Cockroach cafe - Spring in autumn

[GnomeDePlume]

A new thread for those of us dealing with elderly family members. All welcome.

A place to rant, discuss, vent, decompress. No judgement just solidarity.

@Raven08 and @CrazyGoatLady gosh both sets of relatives are cheeky feckers indeed.

Can’t understand the form indeed - I would point them towards the age concern website- lots of useful info there on form filling.

@rookiemere
Good idea! 😄

Raven08, I'm sure it's performative uselessness so that you take over.

I'm sure you're right! ☺️
It's interesting

@TrayofRosesWhether you plan to actually visit or not, I would start dropping snippets into your conversations with your siblings and see how they react to suggesting you go and visit them for a holiday either with or without your mum.

I bet they will say you shouldn’t leave your mum home alone as they know she needs help. And they won’t want you to travel with your mum as that will mean they have to face up to the changes she is exhibiting and help resolve it. But it might help shift their attitudes a bit to suggest you visit. Or maybe pick the one who would be most receptive to hearing it and tell them you need them to plan a visit home to see how your mum is these days and give you a break.

Definitely. do not step in @Raven08 just ask sweetly which bit of the form she doesn’t understand and ‘are there no notes to help you? Do you think we need to pay a solicitor to do it?’

My parents did the POAs about a decade ago entirely off their own bat before I had even considered they were needed. They used a solicitor and spent about £1k on them when I could easily have helped them as I wasn’t doing any care for them back then.

Tell your sister a solicitor would love to get £1k for filling in a form.

@Choux
I know! Crazy money (I think that you could get a refund a few years ago for overpriced solicitor fees..)

@CrazyGoatLady nodding along at your comment about 'for every bad thing there must be someone to blame'. My DM and B very much have this attitude. B also believes that there is also always a way to fix any problem. Putting the 2 together, his attitude is that any problem is someone else's fault so someone else must step in and find a way to fix it- if he has to feel any consequences it is deeply unfair. In the past, our parents have always backed up this view of life and have stepped in to sort everything out for him and make everything OK. He's not at all prepared or able to accept that with elderly parents there will be problems that are no one's fault and don't have solution.

@Raven08 The 'clueless' siblings sounds like strategic incompetence. My family are masters at this. If anything's time consuming, uninteresting and generally a pain in the arse they will claim not to be able to work out how to do it, or make such a poor attempt that someone else (me) has to come in and do it again. Yet somehow they manage to hold down jobs etc and manage to work out how to do things that are interesting/important to them. As an example, B took mum to the GP for an appointment where she was sent home with some monitoring equipment. He knows that whoever takes her needs to accompany her in the appointment as she gets confused and knows that when I take her I write down any advice etc and send him and mum a message with anything important. When I asked him for info about what she's supposed to do, how long for, when does she return the equipment, when is her next appointment etc he claimed he 'couldn't remember' and 'you know I don't do admin stuff- you'd better check so we don't get it wrong'. So I had to spend ages calling the GP and hospital to find out, and was told that they'd been given a follow up appointment date/time and a leaflet with info (which was later found in Bs pocket). So of course, for the follow up appointment and pretty much everything since it's been 'You'd better sort all that, I'd only make a mess of it'.

@teaandbigsticks
Omg, that makes me utterly furious on your behalf! 😡
I vividly remember having a shouting argument over the phone with my brother when mum was seriously ill 3 years ago...
He wasn't going to visit...so I asked him if I should call him if she was dying or not bother?
That was also the admission when my sister went on a 4 day city break!
Mums already mentioned my holidays this year so I'm waiting for my siblings to comment 🙄😬

@Raven08 I bet they will see things differently when it's you taking a break. To be honest, B's strategic incompetence is part of the reason I'm taking a step back until he and DM accept that we actually need to look at sustainable care options. I'm still doing loads behind the scenes and managing her medical assessments/appointments but it had got to the stage where they were both adamant that mum can cope perfectly well, no external help is needed and nothing should be changed to make things easier but calling me almost daily to go over (a 3 hour min round trip, plus time there) and sort out some problem that could have been entirely avoided. I'm hoping that either they will realise we do need to make proper plans or failing that B will realise that if he's going to take on caring responsibilities he has to do it properly or sort things out himself.

@teaandbigsticks
Tbh I've stepped back from it all.
I've passed on all the info for her dr online log in, when meds need picking up, appointments coming up etc
They've happily sat back and watched me do it for 12 years...
My turn

I'm hoping to have a temp job by next month so my availability will be limited

...and if I'm honest, I think mum will be happier long term with my brother running around after her 🤷‍♀️

@Raven08 I'm silently cheering you on from the sidelines.

I need to vent. I live in the same city as my mother. My brother lives about 20
mikes away and visits about once a year . My sister lives a ten hour drive away. I’ve never got on with my mother. I’ve always been the black sheep and she’s always favoured my sister .
Anyway, stupidly moved back to home town some years ago for various reasons and found myself doing everything for her. I have joint POA with my siblings, but I manage the money and pay bills. Sort out crises , get demands to do this and that. I unravelled a financial mess I knew nothing about and have have done a LOT. I have also witnessed her decline. I would say she has quite serious mental decline and is losing her faculties. Gets confused , mood swings etc. I have had many fallings out with her and long periods of NC as she can be incredibly nasty .

Anyway, she has got to the point that she treats me like an unpaid servant .She has no empathy and little real interest in her grandchildren or great grandchildren unless it’s for show. So she likes to have photos to show her friends but isn’t much engaged really.

I have wanted to move away for a long time to be closer to two of my children . She dreads this, but I cannot be her servant much longer. Recently I heard a conversation inadvertently between her and my sister in which she was spiteful and dismissive of me and unkind about my family. Also some praise which my sister ignored, because my sisters agenda is to freeze me out, so my mother tries to appease her by slagging me off.

Since then I have not returned her calls and ignored her messages apart from brief one line replies. I am putting the house on the market and haven’t told her. I just feel very sad. Used, abused and hurt. I don’t want to block her as I have done in the past because she’s 89 . On the other hand I just don’t want to engage with her anymore. She hasn’t seen OH for a year as she insulted him and he’s done with her.

She’s very religious and that is her life. So she has lots of ‘friends’ in her religion although they aren’t people she seems to confide in and are much younger than her. They will help her and support her though if she needs it.

How should I handle this?

@MarieClairedelune

You've already pulled back a little and put your house on the market . So in regard on how to handle it , I think you already are .
You've made the correct decision to prioritise yourself and family and other than writing down what you do for her and details of the companies you deal with to hand to your siblings when they have to step up to the mark then there is not much else that needs to be done .

@MarieClairedelune
You are doing the right thing
I wish we could move, but until at least next year its just not feasible 😕

I'm going out with a friend tonight so looking forward to that.

@Raven08 also cheering you on and @MarieClairedelune good luck with your move. Your mum can't expect you to put your life on hold. If she wants to play favourites, and the siblings want to collude in that, let them take the lead.

DM now struggling with chewing and swallowing. Of course DB cant accept that this is simply how dementia progresses, it has to be the fault of the CH not providing quality food.

Any road up, CH going to contact hospital for advice. Given how long the hospital takes to respond about anything this will be another of 'yesterday's problems' very soon.

@GnomeDePlume if the hospital responds, they might suggest that awful thickener to mix in with your mother's fluids. Honestly, I'd rather be dead than have to swallow that.

@GnomeDePlume sending good thoughts to you during this excruciating time watching your mum exit this life inch by inch. Every time I read your post I want to take hold of your DB and give him a good shake. (And @teaandbigsticks )

Thank you @funnelfan excruciating is the perfect word for it.

@TheBroonOneAndTheWhiteOne weirdly DM seems okay with liquids. It is the combination of chewing and swallowing which is the issue.

I think DB's problem is that he has done next to no reading around dementia and so thinks it is just a memory thing. If everyone around her tried just a bit harder then she would get better.

@GnomeDePlume I agree that excruciating is the word 💐

We’ve found ourselves in a similar situation after a sudden decline. Our Dad is struggling to swallow and even drinking is in laboured sips. He has started to hold food in his mouth as I think swallowing is just hard work. But I don’t think he has much appetite and would absolutely hate thickened fluids.

I’m not sure what mouth care I should be asking for but I really don’t think he would want a feeding tube or anything else to prolong his existence and hoping siblings don’t ask for or agree to this on a visit.

@FiniteSagacity and @GnomeDePlume we were really lucky (?) with DF as he had oral cancer and was very very clear when he got his stage 4 diagnosis that he did not want tube feeding or to have any oral intervention at all and to let him stop eating and drinking if that’s what happened which it was. He stopped being able to swallow food not long after that. He went really quickly but there were no moral quandaries about what kind of intervention he should or shouldn’t have. Sending a handhold.