Advice please

[VET]

My Mum has vascular dementia and lives on her own with her dog. For the past year i have visited every evening and she has regular visitors but still spends quite a bit of time on her own. I do her shopping , washing and housework . The past few months I’ve seen quite a decline and she is now starting wandering. I have an alarm fitted to her front door which alerts me if she goes out at night. So far this week she has gone walkabout at 10pm, phoned the police at midnight to report my Dad missing ( she has been widowed for 6 years) and today I had a phone call to say she was at the motorway petrol station which is not that far from her home but not somewhere she would ever have gone to before.
She has always been adamant that she does not want to go into a care home but I am really concerned for her safety .
I have LPA and she would be self funding but how do I get her to agree that this would be the best option for her as well as she would have company and I think far happier. The other problem will be parting her from her dog.
The responsibility I feel for her is so overwhelming , I don’t know what to do.
Any advice would be gratefully received

 

[Bod]

You will never get her to agree to a Care Home.
But that time has arrived.

Bod.

 

[Rosettastone57]

My Mum has vascular dementia and lives on her own with her dog. For the past year i have visited every evening and she has regular visitors but still spends quite a bit of time on her own. I do her shopping , washing and housework . The past few months I’ve seen quite a decline and she is now starting wandering. I have an alarm fitted to her front door which alerts me if she goes out at night. So far this week she has gone walkabout at 10pm, phoned the police at midnight to report my Dad missing ( she has been widowed for 6 years) and today I had a phone call to say she was at the motorway petrol station which is not that far from her home but not somewhere she would ever have gone to before.
She has always been adamant that she does not want to go into a care home but I am really concerned for her safety .
I have LPA and she would be self funding but how do I get her to agree that this would be the best option for her as well as she would have company and I think far happier. The other problem will be parting her from her dog.
The responsibility I feel for her is so overwhelming , I don’t know what to do.
Any advice would be gratefully received

She'll never agree or see your point of view. You'll wait forever. She needs full time care, if she's self funding, don't discuss it, just arrange it.

 

[lemonbalm]

Hello @VET . I think you know the time has come. This is a really hard thing to do but there are lots of us out here who have had to face it and will be here to help you along if you need advice and support. Many of us have broken our promises. Some of us had found it very difficult but there are many success stories too. You could well find that your mum is much happier surrounded by people with 24 hour care.

Take a look at https://www.carehome.co.uk/. It's a good resource. The pull down menu under "more search options" does have a pet friendly option, so you might be able to find somewhere that will accept your mum's dog too. Call a few care homes you think may be suitable. You will probably feel better after talking to some of the care home managers.

When you are ready, post again for more advice and support.

 

[canary]

There comes a time when you have to change from enabling their wants to implementing their needs and I think your mum has reached this point.

The places she is going to are really dangerous and I know you would never forgive yourself if something happened.

 

[MartinWL]

We don't know from this thread if the lady concerned has mental capacity for a decision about moving into a care home. It may be unlikely but if she understands the danger her wandering causes, remembers the facts, and is able to weigh up the pros and cons, nobody can make the decision for her. She is entitled to decide to risk her own life as s price worth paying to continue living at home. Having said all that of course many of those who have reached the point of wandering at night would not have capacity to make the decision.

 

[cobden 28]

Could you not keep your Mum's dog yourself, but take it into the home to visit her (assuming your Mum does eventually go into a Home)?

 

[VET]

Thank you all for your responses. I know the time has come for Mum to move into a care home, I just needed someone with previous experience to confirm that.
in answer to MartinWL , my mum never remembers that she has wandered or is aware of the dangers.
I will be keeping her dog . I’ve never owned one myself due to working full time , but due to COVID I now work from home. I couldn’t bring myself to re home him.
Thanks again

 

[Sarasa]

Hi @VET, my mother also has vascular dementia. She was OK living at home without help coming in, just me popping over a couple of times a week and a friend that would come to her aid when she got into a muddle, until she wasn't. She never went wandering in quite the way your mother does, but she was phoning the police, fire brigade and 111 on a regular basis over various things, mainly the neighbours that she thought were coming into her flat and stealing things (they weren't). What really pushed me to move her to a care home was when she went off drinking with random men in the local pub, and started bringing them home.
I can see where @MartinWL is coming from, and in an ideal world I would have got mum to agree to the move. However she had no insight into her condition. All the major difficulties she was facing were someone else's fault She'd already agreed to sell her flat and move to anther flat near my brother. If that had gone ahead that would have been extra-care sheltered accommodation. Mum just thought it was a flat similar to the one she was already in, as she didn't think she needed care of any sort. In the end it became obvious to the whole family that even carers in four times a day wouldn't be enough and I moved mum to a care home near me. She was very unhappy at first, but it was the right thing to do. I was rather naïve about it, in that I hadn't really taken in that the home would need to put a Deprivation of Liberty Safeguards order in place to keep her there, and that if she had been assessed at having the capability to make informed decisions about where she should live she could have gone home. As it was they decided she did lack capability and she is now safe there, and if not exactly happy at least fairly content. I would never have forgiven myself if I'd waited till a proper crisis had occurred as given mum's increasingly reckless behaviour it could have resulted in serious harm to her or someone else.
This site is useful for assessing care homes near you Care Homes & Nursing Homes UK – Care Home Reviews & Nursing Home Reviews . It's a pain that you can't visit to check them over, but at least you can look at websites and chat to the manager about your mum and her needs.
You'll get loads of support here with the process, I certainly did.

 

[Melles Belles]

My sister took her dog to visit my dad when he was in the carehome. The other residents enjoyed the dogs visits too.

 

[MartinWL]

Thank you all for your responses. I know the time has come for Mum to move into a care home, I just needed someone with previous experience to confirm that.
in answer to MartinWL , my mum never remembers that she has wandered or is aware of the dangers.
I will be keeping her dog . I’ve never owned one myself due to working full time , but due to COVID I now work from home. I couldn’t bring myself to re home him.
Thanks again

In that case she clearly fails the tests in the mental capacity Act and cannot make her own decision on where to live.

 

[VET]

I have spoken to ASC team this morning and they have told me that my Mum will need an assessment by her GP to determine if she has capacity.
if the GP thinks she does then I cannot put her in a care home against her will.
I just want my Mum to be safe .

 

[Weasell]

I wish you good luck with the assessment.
Do you know not all GP’s known what host/hostess syndrome is?
My mother could fool them all.

When it is necessary for her to go to a care home I will sabotage the central heating system.
I will then pretend that the spare parts have to come over from China and will take a couple of weeks.
I will tell mum she is going to stay in the home until the heating is fixed.
Once she is in the home I think I could be in for a run of bad luck.
Ships with boiler parts sinking, burst pipes, decorating needing done, slow and unreliable decorators???

 

[canary]

Im amazed that the GP will do the capacity assessment - mums GP wouldnt do hers for the deputyship application.

 

[Woo2]

Yes Mums Gp wouldn’t do hers just about a year ago, had to have a private Psychiatrist to do it .

 

[Shedrech]

hi @VET
unless the health & welfare LPA states that an assessment of your mum's capacity has to be undertaken, I'm not convinced the ASC is wholly accurate ... you are your mum's Attorney and if you sincerely believe that she no longer has the capacity to make this decision, the LPA gives you the authority to act on her behalf, in her best interests ... and you are able with finance & property LPA to manage her finances to fund her fees

when you find a suitable residential care home, the manager will assess whether they can meet her care needs and , as Sarasa says, when she is resident carry out a DoLS assessment to be able to keep her in the home (many residents say they 'want to go home' but aren't talking about a real place and have no comprehension of the risks being at home brings) ... the manager will not act if they think your mum has capacity to assess the risks and make this decision

to me, your mum's actions and your understanding of your mum's behaviour and (lack of) comprehension of the risks she is taking evidence her lack of capacity ... if she wanders, do get the police involved as they have to record what has happened and can themselves make referrals to Social Services

maybe the ASC, if you contact them at all, might be reminded to consider that due to her age and dementia your mum is a 'vulnerable adult' who due to her wandering at night and in a dangerous location is 'at risk of harm' (and potentially causing harm to others, should she wander into the road) with no awareness of that risk; that you consider that this is a 'safeguarding issue' and that the Local Authority have the 'duty of care' to ensure that your mum's care needs are provided for

just be aware that if the LA don't consider that your mum needs residential care and you move her into a care home, they may later consider this a deprivation of her assets and should her finances fall below the thresholds at which the LA would usually begin to contribute, they might refuse to do so

 

[Sarasa]

Hi @VET, not all GPs do this, and those that do will charge. We just had my mother in law's GP do an assessment so that my sister in law can obtain deputyship. She spoke to MiL for five minutes via zoom, wrote about five lines and charged nearly £400.00. She did say MiL appeared to have lost capacity though.
I guess make an appointment for your mother with the GP and see where that get's you.
Capacity is such a tricky thing to judge. My mother could put on an extremely good act. You had to talk to her for a while and know quite a lot about her to realise a lot of what she said was totally untrue. I don't know if your mum is the same. If the GP judges she does have capacity maybe try @Weasell 's suggestion and see if you can get her to agree to a couple of weeks respite while something is done on her home. That will give you a breathing space to see what needs to be done next.

 

[She-Luna]

Dear VET

I am at a similar position with my Mum. She is struggling mainly with time of day, and has also become physically more frail (a fall in middle of night this week). Just to say that some care homes will show you around, we went to one yesterday, masks, gloves provided and we were 'hosed down' with a special spray. They are also allowing limited visiting to existing residents. I've felt a bit overwhelmed by the situation, and all the ensuing information and things to consider, but have spent the morning planning, doing spreadsheets and dealing with things in a more sensible order (yes I'm a 'worrier', but also pretty good with admin!) Do you have a PoA for health/welfare as well as financial? I only have the latter and am in the process of dealing with the former. Good luck x

 

[Shedrech]

hi @She-Luna
if you consider your mum no longer has capacity, it's too late to apply for health & welfare LPA
if your mum has capacity and agrees to a move, that's fine
if she doesn't, there will need to be a 'best interest' meeting
though if your mum will agree to a 'holiday' or 'break' or 'treat' in a lovely 'home away from home' for a week or so .... then she may stay much longer ....

 

[She-Luna]

Hi Shedrech -

At the moment, I would consider she still has capacity. She has deteriorated, but I've broached the subject (in a positive, gentle way) of moving into a care home, and she understands and admits that she needs 'looking after'. She loves company (which is what has been lacking this year) - even if she doesn't 'join in' as much as she would have done a few years back, she just likes to be around people and pass the time of day.