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AIBU?

Share your dilemmas and get honest opinions from other Mumsnetters.

Original poster

Put me in a nursing home when the time comes

204 replies

MomOfTwoGirls2 · 01/12/2019 22:55

Rant alert.
Ddad needs 24/7 care. One of 7 siblings. Main care falling to one sibling (not me) other 6 siblings assigned 1 day/overnight each.
This could go on for years.

This is not what I want for my children. If I’m lucky enough to reach old age, I want to be put in a nursing home and to let my children live their own lives.
Anybody else in same boat? AIBU??

OP posts:
Singlenotsingle · 03/12/2019 18:59

I couldn't agree more, Batley. I wouldn't want family taking on the role of carer, and neither would I want to get shipped off to God's waiting room, at the mercy of paid staff. Plus - I want my DC and GDC to benefit from my hard earned money, not see it wasted on care home fees. Switzerland here I come.

rhubarbcrumbles · 03/12/2019 19:07

@rozhuntleysstump I'd hope I've brought them up to have more empathy than to just shove me into a home when I've become inconvenient.

It's not a matter of not having empathy or about them becoming inconvenient, I'd love to be able to look after my elderly relative but due to his extreme behaviour caused by dementia there is no way I could have him living in our home without social services getting involved to protect my children. It's not as cut and dried as you make it out to be.

megletthesecond · 03/12/2019 19:14

I've told mine we'll have to build accessible granny flats at each of their houses and I'll get carers in. (Not fully planned this obviously).

mrssunshinexxx · 03/12/2019 19:16

Hell will freeze over before I put my parents in a home they can be very awful places BUT I don't live 60 miles away from mine and if I did I would be moving or I would move them

Maybe I'm in the minority but I believe if you have a good relationship with parents you should look after them in later life like they did with us at the start you only get one mum and dad

GunpowderGelatine · 03/12/2019 19:19

I agree OP and I am with you 100%. HOWEVER...it has been pointed out before that age can do horrible things to your mind and while you say that now you may not want it when you're older.

And not to diminish your hardship but count yourself lucky there's 7 of you. A colleague of mine looks after her mum 24/7 just about, her only sibling lives in Australia. She's is absolutely knackered and after 6 years of caring for her is finally considering a care home. My colleague is barely into her 50's!

GunpowderGelatine · 03/12/2019 19:21

And I'll be damned if I look after my (awful) mother in her old age. Hell would freeze over first. She can ask one of my (useless yet adored) brothers to do it

CallmeAngelina · 03/12/2019 19:30

Have you ever visited a nursing home ? There is no way I would put a loved one in one.
How many have you visited? The one my dad was in up until his death from cancer in September was absolutely first class. He was very happy there and the loving care they provided, supplementing our daily family visits, was awe-inspiring.

rhubarbcrumbles · 03/12/2019 19:30

Maybe I'm in the minority but I believe if you have a good relationship with parents you should look after them in later life like they did with us at the start you only get one mum and dad

It's a lovely idea but some of us don't have that luxury. I have had to choose between my children and my parent as both could not live in the same house.

helpfulperson · 03/12/2019 19:32

A nursing home was by far the best option for my parents. It meant my mum could get her life back after years of not being able to go out anywhere much because Dad found it too loud, too scary, didn't understand what was happening etc (alzheimers)

So Dad got 24 hr care in a safe secure environment and my mum could enjoy visiting him instead of spending all her time between visits from carers worrying about what was going to happen until the next carer arrived.

In terms of fabric and décor the home isn't great but in terms of caring staff it is amazing. They take time to help my non verbal Dad make choices about what he wants to eat, which polo shirt he wants to wear etc. They have an activity co-ordinator who knows what type of entertainer he enjoys and when to have him in his room with R3 on instead of the Elvis Impersonator

PretendLife · 03/12/2019 19:33

My mum is in a dementia care home, she wanted to go somewhere with other people, we chose a small home with 30 rooms. She has been there 4 years now and we visit every week. She is always clean and well cared for. The carers are lovely and have a laugh with the residents. We had a terrible time with mum in her own home, with wandering off and forgetting we had been as soon as we left. It is such a relief to have her with people who understand dementia and can cope with her. She self funded for 18 months then the local council took over, she stayed the same room, same care so we are very lucky.

PretendLife · 03/12/2019 19:35

What is it about old ladies and Elvis impersonators?!

capsule · 03/12/2019 19:40

My mum always used to say this but she is currently being cared for at home. The family provide some care and carers the rest.When it comes to it, nothing is as simple as it seems.

Supersimkin2 · 03/12/2019 19:41

In London a care home for one dementee costs two complete sets of university fees every year.

It's so sad. Not for the dementee, obviously.

RB68 · 03/12/2019 19:44

My parents have both been ill for some time. Mum died on 15th November this year so its still very fresh. She was 110 miles away. I did one weekend and one week each month. I am the eldest of 6 spread far and wide. It was hell until we forced the issue with social services and got her direct payments for care - Dad was too ill himself and needed to go for therapies and gym it was slowly killing him on top of the liver, heart and pancreas failure he was living with. We also had overnight help from Marie Curie nursing - they could only let us know the day before they could come that night - but it meant one of us didn't have to sit up with her by the bed. He got 22 hrs Direct payment support plus other allowances which meant he could pay a cleaner to come in every other week.

All in all it is doable at home BUT you need tight knit family - we still had rows and upsets but could move past it to an extent to deal with M&D, we couldn't all give the same time wise at least two teachers in there and also 3 of us with family of our own, the rest of us self employed so needing to work to pay bills etc. It was virtually impossible to work in the house when she was still mobile which she was until around 3 weeks before she died.

Having said that she died with the hands of 5 of us on her plus her husband and one of her sisters, it was comfortable and pain free, she faded. I would go like that to be honest. But we tried homes and she was upset, confused, neglected and half the time her clothes were inside out or back to front - others said that home was great...we didn't think so.

Death is hard, life is hard, caring for parents with dementia (or similar) is fucking hard, the system is not set up for it. You move from caring to palliative and suddenly funding is via someone else and that needs to be sorted, other services suddenly available when we needed them weeks ago bloody annoying.

If the patient is angry frustrated and scared its hard, if the illness makes them violent and restless its hard, they no longer know who you are and fear you its hard. There is no easy way really.

RozHuntleysStump · 03/12/2019 19:49

@rhubarbcrumbles I said I could provide basic care. Obviously severe dementia or health problems are different. I thought that was clear in my post.

helpfulperson · 03/12/2019 19:50

Funnily enough PretendLife the other residents love the Elvis Impersonator. I guess the 50's was their teenage music. I remember a fantastic thread on here talking about what music people fancied getting played in their care home to remind them of their youth. I wanted Bruce Springsteen and Meatloaf.

wintertime6 · 03/12/2019 20:04

I think it also depends on what you grew up with. I grew up with very elderly aunts and
GPs being cared for by family at home and it was very normal, despite them being very unwell and needing pretty much 24 hour care near the end.

I'm sorry but I can't imagine ever feeling resentful for ending up in the situation where you end up helping to look after your parents or family when the time comes, surely that's just the way life goes, and unless you've had a really awful upbringing, most people I know are very happy to be able to provide help to family when they need it??

rhubarbcrumbles · 03/12/2019 20:04

At the home where my aunt lives they have afternoons with music from WW2 which was before many of the residents were born/old enough to remember the tunes!

ssd · 03/12/2019 20:06

Put me in a nursing home.

Doesn't work like that.

The person you are now is very very different to the person you'll be in your 80s.

Trust me, I've seen it happen.

CallmeAngelina · 03/12/2019 20:33

In London a care home for one dementee costs two complete sets of university fees every year.

How are you calculating that? My dad's home ( on the south coast) was in excess of £6K per month, considerably more than I paid when both my kids were at Uni at the same time (he didn't have Dementia though).

BackforGood · 03/12/2019 22:59

Being a carer is no different than being a parent.

Don't be ridiculous. Quite apart from physical things like you tend to be young and healthy yourself when looking after your own small children, as opposed from nearing (or past) retirement age yourself. Apart from the fact that the person you are trying to bathe or help to the toilet might well weigh more than you do. Apart from the fact the person - if badly affected by dementia - may have become aggressive and violent.
There is the fact that when you work with little children, or 'parent' them, you are giving them skills and helping them develop skills that mean, over time you will no longer have to do this, that or the other for them. You teach them, they learn, they practice and refine, and then you no longer have to do that particular thing for them. With elderly parents who may have dementia or may have some physical or medical conditions, or maybe a combination, sadly, these skills are going to diminish, not improve.

I agree with @HopelessLayout, @thecatsthecats and others about being given a choice over our deaths. I definitely support the dignity in dying campaign.

Whichoneofyoudidthat · 03/12/2019 23:24

I’d rather be euthanised thanks all the same.

RhinoskinhaveI · 03/12/2019 23:31

One might say that being a carer is the polar opposite to being a parent, the inverse of being a parent ....the 'lord's prayer recited backwards' version of being a parent

RhinoskinhaveI · 03/12/2019 23:34

Being a parent is a journey of growth into independence, it is spring, being a carer for an elderly parent is winter

1300cakes · 04/12/2019 05:27

I don't think I would care for my parents. My mum didn't care for my grandmother at home, she got her in to a nursing home straight away when needed. But she visited every day and put lots of effort in to making her visits nice by really talking to gran, bringing her photos to look at, making cakes/treats for her, doing her hair etc.

Gran didn't really know where she was so the massive effort it would have taken to look after her at home would have been wasted.

I think this was the best outcome and I hope I can do the same if it comes to that. And I hope the same happens for me. I don't want my kids to resent me. Obviously I hope it doesn't come to that and I die in my sleep after a very independent life.

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