. The CNAs are as phony as they can be. They all seem to get along, but there's always gonna be that one somewhere along the line my mother will find somebody she doesn't like.
I haven't eaten there at all recently, but prior to that I had gone and eat with them on occasion, and everything is like restaurant style. They have an open dining room and the aides bring the meals and serve you like waitresses at each of the tables and get what you want. The food has been fine as far as I'm aware. My parents complain on occasion. They've been remodeling. They've redone the carpet throughout, and they've done some of the roofs and the walls. It's very nice. After looking at all of the others in the vicinity, they are not the cheapest, but everything else is wonderful. I think they are a great value for the money. They provided them all sorts of things to do and they had paid trips where they would go out into Fredericksburg, and you'd sign up to go to the Wal-Mart with a group, historical places, and road trips to some of the areas. It's a great place. I'd recommend it to anybody. If someone is not really in need of a whole lot of assistance in the assisted living, they don't have a swimming pool or a gymnasium, but for folks who are not really gonna be using those things, I think they've got everything you'd ever need. I've already told them reserve me a room in the memory wing because I'm going in there in about ten years or so."
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