The support is so needed and wanted. Thanks for letting me ramble!
The crazy thing is that this is where mom wanted to go. In her neighborhood, in her community.
I’m not very confrontational and thought we would have to get on a waitlist, while I tried to cobble together a network of people and volunteers to get her in her home. Until this place opened up a one bedroom on their waitlist.
My sibling just got back from being out of the country and said, we can not let her go home alone. When we looked into it, there are 16 people on the waitlist and the only way to circumvent it is to accept a spot on the least desirable units. Of which there were 2, now 1.
So mom is getting exactly what she told us she wanted. She no longer wanted to own her house with all of the maintenance issues. She did say that she was glad that someone made a decision because she kept changing her mind. (Something that drives my husband insane, she can’t make up her mind and has one bad idea after another).
But she is so very stubborn!
And my husband who is being a bit critical (because he knows how my mom is) has not had to make any decisions regarding his parents. And won’t. Because he’s an ostrich!
Rant ahead! Though I just worked out so the endorphins will help keep me in check.
Mom is still waiting for a room to open up at the rehab place. ARGH. And in part because of the ice I have been with her alone for four nights/five days. I am the one who doesn’t live here, and yet I’ve spent more nights (seven) with her at the hospital between the two visits than the total number of nights the three here (brother, SIL and sister) have spent with her. My brother is so emotional about this that he can’t make rational decisions. I am leaving the hospital in a couple of hours, whether my sister gets here on time or not, and then I’m going home and they will once again have to figure it out without me. I told them I was going to see friends in DC at the end of the month for a week and would likely only be back once before then.
My sister told me on the phone our brother’s plan is for him and his wife to move in with my mom when she’s out of rehab. They lived with my mom and dad for a few months when my dad was in his final days, and my mother HATED it. Oh, well. I suggest things and get ignored so I’m going to just let him do whatever he wants. It sounds passive-aggressive, but it’s not. It’s years of beating my head against the wall trying to reason with him to no avail. I just don’t have the bandwidth to argue anymore. “Control the things I can” and all that.
I so can relate to what you are saying. This is so very hard. And every sibling has a different idea.
I told my mom that there are some battle you can win and some you can’t. Of course she thinks if she digs her heels in, she will win eventually.
She can stay in her community and go to the independent living. Or she can move to my sister’s where they won’t be able to coexist together. Everyone knows that.
But when you siblings have different ideas, it’s so difficult.
I hope they find a rehabilitation place for your mom soon. I know a place has to open up. The place my mom has been, has been so wonderful. But be prepared for them to complain. As I told mom, this isn’t a 5 star hotel that does everything the way you like it.
My friend’s MIL turned 100 last weekend. She lives ‘alone’ in her small house although she too uses only the dining room table, the bathroom and a bedroom. I say ‘alone’ as friend and H live next door and are at her house 3x a day. A nephew helps out and they have a service that comes 3 days a week too. The MIL absolutely doesn’t want to move to a home or asst living. She basically hasn’t been out of her house in 4 years. Now they even have the mobility health service that comes to her as an ER when needed.
Someone made a comment of ‘good genes’ at the 100th birthday party. Friend exploded. She said the mother might have good genes but all this extra care is killing the husband/son (he’s 72) He was in the hospital several times last year, sleeps with an apnea machine, has passed out. His vacation from taking care of his mother was having covid for 3 weeks so he couldn’t go over. I don’t think he’s going to make it to 100.
But the issue now is how to get his mother to assisted living. She’ll never agree.
She’s a sweet lady but very demanding. Open curtains, only son can pick up her medications and for some reason they can’t get them sync’d and he goes almost every day, bring Mail in, milk in, newspaper (they share) It is all the little things.
Daughter/sister calls once a day and causes a lot of trouble, ‘suggesting’ things like letter nephew/her son take over finances, that perhaps nephew and family could move into this tiny tiny house with granny and take care of her. Huh? Son and wife have 2 kids under 4, both work from home, have a nanny. Where would all these people even SIT in this 900 sq foot house? Daughter doesn’t even stay with mother when she visits once per year.
When my grandma was ailing and had to be placed in a memory care facility, my mom let her youngest sister deal with it all. My aunt had her mom move in with her (her husband had an affair and left her during all this) and finally put her in a facility when grandma was no longer safe being with my aunt.
My mom was busy working and just left all of it up to my aunt. Mom says she feels guilty now. And that she feels terrible that my sister and I have to deal with it.
And I’ve done most of the heavy lifting lately. But as I told mom yesterday, that her moving gives her kids such peace of mind.
I have a sick daughter, a husband who had emergency surgery last week. My sibling is working and she has a sick daughter. And sometimes mom makes it all about herself.
Our friend’s mom lives in our neighborhood, in a relatively small one story home. She lives independently, although she doesn’t drive. She has two kids in the area who help get her where she needs to be, and her church gets her to/from everything she wants to participate in there. She cooks for herself, and we have seen her weeding her garden. She is 101, very mobile, and sharp as a tack. Our friend is well aware of how incredibly fortunate she is to have a mom like this. They are few and far between, and they don’t exist in either my or H’s family. All of us hope it will work out that way, but the reality for most of us is far different.
It is so complicated to make this move. I am almost 20 years from walking my cooperative parents through the transition to AL in a CCRC. I remember the effort and stress clearly; so many people stepping up here.
Every situation is different, yet I share my take-aways in case they help. (Most applicable to folks who can be active participants.):
the process is front-loaded for high effort on the senior’s behalf, yet there is usually relief and increased peace of mind for family on the other side of it. Hang in there.
-ambivalence is inevitable for most all of us when a big change, however positive, is imminent. I told my mother that while she knew what she was losing, exactly what she was gaining was to be seen later and that I wanted to hear whatever her thoughts were about it as it unfolded.
noting that there could be bumps in the road and tweaking to be done, but that you will be beside them to resolve questions helped me normalize the move as a process, with reasonable expectations.
I also outlined exactly how placements were made in a crisis, rarely to one’s first choice. It would have been a huge gamble and we would have lost big time if we waited.
I was confident that a move made sense, so I kept our eyes on the prize, with all discussions oriented to smoothing the path to AL and actual steps. Some worrisome to my folks logistics, but necessary and not controversial, were done without much discussion. It can all become overwhelming.
All my best. It can be so hard to do whatever the right thing is. This thread was extra helpful to me along the way.
Of course told me that PT at the rehab thought she would be fine to go home alone.
But she is getting used to this. It’s where she wanted to go all along. Talking about what she wants to bring. Once you are imagining yourself in the space, then that’s good.
My husband is being a bit of a pain. But he is going to have to probably go through the same with his parents. It’s no fun.
I was looking back at old emails about my mother- back to 2015. I wrote my brothers that our mother was crying and upset at the move to AL. Funny, my memory was that she was happy, since it was her decision! That unhappijness faded quickly!
Well my mom is in the hospital after countless hours at ER. She has 3-4 rib fractures abd they’re trying to be sure she doesn’t get pneumonia.
The fractures may have happened while she fell on Wednesday or when they were trying to help get her up from the ground. Poor mom. She was wincing and in a lot of pain.
Her lungs are OK but they are on the lookout for pneumonia and she’s not taking deep breaths because it hurts the ribs. They are using the lidocaine patch at night for 12 hours for pain relief and so she can sleep. She finally fell asleep within 30 minutes after the nurse put the patch on her.
Y’all, I had the most blistering conversation with my SIL today. She said some “interesting” things that I’m still processing, but it does make me worry that things will only go south when our mom dies. Oh, well.
We were pretty functional when my dad passed so I was hoping that would hold, but I’m really not sure now. I have never been close to my sister but have vacationed and done things with my brother and his wife. I would like to remain friendly at least. I’m not so sure now that that will be possible or whether we even want to try to maintain ties. Everyone loves my kids … or so they say. That, for me, would be the main reason to stay close.
The aide says mom is sleeping same as before the fall and fractures, so the lidocaine patches and Lyrica is keeping her pain under control so she’s not wincing or complaining.
A friend in Germany asked about ipuprofen patches. I’ve never heard of or seen them.
I’m sorry youdont_say. It sounds like a difficult time. Taking care of mom has added to the wedge that already existed between my brother and me. It’s sad
