The Hardest Day in a Baby Boomer's Life
The Hardest Day in a Baby Boomer's Life: The Hardest Day in a Baby Boomer's Life just happened to us recently. It's time to move mom to an assisted living place and she doesn't want to leave her home. We had been taking mom to a doctor on a monthly basis, and the doctor had assigned a state agency to be checking on her at home on a weekly basis. After several months the doctor advised my mom on one of her visits that she would need to be moved to an assistant living home. My mom said absolutely not, she was not moving. The doctor quickly turned to my sister and said that there were legal liabilities in keeping my mom at the house. If my sister needed it, she as a doctor would sign a statement that my mother had to go into an assisted living home for her own safety and my sister could take this to the state and demand her move. My mother immediately told my sister that if she did that, she would never talk to her again. Very difficult, but we knew that if she were not in such a place, she would continue to fall and most probably not eat more than one meal a day, if that. My sister had been going to her home every day for the last 18 months. She couldn't take care of herself, could not cook, had loss of memory, and when asked what she ate for the day, would say something like a piece of cake or whatever - although my sister had made sure she had food that she could easily eat without preparation. Yes, there were tears.
Another problem we had was that my sister was moving 300 miles away to Houston and I live in Denver. Where do we move mom? We had been talking to mom about this move for over a year. What we knew was that she did not want to move to Houston or Denver. We all worked and she was concerned that she would be lonely. She wanted to move to Waco when she was ready to move. We wanted to be near her, but we also wanted her to be happy. She has brothers, sisters and friends in Waco who would see her on a regular basis. We made the arrangements for her to move to Waco on the coming Saturday morning. Fortunately for us, our mother agreed 2 days before we were to move her that she was ready and willing to move to Waco. We had not told her that we had already made the arrangements for the move. When she agreed to the move, we informed her that arrangements had already been made for her to move within a couple of days. What a giant relief for us.
We were not too early in moving our mom. We discovered in the first few weeks how much she really needed this place. For the most part she was incontinent. Her mobility was limited. We now had someone to help us. It was good to know that our mom was being taken care of and she was in good hands.
Within a couple of months, mom needed additional care. This meant spending considerably more money so we had to move her into a very small 2 room apartment in the facility and find another home for her dog that she loved so much. This was very hard but a necessary decision (losing a dog for some of us is momumental!). A roommate was in one room, and she was in the other. We loved the other roommate. She was delightful and had been a nurse and we hoped this would help her take her mind off the dog. Everything was fine until about a couple of weeks ago. My mother was found lying on the floor face down in her room and had to be carried to the hospital to be checked out. She was OK and sent back to the assisted living home. Within 3 days she was found again lying on the floor with a repeat trip to the hospital. How was it that she kept falling out of the bed? We finally found out after the 3rd time this happened that the roommate that we loved was trying to help our mom out of the bed and in fact, insisted she get out of the bed by pulling on her arms. As she was trying to get her out of bed, mom fell. We also discovered in this time that certain items were missing in her room. Our mom became paranoid that this roommate would come into the room after others had left and try to make her get out of the bed or look in her closet for items to "collect". The staff found some of mom's guest's jewelry and mom's TV remote in her roommate's room. The roommate was not a bad woman - she just believed that she was helping mom. We were advised on the "thievery" that the roommate had actually believed these were her items. We have since learned this is a common occurrence in these facilities.
Once we learned about the problem with the roommate, we immediately took action - although it was about a week before we
could move my mom. (The roommate for some reason could not be moved, so we had to move mom.) We double checked that we would not run into the same problems with this new roommate. After she was moved into this new room, a nurse came by to check on her. Mom had been put under a Hospice Care program for about a month. This week the nurse advised us that it would be between 60 days and a year for this disease to "end". We had placed mom into this assisted living place only 4 months ago. We have seen the steady decline, but hoped that she would get better. We are still hoping.
In the meantime, Pat and I were in the process of selling mom's home. Our family spent a couple of weeks going through her home and deciding upon what was to be kept and what was to be discarded. Did I tell you that my mom never threw anything away? It took almost a month before we could place the home on the market. This is tricky in that we have to explain to mom where her things are now "located".
In this process we have learned much, including the consequences of selling a parent's home BEFORE consulting with an attorney... even if the home is sold at a loss! We have learned about what kind of trust is needed, Medicare processes and about little known VA benefits available for the spouse of war veterans and the importance of doing in depth research BEFORE deciding on a care facility. We have become pros in this area! If you are facing a similar situation we can help with the sale of your parents home and point you in the right directions regarding resources, processes and steps you may need to take prior to making any decisions. Helping others is always a benefit of facing hard times in your own life. We are here to help!
Comments(0)