What is my obligation here?

[Anonymous]

OP I am so sorry you are dealing with this. What I kept noticing is that your Aunt has repeated refused any kind of organized assistance.

I would consider pushing back on having her wear a safety button. I have known too many elders who fell and then were stuck there for days. It's brutal. No way she wants that to happen to her so she needs to wear the button.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:You can’t fix this. If she is a hoarder then keeping her hoard is the most important thing in the world to her. She would give up her life to keep it. She would sacrifice your life to keep it! It’s an obsessive disorder with a low recovery rate.

Your choices are either a. Let her continue her hoarding and die in it or b. Do regular well check and if the hoard breaks city codes call APS and Code Enforcement. They will either immediately remove her or if she appears capable give her a short timeline to remove things. She doesn’t need to know that you called.

I think the bolded is really it. Sounds like you have experience and for that, I’m so sorry. From the outside, it’s so freaking hard to understand.

A friend, who is clearly a saint on earth, has cleared (to reasonable in hoarding terms) all but one room, so I don’t think there’s anything APS would do. So I guess we’re at choice A. What a sad end.

[Anonymous]

My mother was like this, except no aids, just my father at her beck and call, who didn’t do much either.
The poster above is right, the choices is to either leave her with her precious hoard or call authorities on her and become the enemy (she WILL figure out it was you).
I must add that any help provided by us kids was misused, misinterpreted, or just wasted. When my father had to be hospitalized and my brother held the fort for a week, he allegedly misplaced some of her precious hoard and immediately became the enemy of the state so to speak. They did not speak for a few years.
I tried to organize food delivery, she would order a lot more than they could eat and, you guessed it, hoard it! It would just rot.
She cried and whined how her iPad was broken and we got her a new one. Both were found in her hoard in working condition after she passed. Same was with anything she asked for: clothing, electronics, etc.

This is all to say, please don’t feel bad! This is a very bad mental illness and there is really not much you can do. It sounds horrible but dying is the best thing she can do for herself and others. Otherwise it’s ongoing trauma and horrible filth

[Anonymous]

She will fall again and you refuse to say you can take care of her. Her so called autonomy is psychiatric in nature at this point. Or you call adult protective services

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Who is coordinating her care?
It is so hard when a LO makes terrible decisions and you want to help but have limited power to do so. I'm sorry for your cousin and for you, OP.

She is coordinating her own care. Neglected to mention that she was released to assisted living after her most recent hospitalization, but checked herself out. Has also refused one of those fall buttons.

Intellectually, I get that she has the right to do this. And I can opt not to participate. But damn, that will leave me feeling like a sh*t human.

It’s hard to watch. People are so complicated.

NP. It's really a mindset issue. Your feeling guilty isn't helping her. What about if you thought of it in terms of her own agency. Like a PP said, we all have agency to "ruin" our lives.

You just have to let it go. I would be so mad that my dad would stand on the counter to reach something in his early days of dementia. But, it was his choice to take the risk and he had the agency to do it.

We underestimate how important that is to thriving. She might die sooner, but by God, she made her own decisions till the end.

[Anonymous]

Is this gbm? She may already have severe cognitive deficits that make her incapable of understanding or dealing with her situation, which in any event is completely hopeless. I think you have to try to let go of the idea that there’s anything better that can happen. She can’t make good decisions—her brain is literally being destroyed by an aggressive cancer. Her life expectancy is so short that that there’s no point in trying to wrest control from her legally, even if you wanted that responsibility. It is hard to watch, I know. I’m sorry you’re dealing with this.

[Anonymous]

Falls are something that happens anywhere. It's happened to family members at home, in assisted living, memory care...