Hi,
I’m new to the board and feeling a bit lost about what to do!
My mother has had dementia for a number of years, although we have struggled to get a formal diagnosis.
She had a bad fall last year and ended up in hospital, then a care home. She was always very clear she wanted to go home, so we put in place a care package of carers 4 x a day. My sibling and I live over 5 hours away from her, and she has no family in the area.
She managed to stay at home for about 3 weeks, but was very resistant to care. She ended up with a UTI, couldn’t stand and ended up back in hospital.
We’ve been looking into arranging a live-in carer for her. Our hope was that if she could eat when she wanted and go to bed when she wanted she would be more accepting of help. We had a best interests call about a month ago and everyone agreed to pursue this.
However, when the care agency went to assess her in hospital, she told them she didn’t want a stranger living in her house. She said the same thing to her advocate. It seems she might have had another UTI at the time. She’s now telling the social worker she will accept a live-in carer, but she won’t let them “boss her around”, tell her how to cook etc.
The social worker now thinks we should re-visit the best interests decision. I think there is a significant risk that mum would refuse help from a live-in carer, and quite a big risk she might refuse the carer completely (she called the police when a night sitter came to the house while she was still at home).
At the same time, mum cries all the time that she wants to go home. She’s just called me and threatened to kill herself if she can’t go home (she has said this a number of times).
The hospital staff have never seen her refuse care, so they don’t understand why we want to re-visit the decision. My sibling thinks it would be cruel to let mum go home only for the care arrangement to fall apart again. If it does go wrong, no one is readily available to step in because we’re so far away, so mum might need to be sectioned.
I just want mum to be happy and I hate the idea she might never go home - but when she did go home she kept asking when she could go home because she didn’t like how we’d had to rearrange everything. I don’t know what to think. We will probably have a best interest call next week, and I’m not sure if I should be trying to push against the social workers on this.
Really sorry this is so long - thank you if you’ve made it to the end! Any different perspectives out there?
I’m new to the board and feeling a bit lost about what to do!
My mother has had dementia for a number of years, although we have struggled to get a formal diagnosis.
She had a bad fall last year and ended up in hospital, then a care home. She was always very clear she wanted to go home, so we put in place a care package of carers 4 x a day. My sibling and I live over 5 hours away from her, and she has no family in the area.
She managed to stay at home for about 3 weeks, but was very resistant to care. She ended up with a UTI, couldn’t stand and ended up back in hospital.
We’ve been looking into arranging a live-in carer for her. Our hope was that if she could eat when she wanted and go to bed when she wanted she would be more accepting of help. We had a best interests call about a month ago and everyone agreed to pursue this.
However, when the care agency went to assess her in hospital, she told them she didn’t want a stranger living in her house. She said the same thing to her advocate. It seems she might have had another UTI at the time. She’s now telling the social worker she will accept a live-in carer, but she won’t let them “boss her around”, tell her how to cook etc.
The social worker now thinks we should re-visit the best interests decision. I think there is a significant risk that mum would refuse help from a live-in carer, and quite a big risk she might refuse the carer completely (she called the police when a night sitter came to the house while she was still at home).
At the same time, mum cries all the time that she wants to go home. She’s just called me and threatened to kill herself if she can’t go home (she has said this a number of times).
The hospital staff have never seen her refuse care, so they don’t understand why we want to re-visit the decision. My sibling thinks it would be cruel to let mum go home only for the care arrangement to fall apart again. If it does go wrong, no one is readily available to step in because we’re so far away, so mum might need to be sectioned.
I just want mum to be happy and I hate the idea she might never go home - but when she did go home she kept asking when she could go home because she didn’t like how we’d had to rearrange everything. I don’t know what to think. We will probably have a best interest call next week, and I’m not sure if I should be trying to push against the social workers on this.
Really sorry this is so long - thank you if you’ve made it to the end! Any different perspectives out there?