My mother was in assisted living and I visited every day. I knew too much about the “unassisted” living model. One of my Massachusetts friends takes turns with siblings to visit her father in assisted living in South Carolina, and lives a full life here. They have money and have hired a full time aide. Not sure being close helped my stress.
The thing is, which kid to be close to? The one in NYC who wants to take care of me, ultimately, also had years of health issues, got a PhD, and is finally thriving. She deserves a break and in 10 years, when I will probably need support, I don’t really want her to be responsible. Son is in CA and though our relationship is good, he will not be my caregiver. Third kid has lots of challenges and lives closest. Very healing presence but never answers phone and I don’t want to stress them.
One option I am going to try out this coming year is living in the city. Public transportation, grocery delivery and the “village” movement where we volunteer in exchange for services like a handyman is a possibility too. I would love to live in NYC near one of my kids, but want to give her space and am reluctant to leave the closer one. So it’s complicated.
The biggest stress of my kids right now is that I cannot find a good rental outside the city so, city it is. I welcome opinions on the best path to avoid stress on kids! It may be different for those of us without a spouse. Kids feel more responsible.
I did both - lived near my parents for 8 years of caregiving and then was forced to move way for my H’s job the last two years of their lives. My parents decided at that point to move to their snow bird property in FL. At that point, my brother and I were both a plane ride away. I was flying back and forth at least every other month (my brother going the months I wasn’t there) and even more trips when there was a hospitalization or crisis. I was also fielding phone calls daily both from my parents and the facility staff. Thankfully we had the resources to afford all the travel otherwise I don’t know what we would have done. I’m honestly not sure which was harder! They were both very stressful in different ways.
My plan is to do a CRCC near where my only child lives but with explicit instructions that I don’t want to see her more than once/week unless there is a crisis. I don’t think it matters much the location of the CRCC when people are still independent but once things start to go south health wise, I want the staff to know that there is family nearby keeping an eye on things and that my wishes are being respected.
There are 7 of us kids. We all live on same island and my parents did too. They moved to a CCRC 2 miles from their house. Most of us lived a 5-10 minute drive from their CCRC. My youngest brother lived furthest—1/2 hour drive or longer (depending on traffic). It was helpful to us that we were all within driving distance and could visit often. One or more of us would visit every day, but we tried to take turns as most were still working fulltime.
I felt the staff were more attentive because we were always there and helping and could point out anything that was needed, like getting grab bars & replacement light bulbs installed, toilet aids, etc.
Duting covid, we took mom out because they said they were locking down and no visitors — we felt mom would feel abandoned, especially if was literally the day of dad’s funeral. We kept mom at my place as long as we could, then my sister’s and then rotated her from house to house until she could move back and have visitors and 24/7 aides/companions.
I don’t know how you feel, but for me it would be exhausting to try and find new rentals like you’ve been doing. Finding a permanent place to be sounds heavenly!
Nothing has to be permanent.
My mom moved into one independent living and then moved to be closer to my sibling. I felt that she could have lived where she was first longer and it’s hasn’t been without its ups and downs but it was certainly doable. Most of the hiccups were my mom not liking change and having her own anxiety so that’s her and would not be everyone’s problem
Her first community was definitely younger, more mobile and active than the second. As my mom is less mobile than she was and older. Both have worked, both were very nice.
@deb922 thanks for the message on flexibility! I don’t have to feel like it is my final resting place I am looking at my top choice this week….Yes I am tired from moving !
I think I posted before that my friend (two friends, actually) moved to a continuing care community in Philadelphia. Buy-in not cheap but it’s a nonprofit run by Quakers. Huge windows and beautiful outdoor spaces, center city close to all public transportation.
@oldmom4896 the Quakers run the Kendal system too. I would be interested in the Philly one. Can you PM me? I love that it is in center city. I spent my first 6 years in Philly and was also there in late teens/early 20’s. Love the springtime there.
I plan to peek at a few when we are across country next month. I know we certainly are not prepared to be making any decisions but given them the long wait times I thought it was worth looking.
I’m hoping the type of CCRC we eventually move in to will completely absolve our son of having to do anything. Isn’t that what you’re paying for? I certainly don’t expect him to fly out if either I or DH are in crisis.
Different strokes for different folks. I don’t care how wonderful my CCRC may be, I’m not totally leaving my care up to them rather than one of my sons. And not flying out in a crisis (or non-crisis) is one reason my DIL has said that she wants us near.
Not even close ChoatieMom. A CCRC has strict rules about when they are required to call family. Any change in the care plan, any physical change in the resident, a fall, really any “incidents”, requests for more personal care items or clothing, and certainly a hospitalization.
Calls ranged from “your mom needs more socks” to “your mom refuses to get her hair done anymore” to “your mom was bitten by a squirrel (no joke!)”, to “your mom fell” and everything in between.
There were also occasions that we needed to hire private duty care for 24/7 round the clock monitoring otherwise she would have needed to go back to the hospital or to skill nursing and we didn’t want to move her again because her dementia would get worse.
Obviously if someone is healthy and independent, that’s totally different but once people are ill or have dementia and are in assisted living, the family responsibilities don’t evaporate.
Both Assisted Living and Nursing Facilities will call the primary contact for many reasons. I have received many calls ranging from your father is going to the hospital because his oxygen level is too low to your father needs a new phone charger. Not one call has necessitated me running to his facility to handle something (I have lived from 2 to 5 hours drive away). Mostly the calls are for information (informing me of a health issue), permission (can we give him a flu shot), or meeting a need (like the phone charger). I am sure there can be instances where you would need to help in person, but honestly they are rarer than you would think.
Even when my folks were in our “best” CCRC and we had hired 24/7 companions, we tried to have at least 1 of us visit every day. We would also get called if either parent wasn’t going well, fell, or lost a hearing aid or something else that was important to them. We were definitely notified if the CCRC wanted them to go to the hospital.
Even when mom was in skilled nursing, she really benefitted when we visited often and could coax her to eat and see that her progress fell far short of the glowing report of the therapists.
I think it is very helpful if aging loved ones live closer to those who would care about them aging safely, even if just to be able to have extra eyes from time to time to be sure things are going ok.
Interesting. When we moved my dad and his very frail wife into AL this past summer, my brother and I did not sign a thing. We made sure the contract was in their names, and they were listed as each other’s primary contact. I don’t know if his wife added her daughter to anything, but I doubt it because she was in the hospital more than she was in the facility, and her daughter never came out. My dad took a couple of falls there, too, one that required hospitalization, but we received no calls. We learned about the hospitalizations in a later phone call with my dad, but he was back at the facility mending.
We do not want our son bothered by any of our aging needs.
I suppose you could specifically state that your child is NOT to be notified, but we never did that with our folks as we WANTED to be kept informed. I think my kids would be upset if they weren’t kept informed as they would want to help if they felt we needed them.
That works if both spouses have their mental faculties and are each other’s POA and HC POAs. But you will need to have one emergency contact. If something happens to your spouse, you’d have to have someone else named. If you don’t want your son responsible, you should think about who your secondary person would be.
Exactly. Unfortunately, @ChoatieMom , somebody has to be responsible, unless one dies suddenly, with cognitive ability intact. But, the large majority aren’t in that category. So, someone will have to have POA or guardianship and be in charge of finances. You will need a health care proxy to make medical decisions when you can’t. Who will that be? And who will the back-up person be? Because you don’t just name one POA or Trustee, you name successors as well.
@ChoatieMom your experience was very different from mine. For one thing your parents were a couple. My mother, and now I, are by ourselves. That makes a difference in terms of independence and need for help. It also sounds like your folks maybe didn’t have dementia.
My mother did have dementia, vascular. I had to go to her assisted living constantly. Sometimes in the middle of the night. One time she had bowel obstruction that was dangerous. If she arrived in the ER without me, and they asked why she was there, she would have no idea. I guess the nurse at assisted living could have told them but she had 88 people to care for and I didn’t trust that communication. Also, decisions had to be made.
Residents in assisted living are tenants and can refuse help. My mother refused help with showers and the aides would just walk away. She also thought she could do things that she could no longer do. If she had a wound, she would constantly take the bandaging off. Assisted Living was not allowed to do wound care. So I had to drive over and put the bandages back on. I left notes and signs for my mother and she still took them off. I also was required to do the barrier change for colostomy and was required by the AL to train aides on how to clean, and provide supplies. I had to sign everything, with vaccines, care plans and eventually hospice. I could go on and on.
During COVID when I could not go inside, my mother kept sprouting squamous cell skin cancers. I asked the AL to check her but they didn’t. I would be at the screened window and have my mother show me her arms and put her leg up on the sill ! I found one literally every week or two.
I will say I also wanted the phone calls, even at 3am, because 90% of the time they would have sent her to the ER with, say, a nosebleed, and I told them to grab the supplies I left for that and basically try harder. Otherwise it would be ER for absolutely everything.
We have all had different experiences with parents. I wish I had a crystal ball about what will happen with me but I don’t. So far, memory is good, but two of my friends are already losing it. They don’t have kids and not sure what is going to happen to them, which only highlights the fact that many of us will indeed need our kids to some extent, and we can still hope the burden is not great.
Totally understand that facilities want SOME name on those forms. It won’t be our son. All our paperwork is in order (will, trust, HCPOA, FPOA, funeral directives, DNRs, etc). The courts can appoint a legal guardian should it come to that. There is a 40-year age gap between us and our son. We will be leaving just as he is in his prime. We’ve often told him he has no responsibility for us in our old age. He needs to live his life unencumbered. I understand this is difficult for some to process, but we’re firm that our son is not to have any custodial role as we age. We have enough money to provide for any level of care required for a very long time; that was the main goal of our retirement planning after he came along. I know it’s not a popular position, but this is what we’ve chosen.
BTW, my brother and I flew across the country from our different states to get my dad and his wife into AL this summer when they had concurrent health events that precluded them caring for each other. When they moved themselves out of AL around Thanksgiving this year, we told them it was a suicide move, that they were choosing to die in their house, but because they are fine with that decision, we are, too. We were clear with them that we will not come to their rescue again. They are on their own with the decision they made.
I am looking at my top choice this week….Yes I am tired from moving !