This is what happens....

[Anonymous]

All the people screaming that our parents have the right to live as they choose, wake the F UP.

My parents refused to move. My sister lives with them and, I see now, enabled it so she could keep the roof over her head. Had they moved a few years ago, listened to reason,they would be sitting on easy street with over a mil in the bank, being able to hire caregivers, stay in the lovely home they downsized to.

What they have now: desperation, no money, incontinence, immobilization due to declining health, and destined for a state-run nursing home for one or both that will take their home through estate recovery. Even if one still lives there, if the other dies in nursing home on Medicaid, the state/feds can take about 150K of the value in repayment. And they are still screaming that they won't move and won't go to a nursing home. My father still insists MediCARE will pay for all they need. Totally clueless. My mother will soon be in a wheelchair and/or bedridden all day. My father is too out of it to even care about that, not because he's selfish, but because of a past stroke. He has no capacity to make a good decision.

We cannot afford the 10K plus per month that will be required for them to live the life they desire. So the solution to them is for me to uproot my life and go out there full time and service their needs. I'm not the only one to try to talk sense into them. My aunt (father's sister) tried and all my father would do is scream at her that he knew what he was doing and would not be controlled. My aunt is 96, bought her own addition to my cousin's house and lives well with them, in the life she deserves and loves. She invested in long term care insurance early on. She's fine financially because she made good decisions. She's still so spry and so smart and I'm lucky to have her in my life.

All of this - ALL OF THIS - did NOT have to happen. Years of calling me a control freak and doing NOTHING has put them in this position. It makes me sad and angry and frustrated. I'm hoping when my mother finally gets scared enough, she will allow me and my older sister to come whisk her away from the fresh hell she's living in.

[Anonymous]

OP I so get it and have felt this way too. I had that level of anger, indignation and frustration too. Sadly, what forced me to detach was my own serious health issues. They made these choices of sound mind. Now they will live with the consequences. Do not set yourself on fire to keep them warm. I did and got burned. Let it bring you peace that you tried to prevent this.

[Anonymous]

I get it OP, I've also been called a control freak through the years when I have tried to sit down with my family to come up with a plan - financially, logistically, housing, etc. for my parents as they age and need more help. My father ended up having a very difficult end of life and I almost lost my job going back and forth out of state to help out. Now my mom wants to "wait and see" what happens before she makes a decision. She has a progressive neurological disease.

[Anonymous]

I care for a family member who has nobody else. She is now in a nursing home. It makes me sad but I can only do so much. I wanted her to prepare her home knowing her mobility was decreasing but she said she would be fine. As commonly happens, a fall turned her world upside down. Now I want to sell her home so she can afford to move to an assisted living but she is refusing insisting she is heading home. She can’t afford round the clock health aids and she’s a fall risk. It just isn’t going to work and I won’t be able to come running whenever she needs help. I accept that I can only make suggestions.

[Anonymous]

All these stories I hear just make me more amazed at how my Grandma handled advanced old age and the end of her life. Miss her so much!

[Anonymous]

I was speaking to someone who is dealing with eldercare. Their parents put effort and forethought into planning for their eventual decline. I thought what they did was the most loving thing I had ever heard of and I'm very jealous.

[Anonymous]

OP, you're still being a control freak and not understanding what it means for them to make their own decisions and live the they want. It really has nothing to do with you as long as you stop trying to control them. It's really what it comes down to. You don't like to see it, you want them to be living the way you envision and you're furious. Move on with your life. Talk to them once a week or so. My controlling sister made my parents move into an assisted living near her. Then she dropped dead 3 months in. My dad died 6 months after that. Now my mom lives by herself, in ths place where she knows nobody. Rapidly deteriorating dementia. But she will probably live this way for 10 more years. And for what? She's miserable. I can't see but once or month or so, at best. Why live in nursing homes into your 90s when life that way sucks. Stick it out at home and die 10 years earlier, on your own terms. That's the way I see it. But guess what, I only have to worry about how I want to age.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:OP, you're still being a control freak and not understanding what it means for them to make their own decisions and live the they want. It really has nothing to do with you as long as you stop trying to control them. It's really what it comes down to. You don't like to see it, you want them to be living the way you envision and you're furious. Move on with your life. Talk to them once a week or so. My controlling sister made my parents move into an assisted living near her. Then she dropped dead 3 months in. My dad died 6 months after that. Now my mom lives by herself, in ths place where she knows nobody. Rapidly deteriorating dementia. But she will probably live this way for 10 more years. And for what? She's miserable. I can't see but once or month or so, at best. Why live in nursing homes into your 90s when life that way sucks. Stick it out at home and die 10 years earlier, on your own terms. That's the way I see it. But guess what, I only have to worry about how I want to age.

Your advice and opinion might have some validity if OP’s parents did not expect OP to care about them and uproot OPs life to move and take care of the parents. Otherwise yes she could be nonchalantly indifferent as you advise. That’s not what OP and apparently what OP’s parents desire.

[Anonymous]

Sorry, OP. Some people grow old and live high on the hog, with not a care in the world - yet others work full time their entire lives and have no end in sight - for what?

Sorry you are going through this. You were/are obviously trying to do the right thing.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:OP, you're still being a control freak and not understanding what it means for them to make their own decisions and live the they want.

What they want is for OP to drop everything to take care of them. Trying to get them to see reality doesn't make her a control freak.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:OP, you're still being a control freak and not understanding what it means for them to make their own decisions and live the they want. It really has nothing to do with you as long as you stop trying to control them. It's really what it comes down to. You don't like to see it, you want them to be living the way you envision and you're furious. Move on with your life. Talk to them once a week or so. My controlling sister made my parents move into an assisted living near her. Then she dropped dead 3 months in. My dad died 6 months after that. Now my mom lives by herself, in ths place where she knows nobody. Rapidly deteriorating dementia. But she will probably live this way for 10 more years. And for what? She's miserable. I can't see but once or month or so, at best. Why live in nursing homes into your 90s when life that way sucks. Stick it out at home and die 10 years earlier, on your own terms. That's the way I see it. But guess what, I only have to worry about how I want to age.

It turns out once we start living in ways that concern outsiders, we cease to get a say in how that plays out. Would my mom have preferred to have accidentally wandered into the lake and drowned when she was in the agitated escape risk part of dementia? absolutely! but instead the state got involved because she merely wandered around neighbors properties and had to be brought home by the police. evaluation stated that they could no longer live on their own, and boom! they were in a nursing home with insane fees *in a state with filial responsibility laws*.

it really sucks to suddenly be on the hook for $25,000 a month "care" that I wouldn't wish on my worst enemy.

Anyway, I managed to extract them to a much better and cheaper and closer nursing home, but am I still mad at the awful toll it took on me because they absolutely refused to plan sensibly for the future? yup.

[Anonymous]

I’m not stressing myself out for someone’s bad decisions. Nope. You shouldn’t either.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:I was speaking to someone who is dealing with eldercare. Their parents put effort and forethought into planning for their eventual decline. I thought what they did was the most loving thing I had ever heard of and I'm very jealous.

Yep. This is one of the reasons why we put so much into our retirement rather than pay $320K per kid for an expensive college degree for our kids.

We did not want to burden them with taking care of us financially or otherwise, or have expensive college loans.

We went through some of this with my spouse's parents. They refused to move to a smaller home with no stairs BEFORE they needed to. When they finally did move, it was out of desperation and much harder to do.

My parents planned it better and moved to a smaller place well before they needed to. They also did not want to burden us. Of course, we still help them, but they did not have any expectations that we would be their sole support.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:I’m not stressing myself out for someone’s bad decisions. Nope. You shouldn’t either.

dp. you would just let your parents struggle and die ?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:OP, you're still being a control freak and not understanding what it means for them to make their own decisions and live the they want. It really has nothing to do with you as long as you stop trying to control them. It's really what it comes down to. You don't like to see it, you want them to be living the way you envision and you're furious. Move on with your life. Talk to them once a week or so. My controlling sister made my parents move into an assisted living near her. Then she dropped dead 3 months in. My dad died 6 months after that. Now my mom lives by herself, in ths place where she knows nobody. Rapidly deteriorating dementia. But she will probably live this way for 10 more years. And for what? She's miserable. I can't see but once or month or so, at best. Why live in nursing homes into your 90s when life that way sucks. Stick it out at home and die 10 years earlier, on your own terms. That's the way I see it. But guess what, I only have to worry about how I want to age.

Your advice and opinion might have some validity if OP’s parents did not expect OP to care about them and uproot OPs life to move and take care of the parents. Otherwise yes she could be nonchalantly indifferent as you advise. That’s not what OP and apparently what OP’s parents desire.

Exactly, the OP is in a similar situation as I was. When things rapidly deteriorated, the family expecting me to quickly manage the problem and gain control of a situation I had no control over at that point. To add insult to injury, my father was in business with his brother, and his brother used my father's entire savings account except for $10K to keep their business running. That money that could have been used for get a home health aide was used for the business that is now almost in bankruptcy. They expected me to come up with $6K per month for home health when I almost lost my job on taking so much time off. The crises was predictable. Things were deteriorating for the last two years and no one agreed to planned for anything. They were all "praying for a miracle."