How I first started to look for beds like these

I first started to look for items that could help older people stay in bed after a dear friend’s mother was found on the floor, where she had fallen and laid for two days. Before then, she was becoming more-and-more frail, yet able to take care of herself. Fortunately, when her neighbor found her, she was still alive. Unfortunately, all the complications she had before were further complicated by a broken hip she sustained in the fall. She lived for months, but never came home again from the hospital. Even so, when I would visit her she seemed happy and elegantly content.

Perhaps simple bedrails at home would have prevented the fall.

Recently, this concern came sharply into focus when another friend would anxiously toss and turn at night, and then scramble over anything in her way. She was determined not to be confined.

This was frustrating to her family who wanted her to live at home where they could take care of her. They were not trained in how to plan her living space or experienced in what to expect from someone who used to parent them and now needed their full-time care.

They were determined. After months of discussion among their friends, they acquired bed rails which were about four feet high. They bought enough to completely surround the bed on all four sides. Then, they put pillows along the railings. Most days, two of the sides are left open, making the bed into a large sofa. At night, the two open sides are closed forming a fully enclosed and soft place for their loved-one with frightened dreams.

She and her family have lived this way for years. She needs, and gets, full-time attention from people who bath her, dress her, feed her, do activities with her, toilet her, and put her to bed.

Lessons learned from these experiences may be useful for you, whether in similar situations where life has progressed to this stage or when someone is compelled to chose such a lifestyle.