Sad thread about care homes and visitors

[Strawberriesandpears]

There is a really sad thread running over on the AIBU board regarding elderly people who don't have visitors to their care home.

A lot of posters are talking about elderly people having been abusive to their families or citing various others reasons why they don't 'deserve' visits.

I think a lot of them don't understand however that some people just genuinely have nobody. If like me, you are an only child, and don't have children, just who will be there - probably nobody.

I have hopes of being a kind old elderly soul who volunteers with charities and things and hopefully makes friends through that. However, someone said that friends and neighbours won't visit and that 'children and grandchildren would be the norm'. They are probably right - at least about the latter.

I don't know why I am posting really. Just to say that I am upset. I don't think people from big families can appreciate what it is like for some of us.

You can call me what you like, I think befriending women with the secret intention of making them responsible for your care when you’re elderly is a rotten thing to do. I don’t mean reciprocal friendships where you may end up doing the same for them, I mean actively selecting younger people just as an insurance for if you end up in a care home. Having any degree of responsibility for an elderly person is very stressful, you can’t just do it on the sly. As I said saving for paid care or companionship is much better.

I was upset by that thread too OP, I fully expect to have no visitors in the care home in my old age as I have no DC and I can’t stand my sister. It was like the ghost of Christmas Future to be honest.

I agree with you, OP: I am in a very similar situation.

Plus some people have children who have married and moved to other countries or whose children died before them. I think it also depends how old you are. If you’re very old then your friends won’t be around because they also will have died and your work colleagues will probably also have died and the place where you work simply won’t remember you.

I remember someone saying that her mother had died at a very old age and virtually no one had come to the funeral. What she pointed out was that had her mother died 20 years earlier, the funeral would’ve been packed because there was so many colleagues from charities she was involved with, and people who remember her from work and so on.

The other thing, which we are all aware of, is that almost every organisation you can think of assumes that an old person will have family who can step up and fill in the gaps and make arrangements with agencies and social care and so on. That isn’t directly relevant to a care home, once you are elderly and move into a care home, you still need someone to take care of the bills and look out for you. If you want to stay at home, and many of us do, you have the home to look after bills to pay and help to arrange. We are just not going to have that help. I really think that there is an opening for solicitors, nursing agencies and charities to fill that gap. I think there was a post in hospitals, many years ago, called an almoner, but we have nothing now.

It’s really, really difficult. However much one wants to think ahead and make arrangements there is very little that one can put in place.

I agree with this OP. I have full sympathy with your anxiety but you've been posting about this for many years now and almost every single post alludes to you either being an only child or this perceived notion you'll be alone when you're older. People have given you great advice on the many many threads and posts on this yet you don't actually seem to take any on this on board, or seem motivated to actually change your situation.

You've said you've made a choice to not have a child as you think they will be lonely without any evidence this will be true. It's fine to not want children but own that decision and move forward with your life instead of painting yourself as some sad, tragic helpless victim. If you're choosing to spend your life as a young person obsessively researching retirement villages that may not exist instead of living your life and constantly seeking reassurance that just fuels your OCD instead of seeking proper treatment, again own that decision and take responsibility for it.

Being an only child isn't a tragic thing that has happened to you. People in big families don't have it better. I think you're so caught up in this fantasy in your head of having a best friend sibling with nieces and nephews that would look after you and provide you with company in your old age that you've lost sight of what the reality would be. The reality is if you did have nieces and nephews, they would have maybe moved away, be occupied with their own elderly parents, in-laws, friends and own family that you as an auntie would be low down their list of priorities.

I work in social care and without fail, every big family I meet is beset with drama, fallings out and lots of tension. It is rarely the happy scenario you think it us. Similarly I've met lots of people who are elderly only children and people with no children who have solid networks of people around them as they've had the time to invest in these.

Nothing in life is guaranteed whether it's having children or big families. I think the sooner you accept this, stop thinking yourself as a victim, get proper help for your OCD and take meaningful action to live a purposeful life instead of this constant obsessive cycle you're in, you'll find you're anxiety lifts and you'll be able to build on a support network

Your original post has been deleted by Mumsnet now, but nobody said that people were looking to make friends to make them 'responsible for their care'. We are talking about care home visits - the care home is responsible for the care. This is about a desire for a small amount of human connection, and not to feel completely forgotten at the end of life.

Some people here are childless not by choice, and some of us have no nieces or nephews either (which we cannot help). I, and others, find this topic extremely upsetting. Your words are not helping.

Try and not think about it too much, you may make a friend in a care home if you are one of the 15% who go into one.
None of us know what our future holds. I’ve spoke to my American friend about the same topic, she is wealthy and has built what she calls a caretakers room in her house which is baisically self contained accommodation for a live in carer. She has made a living will, I don’t know if this a thing here, her plans may or may not work, nobody knows.
Do what you can now but don’t upset thinking about it too much.

I’ve worked in many care homes. There are residents that have no one visit - some of them have a lot of family (I’ve been to some of their funerals which had a lot of people there, but none had visited during the many years they were there for whatever reason). There were also people that had friends and church members visit regularly so not having a family doesn’t mean you won’t be visited.

I don’t know but I can give you my experience?
I volunteered for the age uk befriended service in my late teens/ early 20s. I was paired with a lovely gent who had no family at all. I visited him regularly. He came to family christmases, watched my children grow.
when he was put into a care home, I visited him 3 times a week. My sister, Kids, parents also made the time to see him regularly.

he got far more visits that people on there with lots of family members.

Thank you. I absolutely take on board what you are saying, and I am working on my support network. In many ways I am living a double life - trying to go about my life as best I can, yet living with this constant and draining anxiety and dread for the future. It's so hard too when you are surrounded by people with children and siblings and extended family. I completely appreciate that nieces and nephews would not necessarily be the 'answer', however in my family, childless relatives have always been looked out for by nieces and nephews, and indeed, I will be expected to take on that role for some of my aunties and uncles (as well as my parents of course).

I can see that I am not alone in my fear. I mean look at the recent post by @HoppityBun

"Similarly I've met lots of people who are elderly only children and people with no children who have solid networks of people around them as they've had the time to invest in these."

This does bring me hope! I do in some ways believe I can build a network, but threads like that care home visitors one shoot that down and make me worry again.

Oh that is wonderful to hear! I actually volunteer with the Age UK befriending service too. I only started fairly recently, but I would also like to get involved with their face to face befriending service.

I am sorry you are in a similar situation and share my worries.

"However much one wants to think ahead and make arrangements there is very little that one can put in place."

This stands out to me. I am a planner. I like to look and think ahead and take responsibility for myself, but in this case, I just can't. I have this overwhelming feeling that I'll be a burden - not on a specific person, but on society in general, which will have an aging population.

Practically for some of the concerns you list - I don't think paying care home bills will in the future will be a huge problem. There will probably be some kind of automated AI solution, and even now, you can pay a solicitor to oversee that for you, I believe. Advocacy is harder, but again there are services you can pay for.

Oh please go for it. I had over 10 years of wonderful memories and a bonus grandpa from it! ❤️

I think this is a really interesting conversation and something i’m wondering about with my mum for example.

I, like a lot of people my age, have moved away from home for education and work. I live nearly 3 hours away from my mum. If she were to need care, it then would then be a toss up between her coming to live nearer me and having no local friends, or staying in her hometown but not having family. I think the increase in children moving to other places is a big factor in the issue you describe.

In which case there will be other residents to befriend and the staff will likely be very pleasant. My mum works as a carer - she does more companion type things, taking them out of the day, or to the hairdressers, as well as an hour on Christmas Day for a mince pie and a chat (all from their homes). Why not put aside some money for something like that?

There was a post further up where somebody said they simply intend to make friends ‘of all ages’ in the hope one of them ‘will advocate for me if needed’.

I suppose what makes me defensive is as somebody with children, the amount of work that goes into caring for them on a daily basis is huge. Unless you’re a parent you can’t actually comprehend it - it’s 24 hours a day for many years, wiping bottoms, putting their shoes on, making every single meal, getting up at all hours of the night, being hypervigilant for the first 3 years making sure they don’t injure themselves or put something in their mouth, 2 school runs a day for 7+ years. You do it unwell, you do it hungover, you do it upset, you do it with PMT. You get up at 5 or 6am every single day, including birthdays and Christmas and holidays, for years. It doesn’t matter what your feelings are, 24 hours a day for years you are caring. So yes it irks me that in some cases, some people think after a lifetime of holidays and ‘me time’ that women that have cared for children should be befriended simply to provide more care. Most of us don’t want to. We’re exhausted.

As I said, this is just another way of imposing an unpaid caring burden on women. There are lots of excellent paid carers out there so why not bank on that instead? Then it’s a fair exchange of labour for money.

Edit: I also want to add that care homes are very very quick to impose duties on a visitor if they’re ’all the elderly person has’. It won’t be a visit a month, they’ll probably call them if you fall in the night etc - is that fair on them?

Thank you for your thoughts. Unfortunately, I don’t think it’s as straightforward as you suggest. Posts on here and discussions with friends in a similar situation and observations of the care that people do or don’t get when they are very frail support this. There is an international debate about what to do.

Practically for some of the concerns you list - I don't think paying care home bills will in the future will be a huge problem. There will probably be some kind of automated AI solution, and even now, you can pay a solicitor to oversee that for you, I believe. Advocacy is harder, but again there are services you can pay for.

Solicitirs cost a lot and most of us are going to struggle to pay care home fees. Solicitors will not arrange for people to come in and look after you or to take note of what maintenance your home needs, book the optician, notice that your hearing aide battery needs replacing and deal with all that.

I do have a little experience of solicitors looking after elderly people but this is where a trust was involved. They are professional people and need to pay their offices and staff and it takes a significant whack of fees to do. It’s not directly a legal matter if there is no trust to administer. The wills , trust and probate department of a solicitors would deal with sime aspects but not the day to day arrangements for care that we need. The days of the friendly local family Solicitor like you get an Agatha Christie novel simply aren’t here anymore.

There already is automatic payment of bills, but what you want to somebody checking these over and review the charges. If the charges change then you might want to renegotiate or decide what level of care you want. You’re going to have to ring up when the carer doesn’t arrive, or when they do arrive and don’t do a good job or when the other very ordinary matters of looking after a home arise. I know from direct experience in my family, that the frailer you are, the harder and harder it is to do the most ordinary things. Everything closes down and you do the absolute minimum, because you are tired, your body is stiff and basically you exist from hour to hour, except for booking and then waiting for the next Tesco delivery.

You say that “there are services you can pay for“. In fact there are none that will get to know you, oversee your home arrangements and advocate for you in a hospital or to the care home about the care that you’re receiving, all with your best interests at heart. There is nothing that can substitute for a partner or a child to keep an eagle and caring eye on what’s going on, to point out to the doctors that you haven’t received your medication or that the medical records are not correct.

There are lasting powers of attorney, but some of us don’t have anyone to put in this role. It simply is not feasible for most of us to pay to instruct a solicitor to do that role

I fully appreciate your points.

Maybe I am slightly more optimistic because I have the funds to pay to live in a retirement village (a continuing care community) with different levels of care. It starts with independent living (in a bungalow or flat) and all home maintenance is provided. In an emergency, you can call the onsite team (there 24 hours a day) and if you are ill or need help after a hospital stay, they will arrange for you to receive respite in one of their care services. If your long term needs change over time, there are different levels of care you can move to (supported apartments, right up to dementia care).

This certainly doesn't solve all the problems, I know, but it does provide some comfort, I think.

I appreciate this option is expensive though, and not everyone will be able to afford it.

Oh well. I know of one place like that, hundreds of miles away from where I live and not in a million years will I be able to afford it. Even many children of people who are in there now will find it difficult to afford.

And I think it’s “most people” rather than “not everyone”. Otoh it’s a fabulous place and if I could afford it, I’d not be worried at all.

I really wish that such solutions were more affordable. It's not guaranteed that I will be able to afford it, I just hope to! I think continuing care communities are much more common in the USA, and are more accessible to all. I'd like to see more of them in the UK.

I have lots of recent experience of older people and care homes. Old people are just like young people - some are bloody horrible and some are really lovely, with lots of people falling at some place on the spectrum in between. People dont have an automatic personality change when they grow old and all become friendly and twinkly.

Some of the people in my mums care home were horrible. Really horrible. Horrible to the staff and horrible to each other. They didn't have visitors and I wasn't suprised. They were very unlikable.

My mum had late stage dementia and and had some very challenging behaviours. But at heart she was a lovely and loving person amd that shone through. And when she died, the staff said how upset they were and how much they would miss her. We visited her several times a week.

OP - if you are a good person who makes friends and puts love into this world, it will come back to you when you're older. And even if you end up in a care home with few visitors because of circumstances you cant plan for now, you'll still have a good chance of being loved and cared for because of the person you are. We tend to reap what we sow.

I think it’s unlikely - the economic skew has been very much toward the elderly for decades and I doubt any party would win on a ‘free care community’ manifesto.

I said 'continuing care communities' not 'free care community'. It wouldn't be free. And they wouldn't necessarily be government funded either. I don't believe the ones in the USA are.

Here is a definition of a continuing care community:

'A Continuing Care Community is a residential community designed to provide a continuum of care for older adults as they age. These communities offer a range of housing options, from independent living apartments to assisted living units and skilled nursing facilities, all within one campus. The main advantage of Continuing Care Communities is that they allow residents to transition smoothly from one level of care to another as their healthcare needs change over time. Residents can enjoy all the available amenities and live their best lives while receiving appropriate levels of care as their needs evolve.'

A lot of the continuing care communities in the UK currently are 'luxury' type developments - they have swimming pools, fancy restaurants etc. I'd like to see some that offer the basics required for a fulfilling elderly life so that they are more affordable to a wider range of people.

But things being made ‘more affordable’ inevitably means taxpayer funded in some way.

No, it doesn't. Commercial companies could see the opportunity to create such developments. They could build quite large sites which, for example, take advantage of economies of scale. Some care processes will inevitably be taken over by AI too, which could make things more efficient and therefore cost effective.

Why haven’t they already done this?

Thank you, that's very kind of you to say.

I like that you ended your positive message with "We tend to reap what we sow." Because that phrase was used a lot on the other thread, but with very much a negative meaning - that if you are alone at the end of life, it is your own 'fault' that you have no family.