Active discussions

Meet the Other Phone. Only the apps you allow.

Meet the Other Phone.
Only the apps you allow.

Buy now

Please or to access all these features

Talk
AIBU?

Share your dilemmas and get honest opinions from other Mumsnetters.

Original poster

Heartbroken that I'm being forced to sell mum's house, she worked hard for it and paid her national insurance

999 replies

Jkoakham · 25/07/2018 09:28

And now her savings are running out I will need to sell her house to carry on funding it.

It all seems to very unfair, her house was supposed to be passed to me but instead it's affectively passed to government and private companies.

I thought the dimentia tax had been can cancelled?

OP posts:
SinisterBumFacedCat · 01/08/2018 22:24

Many forms of dementia aren't a result of lifestyle but genetic, like my dads. No amount of dieting or healthy living will change weather I inherited it or not.

Hotpinkangel19 · 01/08/2018 22:56

@ballseditupagain he did qualify, his place was CHC funded but they only had a double room available so I had to pay a 3rd party top up of £200 per week

crunchymint · 01/08/2018 23:57

Sinister I know. I had previously said that the most common form of dementia, Alzheimers, is not linked to lifestyle. And there are other types as well not linked to lifestyle. The majority of people with dementia can not do anything to avoid getting it unfortunately.

Lalliella · 02/08/2018 00:05

@crunchymint my dad had vascular dementia and none of those risk factors applied to him, he was previously in very good health and his blood pressure was low. Just one of those things sadly.

crunchymint · 02/08/2018 00:13

Sorry to hear that. They are risk factors. But sadly some people are just unlucky. Just as there is the occasional person who gets lung cancer in spite of never smoking and never living with a smoker.

IrmaFayLear · 02/08/2018 09:08

I don't think anyone who lives to a very great age can escape dementia. It's just another body part that disintegrates.

And it's poppycock that lifestyle dictates who gets dementia. The pil were the healthiest couple imaginable. No smoking, odd glass of wine (and certainly not when young), five a day, exercise, Benecol coming out of their ears, etc etc etc. Ended up with healthy bodies but cabbage brains.

As I said earlier, this is going to become an increasing problem as healthy 60-70 year olds will when they are older sit for donkeys' years in nursing homes in great physical shape, wolfing down the food, but completely unaware of who or where they are. This is what is going to bankrupt us all.

trickofthetail1 · 02/08/2018 09:53

I agree Irma, my relatives who developed Vascular Dementia were active non smokers who were not overweight, it seems to run in our family, three generations to my knowledge.

MeltingPregnantLady · 02/08/2018 10:14

Vascular dementia tends to come off the back of a brain injury stroke or Parkinson's.

Korsikoffs is the only true lifestyle dementia as it's found in alcoholics

OhTheRoses · 02/08/2018 10:15

Irma you do not wolf down food with severe dementia/alzheimers. You forget tl eat. First due time or putting on the oven and forgetting. Then due to no lonver knowing what to do with the food/what the knife and fork is for. The hunger signal gets lost. Then the skills to chew and swallow are lost.

This is where there is a real issue. If a person is still wolfing food, fit and healthy they probably can be cared for at home with some support. It's when the severity crosses that there is no longer care available and this should be funded because the collateral damage to ths health of carers becomes significant.

I will look after our mothers until they need they need 24/7 proper nursing care.

trickofthetail1 · 02/08/2018 10:36

Melting, that is interesting my DM was investigated for Parkinsons as she had a tremor but it was always diagnosed as being a benign tremor. It did make her condition even worse.

Bluelady · 02/08/2018 10:40

Yes, the "wolfing" has me somewhat mystified too. We couldn't get my mum to eat and she weighed about five stone at the end. Refusal or inability to eat is a classic dementia symptom.

MeltingPregnantLady · 02/08/2018 10:55

The body forgets to eat and eventually how to chew how to swallow and how to digest. If you've not hit this stage you do not have advanced dementia.

IrmaFayLear · 02/08/2018 11:30

Dementia clearly manifests itself in many ways.

Mil did have severe dementia - almost immobile, doubly incontinent and she went over time from raging to silence. She had to be fed, but the volume of food she could manage was large by any standards.

Fil has no knowledge of who he is, who his dcs are, where he is... but he eats a large breakfast, lunch, high tea and morning and afternoon cake in between. In fact since entering the nursing home (six years ago) he has become very overweight.

Jux · 02/08/2018 11:58

My mum died at 87 with no sign of dementia at all. She used to work in medical research in the very very early days (40s/50s) and always maintained that smoking made dementia less likely. She certainly bore out that belief (unfashionable though it is to ascribe any benefit to smoking at all, I know).

Bluelady · 02/08/2018 12:00

My mum had no sign of dementia at 87. Come her 90th birthday it fell off a cliff.

MeltingPregnantLady · 02/08/2018 12:05

My grandad was diagnosed at 95. He is unlikely to hit the latter stages of it due to his age.

Like I said earlier. It's like arthritis. Anyone can get it, every one is different, it's degenerative and there is no cure. Some forms are linked to other issues like stroke and Parkinson's or alcoholism others appear spontaneously. It's shit but it's a social disease not a medical one.

OhTheRoses · 02/08/2018 12:34

In Alzheimers and dementia parts of the brain degenerate. I swear very rarely but could you please explain how the fuck a degenerative disease that stops parts of the brain from working is a spcial disease rather than a clinical disease? Genuinely interested to know how you come to that conclusion Melting

MeltingPregnantLady · 02/08/2018 12:44

I'm not saying it's not a clinical diagnosis I'm saying the results of it cause social not medical issues as I and many others have said several times on this thread.

MeltingPregnantLady · 02/08/2018 12:46

In Alzheimers and dementia parts of the brain degenerate.

And in arthritis the joints degenerate. They both cause the same problems at moderate stages - have you ever been around someone with moderate to severe osteoarthritis of the spine? It's not a pleasant existence for them.

OhTheRoses · 02/08/2018 13:02

How is it a social issue when a body stops working?

A social issue is something that the right support can correct:

Poor parenting
Inadequate food
Lack of heating/light
Lack of education
Poverty or abuse in general
A crossover with some addictions although it is possible to recover.

A clinical disease results in permanent impediment which requires specialist support and care because no treatment or adjustment allows recovery or independence.

There is a world of difference between a social problem and a physical problem that requires a degree of social or clinical care because an individual simply can't rather than won't. Perhaps those with a degenerative disease should try a little harder?

jasjas1973 · 02/08/2018 13:04

I'm not saying it's not a clinical diagnosis I'm saying the results of it cause social not medical issues as I and many others have said several times on this thread

Rubbish, that just suits the Government because they can then get the individual to pay for their care.
People with Dementia, when it reaches the stage when they cant live at home, need nursing care that would, even in the last 30 years, been provided on a Geriatric long stay ward but to save money, these hospitals were closed down and the problem dumped into the community.
There is no comparison with a joint condition, where the patient can help and assist their careers.

OhTheRoses · 02/08/2018 13:05

Also how do arthritis and alzheimers cause the same problems? A person with arthritis can continue to communicate; a person with alzheimers cannot. A person with arthritis can make a living will. A person with alzheimers cannot. If a person with alzheimers has to sell their home the matter may have to ne referred to the cpurt of protection if there is no PofA.

MeltingPregnantLady · 02/08/2018 13:08

A person with dementia can communicate you just need to be patient and find appropriate ways to do so as the disease progresses. I'm not saying at the end it doesn't become a medical issue because it does but during the early to moderate stages it really isn't a medical issue.

There is a comparison to many other chronic health issues not just arthritis.

I get it is a horrible disease because it takes the person from you before they physically die but the problems it creates are not medical.

OhTheRoses · 02/08/2018 13:15

Gives up.
The end can be five years before death. Clearly you have very little knowledge of the matter.

OhTheRoses · 02/08/2018 13:19

It's not medical when the oesophagus constricts due to lack of use?
Not medical when bedsores take hold because the person forgets to move?
Not medical when another bit of brain goes and causes a tia?
Not medical when a uti arises due to wiping poo around the urethra
Not medical due to malnourishment
Not medical because the person can no longer say they are in pain
Not medical when the person has to be fed from a sippy cup?

Your ignorance is spectacular even for AIBU.