My Mom and Aunt Are Getting Up There in Age: A Follow-Up: I'm still not ready for this, but I have no choice
Originally published in Crow's Feet: Life As We Age on Medium 08/08/26
While not quite the summer from hell, it has been a very stressful one. Between the heat and smoke from fires drifting over from Eastern Washington and North Idaho, we’ve been dealing with a family crisis involving my elderly mom and my aunt.
As soon as we think something is over, another one pops up. I’ve written about them previously here; the holding pattern we were in has now ended, and decisions have to be made that won’t make either woman happy.
My aunt keeps ending up in hospital. A month and a half ago it was for her heart, as she wasn’t taking her heart medications. Once the hospital got her stabilized, they sent her to a rehab facility for therapy so she could get stronger. She checked herself out AMA with the help of my mom.
Then she fell, and the hospital discovered issues that require serious antibiotics and skilled care. They will be sending her to a skilled nursing facility in a few days. I’m sure she will attempt to AMA herself again, but we have an ace in the hole.
The doctor has diagnosed her with dementia and is unsafe. I have power of attorney, so we are waiting to get official word on everything, and I can make an end run around my mother and aunt and make the decisions. Do I want to? Not really.
I want them both to be in a place where they can make decisions for themselves, but they aren’t, so it falls to me. Thankfully, we have the paperwork they had done a few years back. We have a lawyer on standby to let me know what I can or can not do.
So far, my mom isn’t in as bad shape, though trying to get her to see her PCP is a losing battle. She could stay in her home IF she would agree to having someone come in a couple of times a week to clean and check that she is taking her meds properly, and make sure she goes to her doctor. She has agreed to that, but she has to clean her place before she will allow someone in. Of course, the next time we ask her about getting help, she’ll insist she doesn’t need any at all.
Next time we go up, I am taking dishwasher pods and running all the dishes through the dishwasher right before I start filling out the paperwork to get her some outside help (Washington has a program for people who don’t qualify for help through Medicaid).
So now I am waiting to hear about how my aunt is doing from either her doctor or nurse, so I can call my mom to tell her how her sister is doing and break the news that she needs to go into skilled care. Mom is going to go ballistic; she firmly believes she can take care of my aunt, which is definitely not the case. If we could get her into a close-by facility, Mom may accept it better.
But the fires in Spokane caused evacuations of people in other skilled nursing facilities; nothing within a mile or so is available right now. I am hoping something close to Mom will open up in a week or two, and my aunt can move closer to home, making it easier on my mom to go see her.
Looking at things, we are still in a holding pattern, but this one is much shorter, and an end is in sight.
So now we wait for phone calls, and make phone calls, hope things will get easier, and schedule trips around our health issues.
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