KEEP IT IN THE PHAMLY: Dad Pham

Someone at work asked me if my parents were strict growing up as Asian parents are known to be. It got me thinking. They were both the youngest of 10 children so by the time they were going through childhood their parents would have been less strict. Mum wasn't strict in most ways, but she was dead set on getting school educated.

Mum Pham was the book smart parent. She was studious and disciplined, and a qualified pharmacist (though the communists wouldn't give her a degree because she refused to serve in their army). Growing up all the pressure to study and go to university came from Mum. Dad Pham? Not so much for formal education. He once got in trouble with my Aunty when he suggested our cousin (her son) may be better off doing a trade. She was so outraged by the notion, she didn't talk to Dad for half a year.

I never really thought about why Dad Pham was so much more relaxed about education than Mum and most other Asian parents. That is, until one day, in one of his reflective moods he told me about how he failed forward into the navy.

At school, he ranked 130-something out of 134 for language. He gave so few shits, he didn't bother to remember exactly how low he scored. Now, Dad is not a dumbass by any means. He is actually more intelligent, calculating and strategic than Mum Pham in most ways. But he was too smart for formal education - because it was too easy for him, he got bored. Big Brother Pham would one day follow in Dad's footsteps - he was too smart for boring bookish study.

Dad joined the navy because he didn't have many other options. In the navy, with all the hands-on practical training and studies, Dad actually ranked 24, which was pretty high up there. His own life experience is why he's open to children doing trades or anything hands-on. Books aren't for everyone. Though, books turned out to be for me; they were definitely not for Big Brother Pham. Little Sissy Pham was somewhere in between - I think she'd have excelled at a sport if we could afford sport, but instead being poor forced her down the study route.

Even though I am a book nerd, I believe you should learn life your own way. Whatever suits your interests and skills is what you should pursue. Otherwise, you either won't be happy or won't excel in what you do... or both.

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Dad Pham is forever saying how lucky we are to be living in Australia. He's damn right, we are. Little Sissy Pham and I visit dad once every week, and when I was a single lady with no boyfriend or cat and living 20 minutes away, it was easy peasy to spend all day with Dad and help out. I used to take him grocery shopping in the morning then spend the afternoon cooking a Phamly feast, then chill out until late.

These days, I always take him grocery shopping in the morning and do his dishes, but lunch is potato chips from Big Brother Pham's pantry or 2-minute noodles from Dad's, then Dad kicks us out between 1.30pm to have a nap. Or if he doesn't kick us out, I head home around 2.30pm to do my own chores, and cook lunch for the week, prep our dinners, and do some work emails and set up my work week. Sundays are not fun days. Basically, Dad Pham needed more support than the half day once every week we are able to give him.

The people in Dad's community recommended the Australian Government's My Aged Care support. One of their services is in-home care, which is ideal for Dad because he's nowhere near needing full-time care, but he's not doing so great on his own. He doesn't have energy to tidy up around the house and it's always a little messy. He doesn't have much appetite, doesn't cook regularly, tends to snack on junk food than have meals. General household and life chores are slipping.

My Aged Care has been a complete blessing. The government provides different tiers of funding depending on the level of care you need, which can be spent with any approved in-home care provider so we were able to select Sunnycare, a company that has Vietnamese-speaking workers. Ideal! Dad's English is also failing; he's starting to lose words in Vietnamese let alone English, his third language.

Dad's less lonely during the week as he has in-home care every couple of days, the house is generally tidier because they help clean the bathroom and kitchen, and organise his belongings - all the little things Dad has stopped doing regularly because he gets tired so quickly now. They also take Dad to the local shops when it's a cooking day to buy ingredients, which means Dad doesn't need to wait for me to come on Sundays to buy heavy grocery items he can't carry home on the bus.

Visit https://www.myagedcare.gov.au to see if they have anything suitable for you. While they do have some translators, if you can take time off work to attend the assessment with your loved one it means you'll get assessed sooner because they don't have to wait for a translator to be available. Worth the half day off I took to interpret for Dad Pham.

Dad Pham had a little heart scare when we got back from Europe in September 2017. He’s on a tonne of daily morning and evening medications now, which Little Sissy Pham dutifully packs each week when we visit. He is forever at risk of a stroke which is scary. He suffers from schizophrenia and that irrational part of him doesn't believe he has a heart condition so sometimes skips medicines that are keeping him alive, which is even scarier.

On one of these occasions he went to hospital with nausea and vomiting. When we later saw him at home, he told us to take his meagre savings when he passes away. Now, Dad Pham likes to preach about not being stingy because we can afford not to be tight-asses so it was shocking to learn he had saved some money. We were financially challenged growing up and into our late 20s but the Pham siblings have come good - we can all take care of ourselves these days, and each other and Dad Pham, which is probably why he could afford to save a bit of money on his single pension.

The point of helping Dad Pham out is so he can spend his twilight years enjoying himself and not having to worry about bills and meals and his kids. As soon as we found out he was saving money to pass onto us one day, we told him to 'Treat yo'self!' instead. It didn't take much convincing, to be honest. He recently got rid of his super old, ratty recliners. They were due to be tossed half a decade ago but he held onto them this long because Mum Pham had loved them so much.

We took him furniture shopping and Ted, a friendly salesman at the local A-Mart lucked out 'cause Dad Pham walked in and within 30 minutes had picked out a leather recliner and 10 dining chairs so we can finally seat everyone at the table. We had planned on me being single forever, but things changed so we've been one chair short ever since. Not any more!

As Dad likes to always tell me when I'm looking for a bargain while grocery shopping, "Stop being cheap - Mum only did that because we couldn't afford nice things. You have money - buy the best there is." Solid advice.

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Dad Pham used Little Sissy Pham's old, pink Motorola flip phone and would never have changed phones if it weren't for the whole 2G network becoming obsolete. For some reason (laziness) I left it to Little Sissy, the least techie of the three Pham siblings, to find Dad's next phone. She got Dad an Aspera F24 Seniors Big Button Flip Phone. The phone says it's for seniors but Dad found the user interface counterintuitive and the sound too quiet for his failing hearing. Dad struggled with it for nearly a year thinking his troubles with the phone were his failing to adopt new technology, but really the new technology was failing him. When he remembered how to turn on loudspeaker, the sound was fuzzy and hard to hear. Finally, he gave up and let us get him a new phone.

Round 2 started with Little Sis calling me an idiot for letting her choose Dad's phone and I should have done it. She's right. This time I went on the hunt for a seniors friendly phone that was intuitive, easy to use, and LOUD. I found the Olitech Easy Mate+ phone via intensive googling and research. There aren't too many phones for Seniors on the market and most seemed too much like the dudAspera F24. The Olitech Easy Mate+, however, is designed and produced by people who have worked in occupational therapy, and orthotics and prosthetics so they understand the accessibility challenges of technology for people who are less able-bodied.

Unfortunately, no big tech stores seem to have picked up this handset so I couldn't have a look at it in person before buying. Instead, I took a punt and ordered the phone direct from Olitech online. Worth it.

Dad loves his new phone and I do too. These days I can clearly hear Dad squirming to hang up on me. He's not a big talker so our calls are always super efficient and all about agreeing on logistics for Phamly plans, and occasionally an appointment or social event he needs one of us to taxi him to.

The sound quality on the Olitech Easy Mate+ is clear and loud. The buttons are nice and big. The user interface is easy to use because it's intuitive and logical. I only had to show Dad how to do things once and he got the hang of it. It's well thought out and designed. I cannot recommend this phone enough to seniors who just want a phone they can use to make calls and text.

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