Parenting your parents

Tom the Melaniephile · Feb 16, 2023

I was on the fence about whether this should be a new thread or in the general "parenting" thread https://arstechnica.com/civis/threads/a-thread-about-parenting.1423435/

Since that thread is largely kid focused - here you go.

It's been an interesting and somewhat emotional shift over the past few years - my parents (especially Dad) are getting less and less capable. I've been spending more and more time helping out.

Today was a good day.

Background: Since they sold their house 2 years ago, they've been sitting on well over a half million dollars in cash in 0% interest accounts. They are not otherwise all that flush. Dad has a decent pension, but not enough to cover the care he needs. A fair chunk of IRA/401k money scattered across multiple providers. At least Mom has been making sure they meet the RMD requirements.

Today I went and (figuratively) hand-held Mom to move ~$450k into a 4% CD at the local bank where they already have an account. I found it really helpful to put it in concrete, easy-to-understand terms along the lines of "If we can do this, that's another $1,000 per month of expenses you have covered in the future."

Anyway, thanks for listening. It's been a real emotional adjustment.

Defenestrar · Feb 16, 2023

Oranging while weeping a bit on the inside. I'll definitely be back for advice/therapy/venting/rando-internet-affirmation (or rejection) later on.

Tom Foolery · Feb 16, 2023

I feel you, fellow Tom. I have issues with my own folks, but I have aired them out enough here on these fora. I wish you the best, and hope that you can see yourself through this with the patience and compassion that I assume you possess.

You are not alone.

Semi On · Feb 16, 2023

We are getting deeper and deeper into the same situation. My wife spent all of her vacation time last year flying back and forth to Florida because they kept having massive health emergencies. They are insistent they want to stay in Florida but that's just not feasible any more.

On my side, my mother is predisposed to making whatever the worst possible decision is for her own well being. She was adamant that she couldn't work another year at 62 since she had been working basically full time since before leaving high school as an LPN. Three years later and now she's at the point she would have retired anyway, but down 30% of her income and unable to afford to run the heater in her house in the mountains of Norther Arizona on her own.

Adults that have been on their own for decades don't want to be told what to do but there comes a point that they clearly can't take care of themselves.

Getting Better · Feb 16, 2023

I'm thankfully not at this point with either set of parents yet, but figure this thread will go on my list because:

1) at some point I'll get there
2) probably not a bad idea to know what other people are experiencing so I can figure out how to avoid making mistakes for when my kid is going through this with me.

Cognac · Feb 16, 2023

Mine are very recently retired. There's no issue with mental capacity, but dad has had a few medical... "'episodes"' in the last few years (this contributed to the decision to retire as well). Unfortunately one of his hobbies is spending long periods of time (days, sometimes weeks) in locations where he is uncontactable. If something were to happen, no one would know. His attitude has been 'but nothing will happen'. Now that their first grandchild is on the way I'm hoping he'll be a little more sensible and at least invest in some kind of emergency location device and sat phone. I don't want to have to stress about his whereabouts and well-being at the moment.

Tom the Melaniephile · Feb 16, 2023

I appreciate the rapid and wide response and support in this thread.

It's a challenging position to be in (on both sides) when roles/responsibilities are shifting so radically.

Tom the Melaniephile · Feb 16, 2023

Tom Foolery said:
I feel you, fellow Tom. I have issues with my own folks, but I have aired them out enough here on these fora. I wish you the best, and hope that you can see yourself through this with the patience and compassion that I assume you possess.

You are not alone.

Much appreciated, Tom!

And frankly, I'm definitely not alone. While we don't get along, my sister has taken on most of the day-to-day support - she lives much closer. My brother is still worthless at best.

Defenestrar · Feb 16, 2023

Cognac said:
Mine are very recently retired. There's no issue with mental capacity, but dad has had a few medical... "'episodes"' in the last few years (this contributed to the decision to retire as well). Unfortunately one of his hobbies is spending long periods of time (days, sometimes weeks) in locations where he is uncontactable. If something were to happen, no one would know. His attitude has been 'but nothing will happen'. Now that their first grandchild is on the way I'm hoping he'll be a little more sensible and at least invest in some kind of emergency location device and sat phone. I don't want to have to stress about his whereabouts and well-being at the moment.

Sounds like you're already aware of them. But personal locator beacons have come down a lot in price over the years. Still expensive. I'm not aware of any PLBs that don't require manual activation though - they're not like some of the autocalling marine or aviation systems. It's on my list of required gear if I end up taking scouts on backpacking trips. Satcom options are a lot better now too, but they require extra steps to initiate a SAR response.

Tom the Melaniephile · Feb 16, 2023

Semi On said:
We are getting deeper and deeper into the same situation. My wife spent all of her vacation time last year flying back and forth to Florida because they kept having massive health emergencies. They are insistent they want to stay in Florida but that's just not feasible any more.

Condolences.

Fortunately for us, that "refuses to leave Florida" is a couple of years behind us. Years of convincing, and that's what led directly to the "over a half million dollars sitting in the bank earning 0% interest"

thekaj · Feb 16, 2023

I might end up abusing this thread.

My dad is out of the picture via my siblings and I informing him that we wouldn't put up with his emotional abuse anymore. Being the raging narcissist he is, he spent several years insisting we couldn't live without him and we'd come crawling back. He still occasionally tries to pop up to remind us that we could totally come crawling back if we want.

My mom has her own set of issues. I've mentioned it recently that she's a 75-year-old in a 95-year-old's body, with the mentality of a 15-year-old. Basically, she's spent her entire life making choices without considering the consequences, which worked out fine most of the time, as my dad was great at co-enabling. But the many bills are now coming due, and she's never developed the skill set to deal with them rationally. She lives by herself on an acre of land in a 3-bedroom house, which she refuses to admit is way too much for her to keep on top of, either physically or financially. She broke her back trying to clean out the gutters several years back. Her neck bones are so bad that a surgeon refused to work on them because any attempt at reinforcing them would break them even more. She broke her leg 2 days before Christmas, and then broke it again last week. And yet, she's adamant that she doesn't want to move out.

It's just maddening trying to discuss it with her, as she insists she doesn't want to lose her independence and be a burden. And yet, the choices she makes increases her dependence on others. My siblings and I spent the last week tag-teaming staying with her, since she can barely hobble around. She missed the holidays with us, and caused a bunch of her friends to scramble during their holidays to help her out when she first broke her leg, as a snow storm hit so we couldn't assist. Last year we invited her to our boat, where she fell and broke her nose on the dock, because she is bent over from her back issues but won't use a cane or walking sticks because it makes her look "old". Had she downsized even just a few years ago, she'd be SO much better off. Yet she's still insisting she's not ready to move out. She will end up getting wheeled out, probably very soon, when she could have had many more years of fairly independent living.

Alright, vent over.

Tom the Melaniephile · Feb 16, 2023

thekaj said:
Alright, vent over.

Nah, I get it. Dad keeps putting Mom through the wringer insisting/pestering/insisting/pestering to do things that end up being extremely (overly) demanding on her because of his physical/medical challenges and inability to even take care of himself, much less help make things happen.

He's also a massive attention hog, must be the center of attention at all times - and having a non-family-member nearby giving him full attention isn't good enough. He apparently had a total meltdown because he was "alone" with a professional, paid caretaker while I went with Mom to the bank. Yes, he already knew the caretaker from multiple prior visits and all four of us spent a couple of hours together without issues before Mom and I went to the bank. Mom even called him with an update while we were at the bank.

Coppercloud · Feb 16, 2023

Feel for all you folks. Fortunately for me my parents are not at that age yet. They're going to be retiring and still taking care of my dad's mom for the foreseeable future. Between Grandma and the family land that's all kind of consuming their lives at the moment and it kinda sucks because it cuts into our support network, but it's what has to be done. Sadly grandpa died in 2020, but that's one less burden because by the end he was like a 3 year old in an 80 year old's body. Grandma has been pretty good moving into assisted living and all that. She's just a bit lonely and high maintenance.

Thorvard · Feb 16, 2023

My Mom died back in '04 (suddenly, they were on a plane in Italy and she had a heart attack) and my Dad has been "alone" since then. I put alone like that because my older brother(55) has been living in the apartment since '07, which was right before I moved out(3 men in a 2 BR apartment, shudder). Anyway my Dad always was able to take care of himself until his stroke a few years back, now he needs care. He's still there mentally but physically he needs help.

Anyway, I feel like I have to parent both of them. My brother is a out of control hoarder, and my Dad won't say anything to him and my Dad doesn't think he needs to go to PT because "I get around fine". My sister is of no help because she is still recovering from her near death cancer scare so all I get from her is "Someone should talk to them"

At this point I just pray his will is up to date and my brother doesn't try to move in on the apt after(last I heard its around $680k in value).

Carhole · Feb 16, 2023

This thread will become a regular as with the parenting thread simply due to the Ars demographics, so good call getting it started.

Things began getting challenging with my family I think fall of last year when my MiL decided to do a shit job with her nutrition and FiL didn’t do jack to help out. Mind your third world, so our assistance has been primarily financial since the pandemic. MiL passed early January after massive stroke, Covid, hospital time, coma, more hospital time, then home yet again before falling into one more final coma. I was having to Dr. her remotely while my wife relayed info to the rest of the family on the ground. She made the bad call to come back just a week or so before her mother passed so we are still dealing with funerary crap. Wife is down, I’m injured—quite badly and awaiting my next surgeries, and then the plot thickened.

My mother popped positive for what we first thought was Cholangiocarcinoma (bile duct cancer) and that’s now believed to be pancreatic. She cannot face it, and I’ve had to attend her every medical appt with her mind in denial, and my father’s untreated hearing loss preventing him from having basic conversations with the doctors. It’s been truly exhausting. Alas, I got Mom accepted into the GI Oncology program at Stanford and we found her cancer early which is a rare piece of luck strewn into this clusterfuck. Kicker: I’d (clinically, amateur to be clear) diagnosed her with gallbladder cancer back on Nov, 1 while taking note of her rapid onset of jaundicing, and reading all of her bloodwork back for months. Bad decisions: seeing a naturopath instead of an MD as your PCP. This ND misdiagnosed Mom with an extremely unlikely disease instead of seeing the obvious signs so we have collectively lost four months now to where Mom could nearly be done with Chemo. Fuck.

Meanwhile, my sister is ill and hasn’t been able to be present as part of the team, and my wife continues to mourn so it’s been a frenzy of research and trying to support Dad in getting him up to speed as a caregiver. Thankfully he agreed to get his hearing checked this month. And he also got diagnosed with cancer. OK WTF now? Thankfully biopsies came back as basal cell carcinoma and first excision got one of two spots clear margins. He’ll need a Mohs graft to get his forehead in the clear next month, meanwhile we get Mom started for real.

This is almost all-consuming, with my mental and physical stamina both depleted from injury and medication required to keep from crawling out of own skin. Enter my little brother to the rescue. He’ll be teaming up with Mom and Dad as they get to CA. Stanford is damned impressive in case you ever need to get serious help for your loved ones or yourself, and I’d recommend essentially every department there. Medicare accepted.

Meanwhile, we just found that Hopkins is trialing a freakin’ pancreatic cancer vaccine for existing cancers. Hell yes, immunotherapy! Mom is so afraid of chemo if may come down to something like this to get her the neoadjuvant care that she requires.

Thankfully we aren’t looking at financial ruin just yet, and may get Mom to come around and give this a fight. The suspense has been hard. The moral support and critical decision making that I had expected my father to be able to make have all also been hard. It’s that time in life as I near 50, no surprise I mean to be needing to step up to this plate. I’m still happy for this thread. Thanks, Tom, and good luck with your folks as well.

Bardon · Feb 16, 2023

Carhole said:
This thread will become a regular as with the parenting thread simply due to the Ars demographics, so good call getting it started.

Things began getting challenging with my family I think fall of last year when my MiL decided to do a shit job with her nutrition and FiL didn’t do jack to help out. Mind your third world, so our assistance has been primarily financial since the pandemic. MiL passed early January after massive stroke, Covid, hospital time, coma, more hospital time, then home yet again before falling into one more final coma. I was having to Dr. her remotely while my wife relayed info to the rest of the family on the ground. She made the bad call to come back just a week or so before her mother passed so we are still dealing with funerary crap. Wife is down, I’m injured—quite badly and awaiting my next surgeries, and then the plot thickened.

My mother popped positive for what we first thought was Cholangiocarcinoma (bile duct cancer) and that’s now believed to be pancreatic. She cannot face it, and I’ve had to attend her every medical appt with her mind in denial, and my father’s untreated hearing loss preventing him from having basic conversations with the doctors. It’s been truly exhausting. Alas, I got Mom accepted into the GI Oncology program at Stanford and we found her cancer early which is a rare piece of luck strewn into this clusterfuck. Kicker: I’d (clinically, amateur to be clear) diagnosed her with gallbladder cancer back on Nov, 1 while taking note of her rapid onset of jaundicing, and reading all of her bloodwork back for months. Bad decisions: seeing a naturopath instead of an MD as your PCP. This ND misdiagnosed Mom with an extremely unlikely disease instead of seeing the obvious signs so we have collectively lost four months now to where Mom could nearly be done with Chemo. Fuck.

Meanwhile, my sister is ill and hasn’t been able to be present as part of the team, and my wife continues to mourn so it’s been a frenzy of research and trying to support Dad in getting him up to speed as a caregiver. Thankfully he agreed to get his hearing checked this month. And he also got diagnosed with cancer. OK WTF now? Thankfully biopsies came back as basal cell carcinoma and first excision got one of two spots clear margins. He’ll need a Mohs graft to get his forehead in the clear next month, meanwhile we get Mom started for real.

This is almost all-consuming, with my mental and physical stamina both depleted from injury and medication required to keep from crawling out of own skin. Enter my little brother to the rescue. He’ll be teaming up with Mom and Dad as they get to CA. Stanford is damned impressive in case you ever need to get serious help for your loved ones or yourself, and I’d recommend essentially every department there. Medicare accepted.

Meanwhile, we just found that Hopkins is trialing a freakin’ pancreatic cancer vaccine for existing cancers. Hell yes, immunotherapy! Mom is so afraid of chemo if may come down to something like this to get her the neoadjuvant care that she requires.

Thankfully we aren’t looking at financial ruin just yet, and may get Mom to come around and give this a fight. The suspense has been hard. The moral support and critical decision making that I had expected my father to be able to make have all also been hard. It’s that time in life as I near 50, no surprise I mean to be needing to step up to this plate. I’m still happy for this thread. Thanks, Tom, and good luck with your folks as well.

Man, that's got to be crushingly difficult - I feel for you.

We lost Mum 4 years ago from throat cancer and Dad ... physically he's in good shape and his thinking processes are fine, but his memory is getting progressively worse. As in he'll raise the same topic of conversation 3 times in a 10-minute phone call. Oh yeah, did I mention that he's halfway across the planet? My sister lives about an hour away and my brother about 3 from him, so at least they're not too far.

We are blessed that he's lived in that house since 1969 and the neighbourhood ladies have essentially adopted him: Someone checks on him in that big old house every day to ensure that he hasn't fallen or anything. It's far too big for him but all of his memories of Mum are their so we'd have to drag him out kicking and screaming.

We're also lucky in that financially he's fine and my siblings have over-ride on any major financial decisions, which he set up when he realised that he just couldn't manage the day-to-day of his finances.

So all in all we're damn lucky, but the deterioration of his memory is getting quicker and soon we'll have to have the dreaded "get full-time help in or move out" conversation.

Scotttheking · Feb 17, 2023

my mom has 20k unread emails, is on a massive amount of mailing lists, and buys things through random aggregator sites. I could spend a month to clean it up.
She’s not digitally literate and it is a pain to manage.
At least she probably won’t go broke. I’d hate to manage that.

Tom the Melaniephile · Feb 17, 2023

Carhole, I can't even imagine how I would handle half the challenges you face. hugs

cogwheel · Feb 17, 2023

Bardon said:
So all in all we're damn lucky, but the deterioration of his memory is getting quicker and soon we'll have to have the dreaded "get full-time help in or move out" conversation.

Do not wait.

You really should be having that conversation now.

I'm spoilering this because it's pretty raw, and I don't know if reading it would be counterproductive for you right now.

I went through what sounds like the exact same memory deterioration with my father (conversations would loop about every three minutes). A few months after my father was at that level of memory deterioration, he was breaking down crying (and my father never cried in front of me in the past) because he thought he hadn't seen my mother in weeks and was being prevented from seeing her, despite having actually visited with her (they were both in the same long-term care facility at that point) the previous day. Within weeks of that, he was mixing up my grandparents and his grandparents, and calling me to ask me to pick him up from the airport in Berlin, Germany (he worked for the DoD and was in Berlin a lot in the 80s and early 90s).

I consider myself lucky that he passed away before he forgot who I was.

Carhole · Feb 17, 2023

Tom the Melaniephile said:
Carhole, I can't even imagine how I would handle half the challenges you face. hugs

Thanks, but just like with your situation, we just need to get it done. It’s part of the package deal in being a decent human being, and until it’s impossible I will continue to help my folks, as they’ve been incredible family despite the idiosyncrasies and deserve nothing less of devoted offspring doing some heavy lifting for them.

Man, that's got to be crushingly difficult - I feel for you.

Appreciated as well, Bardon. I was shocked by the amount of news but at this point it’s just the grind. Maybe keeping sight of the finish line is helpful? I, not sure, I also harness selective memory by meditating my coffee time as me time before jumping back into the fray. That helps.

DrWebster · Feb 17, 2023

Oranging because it's relevant to my impending situation.

Bamboozled · Feb 17, 2023

Start the conversation with the parents as soon as possible. Show them that they taught you well so that they can trust you to, at least, share their financial posture. Familiatize yourself with the concept of power of attorney and living wills. Understand what a "wet ink" copy is and, based on your parent's financials, who will require it when. Get to know what an "elder care" attorney knows that any other attorney does not and why that matters. Develop your own support group with sibling or other dear ones so you can talk over things before you make decisions

Finally, make the best decision you can and don't regret or look back. Each situaton is unique.

(Brought to you by all the things that I did not do (or do completely) and thus struggled for years. Regret was by far the worst.)

Edit: Make list: List of doctors, lists of meds, list of nursing homes, lists or their friends (important this), lists of assisted-living centers, list of their keepsakes, lists of their possessions

Tom the Melaniephile · Feb 17, 2023

So, when thinking about long-term care (whether in-house or a nursing home) - these things get EXPENSIVE. Fast. Medicare doesn't cover them. Medicaid does, but you basically need to exhaust nearly all assets. While there are some protections for a spouse, this can still really screw them over financially.

Keep in mind Medicaid has a 5 year "lookback" period. If the person needing Medicaid or their spouse transferred assets improperly there is a rather severe penalty. This is why a "Medicaid divorce" is a thing. To protect the more-able spouse.

This stuff is complicated and nuanced - even an elder care attorney may not know it well.

More here:

How the Medicaid Look-Back Period Works

Understand how Medicaid’s look-back period works, the exceptions, penalties, state-specific rules and strategies to retain assets and qualify.

www.medicaidplanningassistance.org

Medicaid Divorce: An Overview | Helsell Fetterman

This article covers some of the issues that should be considered if you wish to examine the possibility of a Medicaid divorce.

www.helsell.com

thekaj · Feb 17, 2023

Yeah, I was quite shocked at the cost of even assisted living places. My mom lives in a small community that ranks pretty highly in the country for retirement living, so there's plenty of resources. But holy crap, a 2 bedroom apartment where you get one meal a day cooked for you, and someone who comes through and helps with various chores around the place as needed costs more per month than the mortgage on my 2,600 square foot house on nearly an acre.

Washington State implemented a mandatory long-term care insurance law last year, but they managed to fuck up the implementation so badly that they immediately repealed it after it went into effect. It's not a bad idea in theory, and what my FiL went through with my MiL and her early onset Alzheimer's made it abundantly clear it's needed. The state just completely half-assed the legislation.

Tom the Melaniephile · Feb 17, 2023

Yet another reason for Medicaid for All.

Defenestrar · Feb 17, 2023

Yeah. Washington had a good idea, but they effectively tried to fund it with a progressive income tax. Since the State Supreme Court has consistently ruled that as unconstitutional (state), it blew up. There's plenty of ways to tax and fund it, but that wasn't the one. There were also a lot of problems with eligibility that probably would have failed in court.

Some types of trusts can protect assets from Medicaid - but like it's been mentioned, they have to be established long in advance. So yeah, as I understand it, long term care for one spouse can make the other homeless under the current system.

beeblebrox · Feb 17, 2023

My FiL is a Vietnam vet who gets a small stipend from the government. He has vascular dementia brought about by a series of small strokes about 10 years back, and is in no way capable of managing his own affairs. Or anything. My wife and I have Durable Power of Attorney on his behalf, and so we (mostly my wife, I mean) manages pretty much everything for him. About 5 years ago, before his decline was super obvious, we relocated him here to Texas with us (from South Carolina). He lived with us, briefly, and then we got him into an independent living facility with on-site "add on" care.

It quickly became apparent that it was too much for him, even with extra care, and so we got him into a memory care facility. I will echo someone's comment, above: it's expensive. Like, amazingly expensive. Even for the places that just med them up and put them in front of a TV, it's costly. But we couldn't do that, weren't happy with that arrangement. So we found another place for him.

His monthly income totals about $2,500/mo. No, that's not a mistake. Between the military pay, his aid and attendance, and his meager Social Security, that's about what he gets every month. The least expensive memory care facility in the area (that's not a shithole, mind you, but it's maybe 2 steps above that) costs... $3,600/mo. And meds, adult diapers, showering supplies are all NOT included. So he's in a ~$1,400/month hole.

Fortunately, as a "web guy," I worked it out with the facility that I would do $1400/mo of work for them on their website and online marketing campaigns to make up the difference. So now I'm an indentured servant to the place my FiL lives at... or he has to come live with us again.

My bio dad is approaching 78, and he's beginning to fade, fast. Memory issues are cropping up, he has degenerative nerve damage in his legs and spine, and now he's been diagnosed with Idiopathic Pulminary Fibrosis - which is irreversible and terminal. It's basically scarring in the lungs, and the only treatments for it only delay it, not stop it or even make it better. So eventually my dad will suffocate to death. He's up in PA, so I don't have ready access to him, but I have a brother who lives nearby who is stepping up to help out. Got his accounts in order (my dad had been hit up by the Trump Recurring Donations™ scam and didn't know how to stop it, etc), all that. So that's at least a few less worries.

But god damn, IPF is terrible. And apparently he's had it for a few years... and it looks like life expectancy once diagnosed is typically 2-3, maybe 4, years. So while I'm not parenting my dad, he's only a matter of time.

Getting old is fun, isn't it?

Bardon · Feb 17, 2023

cogwheel said:
Do not wait.

You really should be having that conversation now.

I'm spoilering this because it's pretty raw, and I don't know if reading it would be counterproductive for you right now.

I went through what sounds like the exact same memory deterioration with my father (conversations would loop about every three minutes). A few months after my father was at that level of memory deterioration, he was breaking down crying (and my father never cried in front of me in the past) because he thought he hadn't seen my mother in weeks and was being prevented from seeing her, despite having actually visited with her (they were both in the same long-term care facility at that point) the previous day. Within weeks of that, he was mixing up my grandparents and his grandparents, and calling me to ask me to pick him up from the airport in Berlin, Germany (he worked for the DoD and was in Berlin a lot in the 80s and early 90s).

I consider myself lucky that he passed away before he forgot who I was.

Thanks, both for the advice and the honesty in your spoilered section. I appreciate that must have been difficult to go over and I'm truly grateful that you felt willing to share to help us avoid what we can of that situation.

Yes, we're arranging with my siblings to have "the talk" in the next few weeks, it's just a matter of my brother's job has him flying all over the country so it's difficult to pin down a time when we can all be involved (me via video) as it's important that we're all there, all part of it and all making it clear to Dad that we're just looking out for his best interests.

Fortunately he's in Canada where the costs aren't quite as dire as the USA for carers/facilities and financially there is no issue even if he beats my great-grandmother's family record of 104.

asbath · Feb 18, 2023

Oranging this thread as eventually I'll be part of this conversation. Not for a short while, but inevitably so.

My parents are physically doing ok, for now, but my dad's temper has been short over the past few years. He's also starting to get forgetful. I know that I'll be helping my mom support him soon.

von Chaps · Feb 18, 2023

I will probably not contribute much to this thread as I have been through what y'all are experiencing/anticipating and have come out the other side wiser, happier and also a bit more jaded. Lost dad to bladder cancer (dragged on way too long) and mum to dementia (ditto). Know that you all have my sympathy.

I would like to contribute the following observations for what they are worth:

Parents refusing help and not acting in their own best interests is the natural order of things - try not to be frustrated by it
It can be especially challenging if you did not get on well with your parents (but also easier to be objective in some respects)
It is a massive shame that everyone has to learn and find their way through this process with little outside help and often despite the system
That said, there is help to be had and you should fight for it
There should be some centralised resources to help - perhaps this thread will be that for you guys
Look after number 1. It is easy to get so wrapped up physically and emotionally that you neglect yourself and your own loved ones. Then you are no use to anyone.

I am oranging this to remind myself how lucky I am that I have all this behind me (sorry, I know that doesn't help you), but also to remind myself that I'm next in line and to try not to be like that myself.

You all have my sympathy and some understanding as you work through this inevitable phase of life. We never stop learning!

wallinbl · Feb 18, 2023

Mom and Dad have very different preferences for where to live. I grew up split between where Dad prefers and where Mom prefers. After my kids became teens, they moved to where my brother and his kids were, which is back where Dad prefers to live.

That may seem benign, but it's not. Each of them has existential despair for being where the other wants to live. Mom will tell you winters up there make her suicidal. She demands I keep a place down here so she can come and go as she likes. When my youngest goes off to college (this coming Fall), I'm going to move back up north. Mom has made it clear my doing so will put her mental health at risk.

Jolly good fun.

Carhole · Feb 18, 2023

cogwheel said:
Do not wait.

-snipped a tad-

I went through what sounds like the exact same memory deterioration with my father (conversations would loop about every three minutes). A few months after my father was at that level of memory deterioration, he was breaking down crying (and my father never cried in front of me in the past) because he thought he hadn't seen my mother in weeks and was being prevented from seeing her, despite having actually visited with her (they were both in the same long-term care facility at that point) the previous day. Within weeks of that, he was mixing up my grandparents and his grandparents, and calling me to ask me to pick him up from the airport in Berlin, Germany (he worked for the DoD and was in Berlin a lot in the 80s and early 90s).

I consider myself lucky that he passed away before he forgot who I was.

That is a mixed blessing for sure, however for those who haven’t yet had to help a loved one to the grave it can be a little bit unsettling as hospice becomes the trajectory and memory function almost always fails to a degree, and often very confusingly so.

You can prepare yourself for some of this by first, expecting that confusion from strong medication given for palliative care alone will be enough for your folks to mistake nearly everyone for anything ranging from actual angles to long-dead relatives, all spoken with perfect clarity and conviction. It can be jarring, for example, when you’re mistaken as your dead uncle but that does allow for some opportunities to slip reassurances in and then use your best judgment as to whether or not correcting the patient is a wise move, as if you’re lucky a nap will occur.

Just understanding that this is perfectly normal helps, and work with your hospice team if they’re spending majority time caregiving for what trips up the parent in question, and what tactics to recover or comfort have seemed to help. Keep your cool when Mom or Dad starts tripping balls. It’ll happen.

Thegn · Feb 19, 2023

My parents got divorced when they were young; as a result of the fallout from that I'm not particularly close to either of them. Let's be clear - they care about me, but they were so wrapped up in their own bullshit at a time I needed a lot of help from them that I won't feel exceptionally bad if I just walk away from them if things get really bad. My mom especially I may have to do so - she's married to a man with the emotional maturity of a turnip. She's in early stage dementia right now. I tried to help her set up a living trust to help both protect her assets and guarantee he'd be taken care of after she dies (he's much younger than her and likely to outlive her, but has no financial acumen whatsoever) because that was what she wanted. He's fought her every inch of the way, and nothing got set up, so I've washed my hands. As soon as she's dead I can see their assets evaporating into bike parts and trips to Spain. If he ends up homeless, IDGAF. She lives very close to me.

My dad is in better mental shape, but thirty years of smoking gave him lung cancer. He got lucky and they caught it early, but they did remove one lobe of his lungs, meaning he's down to 4/5 capacity. He and his wife live about four hours away from us, but I don't want to encourage him coming up to visit me - he's got anger management issues (possibly PTSD due to service in Viet Nam) and is a fucking terror on the road. I'm not likely to move closer to him, as he's living in the ass end of nowhere and deep red country where my wife and daughter would stand out like a sore thumb. (He's flaming liberal, just moved out there to take care of his mom and never moved out.) I honestly don't know how long he's got. All the women from the previous generation in his family lived to over 100 years old, and all the men died in their forties of misadventure, so we're in undiscovered country. Dementia isn't an issue on that end, but he really shouldn't be driving not because of age but because he's a fucking terror, and he doesn't listen to anybody about it.

I should add I am willing to help (when my dad had his lung lobe excised, I went down multiple times and did cooking/cleaning/chores for them; WRT my mom I've tried to help where I can but her husband makes it near impossible) but they're difficult people, both in their own way, and I'm not expecting to receive anything from them when they pass.

Danger Mouse · Feb 25, 2023

CNN even had an article about it a week or so ago, calling us the "sandwich generation" for taking care of our own children as well as our aging parents.

As people age, even more of the superficial aesthetics falls away and their character gets revealed, flaws and all.

The emotional/psychological burden for caring for a parent(s), especially if the relationship has been fraught with conflict, can feel like a cruel and unfair incursion into your daily life, which is already filled with stress from the pandemic and the struggle of living in difficult times.

Accepting them, as flawed and broken as they are, is critical if you are going to be dealing with them on a routine basis. If you are able to cut yourself off from it, that may be healthier in the long fun if you can turn off any feelings of filial piety.

It's good to remember the feeling of annoyance at their flaws and the burden they place on you, when planning for your own future and how you may burden your own children.

My parents are in their mid 80s and doing remarkably well, but have the usual issues. Fortunately, neither have gone round the bend to (flat earth, lizard people, etc) insanity, although my mother was slightly overtaken by right wing (for Korea) propaganda for a while, but came back to her senses pretty quickly since the medical stuff they talked was obvious trash.

For every Alex Jones, there's a counterpart in a different language/culture/country that is also selling snake oil (figuratively and possibly literally).

Carhole · Feb 26, 2023

We got Mom and Dad off to Stanford. For a minute here I was questioning whether or not she’d get in the car thst my wife so generously offered as their chauffeur to start the trip, however this morning I was pleasantly surprised by Mom’s excitement to go on a trip. She is back to not believing that she has cancer but at least she’s heading to a place that won’t let her fuck around to find out the hard way.

DrWebster · Feb 27, 2023

Ugh, starting to feel some of this now. Dad had a hip replacement a month ago and had been recovering well, but late Saturday night started feeling faint. Ended up passing out while trying to climb into bed (because of course he'd rather try to sleep it off than get medical help). There was no way Mom could drag his ass to the car to drive him to the hospital, so they ended up calling an ambulance. Turned out he'd gotten some blood clots in his lungs that they had to suck out. Mom was trying to make it sound like it wasn't Dad's fault (something about he should have been put on blood thinners after the surgery, but the doc just prescribed aspirin instead), but my wife knows someone who underwent similar surgery and apparently blood clots are commonly caused by lack of activity...which doesn't surprise me.

What sucks is that Mom tried to call at like 3am on Sunday to tell me what was going on, but I slept through it and didn't find out until later when I got a text from my sister. She slept through the call too and Mom was understanding, but I'm going to have to pay more attention to these things as this is definitely not the last time this sort of thing will come up. Thankfully while my folks live a few states away, my sister is just a half-mile away from them. But it's just a matter of time before a call comes where I have to do a last-minute, urgent road trip.

thekaj · Feb 27, 2023

Mom re-broke her leg 3 weeks ago today. She went in to the doctor to have the staples removed from the incision and got an x-ray of the bone. Doctor chewed her out for it not nearly being as healed as it should be, and (empty) threatened to put her in a rehab facility so she'd stay off it as instructed.

I've made the comment to my siblings before that the same reasoning behind the shooting of a horse when it breaks its leg applies here. She just won't follow doctor's orders if it isn't something easy like swallow a pill on schedule or surgery that makes it all better instantly. We've got her set up so that she doesn't need to move around much at all. Neighbors and friends go over daily to check on her, and we've offered to help pay for in-home care. But she still finds things that she HAS to get up and walk around to do, and is then shocked when the doctor calls out that she's not healing properly.

There's also the martyr angle going strong. My brother called her the other day, after the doctor's visit, and said that she was in good spirits. Said she was feeling better and thought she was improving. The next day, she posted on Facebook, lamenting the pain and suffering she's going through and having to rely on friends and neighbors to get through the day. My sister called that night, thinking she must have had a bad day. Mom was right back to being upbeat and saying she was improving, again brushing off the suggestion that we get a professional care provider to help out. That's the super annoying thing. She WANTS the attention and sympathy from all the friends who have to disrupt their lives to come over and help out. And she loves using social media to broadcast out her lamentations, so she can feed off the sympathetic comments. But do anything to fix the issues that she's lamenting about? Get a professional (who won't dole out the sympathy), go into short-term care, come over and stay with one of us? God no! She doesn't want to be a burden.

Defenestrar · Feb 27, 2023

My dad just asked me to get power of attorney on his behalf so I can read and sign documents for him and manage banking/retirement things. He was acutely blinded about three years ago and he and my mother are getting a divorce (which is a whole other story of cognitive stuff), so he'll need someone else to handle his business. He's also planning to move about seven hours away (back to where they lived pre-retirement) so I'll get to do it all via phone/internet. Any advice on the PoA front? I've had medical PoA for years with respect to my wife (and she for me), but durable PoA is a different thing entirely. What do you do if you're told to sign something you don't agree with, or think is a good idea? (like transferring a check to that Nigerian Prince)? Are you obligated to follow those wishes?

Defenestrar · Feb 27, 2023

thekaj said:
Mom re-broke her leg 3 weeks ago today. She went in to the doctor to have the staples removed from the incision and got an x-ray of the bone. Doctor chewed her out for it not nearly being as healed as it should be, and (empty) threatened to put her in a rehab facility so she'd stay off it as instructed.

I've made the comment to my siblings before that the same reasoning behind the shooting of a horse when it breaks its leg applies here. She just won't follow doctor's orders if it isn't something easy like swallow a pill on schedule or surgery that makes it all better instantly. We've got her set up so that she doesn't need to move around much at all. Neighbors and friends go over daily to check on her, and we've offered to help pay for in-home care. But she still finds things that she HAS to get up and walk around to do, and is then shocked when the doctor calls out that she's not healing properly.

There's also the martyr angle going strong. My brother called her the other day, after the doctor's visit, and said that she was in good spirits. Said she was feeling better and thought she was improving. The next day, she posted on Facebook, lamenting the pain and suffering she's going through and having to rely on friends and neighbors to get through the day. My sister called that night, thinking she must have had a bad day. Mom was right back to being upbeat and saying she was improving, again brushing off the suggestion that we get a professional care provider to help out. That's the super annoying thing. She WANTS the attention and sympathy from all the friends who have to disrupt their lives to come over and help out. And she loves using social media to broadcast out her lamentations, so she can feed off the sympathetic comments. But do anything to fix the issues that she's lamenting about? Get a professional (who won't dole out the sympathy), go into short-term care, come over and stay with one of us? God no! She doesn't want to be a burden.

Arrange for a "winning drawing" to go on an Alaskan cruise? Not-a-burden forced rest?

DrWebster · Feb 27, 2023

Defenestrar said:
My dad just asked me to get power of attorney on his behalf so I can read and sign documents for him and manage banking/retirement things. He was acutely blinded about three years ago and he and my mother are getting a divorce (which is a whole other story of cognitive stuff), so he'll need someone else to handle his business. He's also planning to move about seven hours away (back to where they lived pre-retirement) so I'll get to do it all via phone/internet. Any advice on the PoA front? I've had medical PoA for years with respect to my wife (and she for me), but durable PoA is a different thing entirely. What do you do if you're told to sign something you don't agree with, or think is a good idea? (like transferring a check to that Nigerian Prince)? Are you obligated to follow those wishes?

IANAL but PoA to me means you're empowered to do what's in the best interest of the person. If what that person wants you to do for them conflicts with what's in their best interest, you ave the ability (and some would claim the obligation) to decline to do so. I'd imagine a court would be sympathetic should such a situation escalate to the point where they'd need to hear it -- you'd been given a PoA for a reason, and would hopefully be able to demonstrate that your actions were done in good faith and that the other person was not of sound mind when asking you to execute on something that would harm them.

Parenting your parents

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