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[quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous]Dealing with this now with my mom. In a span of 5 months, she sold the family home, moved to CCLC assisted living/nursing care then recovered enough to move to independent living. Now she’s in the hospital and will be released to assisted living for 30 days.

I’m supposed to help move her from the hospital back to Asst Living and I have used up all of my Family Medical Leave used to care for her prior to her first move. I had to tell my sibling that I can’t help.

Also, I’m enacting tough love. My mother refuses to take her prescription medicines (how she ended up in the hospital). This cycle of back and forth to the hospital has been ongoing for too long. I’m done.

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This is the million dollar question: we can accept that elderly people of their right mind can make their own choices, even if they are terrible choices.  But when those terrible choices are made - against the advice of professionals and their children - what happens to the moral obligation of the child?  It is completely unreasonable for our parents to expect us to drop everything and rescue them from their bad choices, just to repeat the cycle.[/quote]

I have been thinking about this a lot myself as I deal with my own mother. At what point is the health of the caregivers taken into consideration?  At what point are our parent's decisions still considered "sound". Some cases are cut and dry but others - like my mom - is very good at pulling the wool over medical professional's eyes. And so the cycle continues. Meanwhile, every time the phone rings, or when I think I can actually get out of town for a long weekend - I find myself back in the hospital with her. The only thing I can really do is vow I won't do this for my kids. [/quote]

This is a very important question and sadly I let it get to the point I had my own health crisis. My body was signaling and i just kept ignoring and dealing with the mom horror show. I think a lot of doctors/case managers/providers/family members just assume certain women and some men will do backflips forever for the challenging elder and they just continue to take the easy route and support the elder and gaslight the one lucky enough to deal with emergencies. I finally had no choice but to say sorry I can do no more. The world didn't end. Sadly I had to explain my health issue, because professionals apparently need to judge those of us who finally set boundaries. Sure enough family and providers finally turned on mom and gave her the business for refusing to comply with meds and lashing out so much and for not following recommendations. Siblings still tried to get back the easy road of expecting me to do everything. Now they are finally pushing her to accept an appropriate residential.

Don't let this do in your health. Learn from me and set your boundaries and guard your right to have health. You should not need a major diagnosis to be able to say it's too much and to be firm and confident. Don't allow anyone to shame you, gaslight you and guiltrip. I have said this before. Some parents will gladly eat their young. Don't let them. It has been too many years of this. I wish I set my boundaries MUCH earlier. I have seen too often that too many good deeds get punished. Too many of my peers not only dealt with awful behavior and endless emergencies, but their own serious health issues or their teens went into crisis. Someone here said it is more important to be a good elder than a good child. Value your children's need to have health parents over your parent's needs to have their children be servants.[/quote]

Thank you for this. Not to hijack the OP, but I have found most family, friends, doctors imply that I should give up everything for my mom's care. That it is my obligation to do so. I have just spent another exhausting week dealing with her medical needs, I had to cancel 3 of my own appointments - ones that had to be made months in advance. So while I find solutions for my mom, I am losing touch with my friends, my physical health and my kids. Not even to mention my job. For what? What is the end game - my mom lives 2, 3, 5 more years? Meanwhile, I end up sick, exhausted and unhealthy with no friends or relationships with my own kids? [/quote]

It’s your choice.  And I mean that kindly.

My sister isn’t speaking to me because I didn’t leave my toddlers to rush to sit bedside by my father’s hospital bed while they took measures I disagreed with to keep him alive.  No surprise they were a waste of time - the man was dead.

It wasn’t my choice how he died, but I could choose to not indulge it.  I flew in for less than 48 hours to bury him and won’t be back to visit my mom because her place isn’t feasible with kids.  She knows where I live.  She can move.[/quote]

With no siblings SOMEONE has to be an advocate. My point is caring for elders is draining, exhausting and many choices are expensive. If only from an early point - parents would acknowledge this and realize they can name choices before it becomes a crisis. For context, I had worked with my mom prior to her hospitalizations to come up with her "plan" which we all thought was a great plan, until it wasn't. Strokes and other health issues can change a person's ability to follow a "plan". Not so sick they fit into many of the solutions available, not so well they can live on their own. No matter what has to be done, a loved one involved is important. And as you said early "it's your choice, and I mean that kindly". YES, I made the choice to assist my mom, who was a caring and loving individual to me. She put aside much of her life for me, it's my turn to help her. What I didn't choose was just how difficult it can be to find care for her that is not me - I don't have a million bucks and I don't have 24/7 hours to devote to her.[/quote]

Not the person you are responding to, but next time she is hospitalized you need to figure out your boundaries and make them clear and unapologetic with the social worker. They try to guilt and shame to make their job easier, but if you cannot take another second of this, you need to be an advocate for yourself and her and get her properly placed.

I used to be infuriated when I vented on here and people told me I was making a choice. It took me years of losing my mind and insane stress on my family to realize I had chosen not to have firmer boundaries. Even if you are an only child there is only so much you can do before you are losing your job and your sanity. [/quote]

Guilt and shame the social worker to do WHAT exactly?? It’s is the family’s responsibility to care for their loved one, not the social worker/hospital, who cannot invent resources that do not exist.

Here is what a social worker CAN do: place a patient in an appropriate rehab (and occasionally LTC/nursing home), or discharge home with home therapies, oxygen, visiting nurse, etc. and information about how to access available community resources like adult daycare/Meals on wheels, private duty caregivers, etc. (since only Medicaid covers the cost of caregivers, and only after a long waitlist). Social workers CANNOT place patients who have capacity against their will or pay for private duty caregivers when a patient/family cannot afford them or decide to house a patient indefinitely in the hospital because their homes are unsafe and family is not available to step in. Sometimes there are no easy solutions.

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The solution is to let them live with the consequences of their choice.  Often this means a horrible painful miserable death alone - at home though![/quote]

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