drinking and falling

[toofishy]

my mum is 87 lives alone and on the whole is fairly independent .
Between my bother and i we see her at least once a week each plus always cover weekends.
For both of us it's a 2 hour ish trip there and back each time.
She refuses to stay with either of us for an evening.
She has always liked a drink but is now beginning to get drunk at night and fall over.
the alarm people call us and we go over to find her incontnient confused etc.
The next day she has no recollection of this and becomes very angry .
I now dread going to bed as i am awaiting the call.
Has anyone else had this? Any ideas for how to get through this until she inevitably has an injury requiring hospital ?

If it's a council alarm service they will have a team that will turn out, it might be a five hour wait but it could be that for the ambulance service. My mother's alarm service let me specify hours where I was available. Your mother has a choice to drink excessively or not, you have a choice whether to turn out or not. You have to decide what your limits are and then stick to it - if that means no call out after 11pm then put your phone on silent at that time.

But what will happen if....? The alarm service will send their own team out or call an ambulance. There are many people with no close family to call out and there is a service for them. I would say that if you live an hour away you don't count as "close" anyway.

I agree with Knok. You're going to have to decide whether you're there fir all falls it just certain hours.

Has your DM given you POA and has she had a recent Social Care Needs Assessment?

yes I did have a conversation with her yesterday but she is adamant that she is not drinking or causing us any problems
we have both tried to persuade her to live nearer but she probably relies on her neighbours who are a motley bunch to get the vodka for her.
yes i'll sit with mybrother make some criteria and than tell her our decision.
it's just so wearing

Tell her you won’t rush to her side next time. And mean it, if only just the once. She’s being selfish.

Yes, you'll have to tell her that

I don't know of any services that have their own team - I know it exists in some areas, so perhaps look into that.

otherwise, if they can't get you, they might send an ambulance, which is a shame if she's unhurt and just a PFO which can wait till a more civilised hour. Really it's not fair to call anyone in that situation though.

does she have any conditions that cause her to genuinely forget, or not realise what she is doing?

Does her GO know about the drinking? I know that's unlikely if she's denying it to you, but it might be worth sending them an email saying that you don't want any information from them, you just want to make them aware that she's having regular falls due to alcohol consumption and you feel that she needs a Social Care Needs Assessment.

It all sounds very stressful for you and I'm really sorry I don't really have many suggestions for you, as it sounds like she has capacity to make the decision to drink if she wants to.

I would just point out that while you absolutely can state you aren't available after a certain time and to call an ambulance to assist her up, it's important you're aware that falls like this are categorised as low priority and it is likely, depending on your area, that your mum will be lying on the floor all night if ambulance demand is high (which it constantly is across the country atm sadly). This can lead to further complications such as rhabdomyolosis caused by lying in one position for a long time which can be life threatening, as well as pressure sores etc. I completely appreciate how stressful and draining it must be for you to be constantly dealing with these alarm calls - some areas do have a designated falls team who are separate to the ambulance service and manage to attend patients in a much quicker time frame. I would see if these teams operate in your mums area as this could be a viable and safer alternative.

The only other thing I can think to suggest is to speak to her GP - they may be able to broach the subject of her drinking with her and come up with some solutions. They will also have a much better understanding of what support services are available in your area and have suggestions of what you can do.

It's a really difficult situation and it sounds like you've been doing a lot for her already. I wish you the best of luck getting the situation resolved! x

I'd speak to the neighbours that are buying the alcohol for her and ask them if they realise that she's having falls and if they will go and help her each time! Maybe they don't realise the situation?

Sorry if this is thick but how will a needs assessment be useful in a situation like this?
I ask because I know someone who has issues with her mum - early 70s and otherwise fine - but falling over from drinking and has had two injuries that needed A&E.

This was happening with my grandad recently and actually has just died today.

When he kept having a sherry and falling he ended up with some really nasty head gashes.
My mum had assessments and carers were coming in twice a day, my gran suffers from arthritis and is very sore a lot so she just couldn't look after him and after about 4 months of the carers coming in my grandad kept having falls still and he secured a place at a care home.
Then he just gradually faded away.

I think you're going to have to have her assessed

yes thankyou fir the advice.
i think there's not an awful lot we can do.
except draw our own boundaries.
The neighbours probably benefit as she most likely pays them to get the booze plus this morning there was evidence someone else had been in there yesterday drinking as well .
She is mentally completely fine - physically too if it wasn't fir the drinking

And my grandad was just having a sherry after lunch and at 6pm.
It doesn't take much for them to fall. But he also had aphasia and was just kind of slowly declining.

To a pp question why get her assessed?
Because she may not be able to live alone if she is at risk to injury

sorry to hear about your grandfather- a terrible end to a life

Definitely speak to neighbours and ask them not to get alcohol for her . Also ask them for their contact numbers so you can call them if she has fallen because of her access to booze !
They need to take some responsibility.

It’s possible she would fall anyway. My father fell regularly. He’s teetotal and always has been. So be prepared for the possibility that she will continue to fall even if you get the alcohol under control

Oh I see
but if she wants to live alone they can't do anything can they?

the person I'm thinking of is living with her husband anyway but he just thinks it's funny
(he didn't get called from work to go to A&E because he can't have his phone on him)

OP interesting that you found evidence someone else was there. I think you need to be factual and unemotional and ask your mum to provide another number to the careline.

If op has power of attorney she can

OP doesn't need POA to remove her name as a contact for community alarm. POA (if in place) won't be active if Mum still has capacity (and it sounds like she has)

You need to find out who visits her. Very often, older people who are vulnerable in some way (and if your mum drinks then she has a vulnerability) and can be taken advantage of. I know of cases where drinking 'friends' managed to get access to a bank account, and used the older person's money to fund their booze and plenty else.

hmmm this has been something we were concerned about but she is able to do as she pleases so v difficult to negotiate.
She has also always been very cagey about letting us know about her finances as if we would be the ones likely to fleece her.
I am grateful for all your advice and have arranged to meet up with her and my brother this weekend for a frank discussion

Hungry what is it you are thinking OP can do with the PofA?

OP I hope it goes well this weekend.

Horrible situation OP. Are you 100% sure that she’s falling due to booze? Reason I ask is that my mother (much younger) had a drink problem and collapsed several times. We assumed she’d been drinking but she swore not. Turned out she had a brain tumour.

Sorry to say this, but with experience I can say that you need to let her fail so that SS step in and force help on her.

@MrsRussell is the Elderly Parent Board's long suffering expert on dealing with such matters. I hope she doesn't mind me linking her but her experience is off the scale compared to some of us...

This is my dad , luckily my mum and niece live with him but a few times he hasn't been able to get up and we ve had to go .

He has also broken his teeth and at one point fell over the banister and had a spiral fracture from hip to ankle .

Unfortunately if you feel you can't do it anymore, you will have to let them literally fall down and reach rock bottom