Until 15 months ago, my kids (and my S is now 31) had all 4 grandparents. Now they have lost both grandfathers and I think they are seeing mortality in a very different way. @esobay, these two have had to be there for each other for some significant life cycle events (happy and sad) over the 18 months they’ve been together and I think it’s the real deal. I think tomorrow will be difficult, as her grandma was very present in the lives of her children and grandchildren. My S’s girlfriend had dinner with her every Thursday, and often my S was there as well. We have embraced her and her family and we will grieve with them as they did with us only two weeks ago.
Condolences to your family, @MomofJandL.
Condolences @MomofJandL . Wish for the smoothest process for all the death entails.
Deep breaths.
@MomofJandL, condolences and best wishes for clarity and calm in the coming days.
Condolences to @MomofJandL and @runnersmom …and others struggling too
I went to a most amazing funeral yesterday for my S’s girlfriend’s grandmother. The outpouring of love for this 91-yo woman was incredible, and the bonds among the extended family are something to which I aspire. Compared to the debacle that accompanied my FIL’s passing, this affirmed my desire to inspire love and connection between and among my kids and their (hopefully) future families. She clearly taught them all by example, and will be sorely missed for all the right reasons. What I did see though, that has me a little concerned, is that while her family has embraced my S in a wonderful way, I think he’s feeling a lot of pressure to “formalize” their relationship, if you know what I mean. So, while I would welcome that development with open arms, my plan is to back off and be the supportive mom. He’s lost both his grandfathers in the past 15 months, and now this incredible woman who was so important in his GF’s life. They’ve been so supportive of each other it brings tears to my eyes, but I think they need a little space to process it all without nagging mothers/fathers/siblings! Yes, all are in favor of this union! To the next generations…
runnersmom- a service that allows a person to be well remembered and honored is such a wonderful experience. I went to a funeral like that this month; the warmth within the family was palpable.
As to the enthusiasm for S’s relationship moving forward, that’s a bus I don’t get on, never mind try to drive, either. We would be happy if current partners prove to be the one for both of our kids, yet want the timing to be in the hands of each couple. I know there are pressures from both of the SO’s families. No Greek chorus here.
Thanks for all the kind thoughts, and for all the support this community continues to provide. My own mom, at 90, is still my hero, and I’ll still be checking in here.
runnersmom, that sounds like a lovely service for a lovely person who built a real legacy. Inspiring.
I’m visiting my daughter at her college. Mil flew into the same airport we did. I’m not as surprised by her lack of mobility, she’s had 2 knee replacements, but i am by her lack of stamina, and how distracted and muddled she is getting. She’s only 74. I swear she should be looking at new living arrangements asap, but she and her hubby have no intention of leaving their 100 acre property. My husband has been trying to talk to them for years about thinking about what to do when they shouldn’t be living so remotely and so far from society. What shocks me more is my husbands sister just tried to leave her two young children with her for spring break. She ended up going back 2 days later when it was clear things were out of control.
Tomorrow when we go back to the airport I ordered a wheelchair to get her to her gate. Atlanta airport is huge and she’d never make it through alone with her bag.
My mom is home! She was sprung from the rehab center Thursday. As I had said before, the rehab center wasn’t even giving us a date for her release until I put the state’s elder abuse agency on the case. One visit from the elder abuse people, and suddenly the rehab people decided to let her out.
Mom sounded so happy today when I called. She’s glad to be home in her own apartment, able to see her own friends, able to eat in her facility’s dining room with silverware and tablecloths and good food.
She has a fulltime live-in aide. According to my sisters, the aide is terrific: observant, careful, kind, but unobtrusive. Before she moved to the US, she had taken care of elders in her native Ghana, and by all accounts, she’s good at it. I hadn’t realized that many of the aides in my mom’s area are African immigrants. I guess I didn’t even know that there was a substantial population of African immigrants in the NY metropolitan area.
Cardinal Fang, many of my stepmother’s aides were from Ghana. A wonderful group of women for sure! So glad for your mom.
Eyemamom, that is really too bad. You just know that there will be a crisis and everyone will have to react quickly and they will not be able to move on their terms.
CF, great news!
The rehab place Mom was in was staffed by Filipinos and Africans of several nationalities. The aides at the AFH are from Jamaica and it is run by immigrants from Romania. It surprises me: Jamaica and the PNW are so far apart. One has left her family there while she helps support from here. They are truly the best ever for Mom.
I’m so sorry, @MomofJandL .
My condolences to you too, @runnersmom .
Hi. I’ve never been to this thread before, but I definitely could use some wise CC counsel at this point.
My husband and I have been trying to convince my in-laws (early eighties) to move to assisted living. Their resources are low, but they do have AL insurance. These attempts have been completely fruitless. They insist they aren’t like “those people”.
We’ve been dealing with medical issues with each one of them for several years. My MIL has dementia, but has been physically pretty well. My FIL has diabetes and heart disease and CLL.
They have no social life at all. I think my MIL has some kind of agoraphobia. She never goes out. My FIL can drive and does the food shopping and errands, but they have no friends, never go for a walk, never see a movie, don’t travel. My MIL can no longer read.
Well, this week has been the nightmare we have been trying to avoid. My MIL got an infection and had to be hospitalized. In the hospital, they found she had terrible anemia and have been attempting to diagnose the cause (turned out to be an ulcer). My FIL stayed with her in the hospital a lot, and didn’t rest, didn’t drink enough fluids, etc., and ended up going to the ER by ambulance with shortness of breath. It turned out to be pretty much nothing on the heart front (our fear), but he was dehydrated, had anemia also, and wanted to be admitted - - so they did. Of course then they do tests and start finding things . . .so are adjusting meds, etc.
Meanwhile, both of them are calling my husband constantly at work, and his father asks for advice, and then when he doesn’t like my husband’s advice is YELLING at him. Like swearing. This has happened twice this week.
Our short term goal is to get them out of the hospital, but we really feel they cannot possibly live alone much longer. My MIL can’t take care of herself really with the dementia. I’m starting to wonder if maybe my FIL also has some dementia. He certainly is making terrible decisions and not taking good care of himself.
I feel like assisted living is the answer. But how do we get them to do it . . .?? Can we force them to do it? I don’t like the idea of forcing them, but their safety is an issue for sure, and my husband works full time in a very demanding job, so having weeks like this going on ad infinitum just can’t happen.
Sorry to go on and on. I feel so badly for my husband and want to help him, but not sure even how.
And just to put things in context, these people have never been easy going and sweet . . .and there have been ongoing issues with health for at least 25 years.
amarylandmom, what a mess! Not all that unusual, really, but a mess.
Does your husband have POA, or any detailed insight into their financials?
At this point the case manager (social worker) at the hospital may be your best asset. Is it possible that either or both of your in-laws could be released to a nursing home for rehab following the hospitalization? That might be a first step to getting them into an AL facility permanently, and might buy you some time to pick one. Medicare allows you to appeal a release from the hospital if you have reason to believe they are being released to an unsafe environment given their inability to care for themselves, so the hospitalization may be the path to get them to AL.
Do you have copies of their AL insurance policies, so you can see what their limitations must be in order for the policy to take effect?
I can sympathize with the yelling. After FIL’s stroke, the family had to literally hide the car keys because FIL drove against explicit doctor’s orders. FIL yelled and swore, and told DH he was no longer allowed in the house. He never gave up his fight for the keys or anger at DH, even as he got so weak he couldn’t sit up in bed without help. So sad.
So sorry amarylandmom! Am assuming the policy your inlaws have is a long term care policy. Check the requirements and exclusions, and the waiting period. If they go into AL and if they meet the requirements for the policy to kick in (probably will need an eval by one of their case managers to see what level of care they require-- depends on the policy I think) then there will be a wait time (3 mos, 100 days, whatever they selected) before the policy kicks in. But they can be a godsend. My late dad never used the LTC for my mom (big mistake) as I think he misunderstood how it worked. We did used it for my dad, for about a year and a half or so. If we were smart we’d have applied for it sooner, as it would have lasted/covered 6 years, and we only got less than 2 years of reimbursement on the policy.
As for “forcing” them, you can apply for guardianship, and the courts will order an evaluation (this probably varies by state). You may have to get your own independent evaluation first and then have the doctor fill out the form saying they are not competent to manage person and/or property. If you have legal guardianship, you can make these decisions. POA isn’t sufficient, I do not believe.
@amarylandmom , sorry to see you join us, this is a tough place to be. My brother and I let our mom stay on her own for way too long, at least a year. It is a mirical looking back that she didn’t either food poison herself, over/under medicate herself, or crash her car. We had to back off partly because her Dr. didn’t give us the support we needed to take control.
I am seeing my old friend go down the rabbit hole of dementia and fight to be “independent and alone” while her niece is trying to provide care. At least the niece got some control of the financials and the durable POA. She orders food delivered which my friend throws away about half of. But this last visit by niece (she lives across the country) turned into a fight, partly for control.
After my experiences with my Mom and what I see from old friend, I advised the niece to go ahead and step back. She has control of the finances, so watch those. She has people watching enough so that if friend fell, it would be caught in a day. If old friend doesn’t take her meds, or eat … oh well, she will be moving along in one way or the other. Friends’ Dr. didn’t think niece could get guardianship as yet. Niece is torn up about it, but I told her that it is OK to let it go. Give old friend her control and she will be OK or be done. Sounds harsh here, but I believe that spinning your wheels to slow the inevitable is not productive.
So I’d give you and your DH the same advice. Look deep within yourselves and do what you can live with. Can you live with your choice to let angry parents make bad choices? Can you protect the MIL how can’t protect herself and let angry FIL just go? Take the advice of the hospital case manager or social worker. You might have to hunt them down, but they seem to be your biggest asset in getting this ball rolling.
Ultimately, we do have to accept that we can control only ourselves and can’t control the actions of another grown person, by law! If law is still supporting FIL, then you have to wait. The in-laws will get better or get worse. But I’d try to get control of financials, get permission to talk to all Dr.s and get DURABLE health care POA. That would be my focus for right now. And make friends with the social workers at the hospital.
This will be a long hard journey, especially with two of them. Keep thinking LONG term and only fighting for the ability to help by getting onthe health care and financial POA’s.
Thank you so much for the good words of advice and your kindness, @MomofJandL It’s nice just to hear we aren’t alone.
We did try to get my MIL into rehab, but they said that physically she’s fine now and really there’s nothing to rehab.
I feel like the mental issues are more challenging than the physical ones right now. My husband said they are both going to be released today, so we are going to get them situated in their apartment, but I feel like in the medium run, we need another plan!
We have seen their AL insurance policies, and have shown them to one AL facility. I think the coverage is adequate. Both my husband and his brothers earn good livings, so I think they could supplement. They have some money, but not much - - my husband is aware of what they have.
@jym626, thank you so much for sharing your thoughts on the legal issue. The scary thing about my husband’s parents is that his mom is actually pretty good at faking the social graces for 10-15 minutes. When she went into the hospital, several people called to tell my husband the strange things she said to them . . . because they didn’t think my husband could possibly be aware of her dementia. She really doesn’t seem that way when you first meet her. But I assume an evaluation will be more than “hey, how are you doing?”
I will make sure we really understand the policy. It seems like a specific policy that may be used for assisted living, but not any other types of long term care. But we will check! We haven’t looked at it in awhile since they’ve been so resistant to any suggestions.
Thank you so much for your thoughts . . .
You and I are peas in a pod. I agree with what you’ve written quite wholeheartedly. But my husband is a bit accustomed to acquiescing to them in ways that I don’t consider healthy. It doesn’t help that while they don’t want to take any advice for him, the second an “emergency” happens, they call him begging him to do this, that, and the other. He’s a very loyal person which I admire, but the path he is taking is not exactly the one I would have taken.
I’m just anxious to minimize my husband’s stress and burden, but as you astutely point out, sometimes you have to step back and be willing to let things take their course. I fear we will not be able to get the level of control we need legally in terms of guardianship, but I do think we have emotional leverage to force the issue. I’d be willing to use it. I’m not sure my husband is there yet.
It’s just really nice to get these understanding messages. I had no idea what this would be like. It’s truly petrifying in certain ways. I don’t feel my in-laws are safe in their living situation personally and in the ways they don’t care for themselves i.e. FIL absolutely should be using a walker, following a diabetic diet, etc. - - does none of it.
It’s exhausting watching my husband alternately try to please them and care for them and be a good son and being incredibly frustrated by their stubbornness and sometimes their meanness.