Who's money is being spent here?

mrsconn23

Dear Prudence,

My elderly grandmother’s quality of living has deteriorated. My family has decided to get her in-home assistance, take her to the doctor, etc. The problem is that she wouldn’t consider it essential and wouldn’t want to spend the money. My family’s solution is always to lie and say it’s free or covered by insurance and tell the people who will interact with her to lie too. I understand it’s all being done in an effort to help her, but I’m conflicted about how much she’s being lied to and about asking people who aren’t family to lie to her too. Should I speak up and raise this as a concern to the rest of my family or keep my mouth shut?

—Lying for Good

MissKittyDanger

Seriously, who's money is it?

STARMOON44

Omg shut your mouth

banana468

mrsconn23 said:

Dear Prudence,

My elderly grandmother’s quality of living has deteriorated. My family has decided to get her in-home assistance, take her to the doctor, etc. The problem is that she wouldn’t consider it essential and wouldn’t want to spend the money. My family’s solution is always to lie and say it’s free or covered by insurance and tell the people who will interact with her to lie too. I understand it’s all being done in an effort to help her, but I’m conflicted about how much she’s being lied to and about asking people who aren’t family to lie to her too. Should I speak up and raise this as a concern to the rest of my family or keep my mouth shut?

—Lying for Good

How old is the LW here and is the grandmother also of sound mind? 

DH's grandmother ultimately went kicking and screaming into assisted living because she stopped being capable of caring for herself and the cost to care for her in home was far more than if she was in a VERY nice facility.  

Is it possible that the LW is old enough to see what's going on but not old enough to know all the details?   As someone who is seeing this with her own father and who watched this with other parents, I'm suspecting that the generation older than LW has power of attorney that can be used to pay for this AND all of this DOES need to come out of grandma's wallet eventually.   I'm curious if LW just doesn't know the big picture of elder care and finances.  

mrsconn23

LW needs to butt the hell out if they are not making these decisions surrounding grandma's care.  I know there's been all sorts of conversations about money and caring for people in DH's family because it's happened a few times.  There's ALL SORTS of shit people have to do to protect the finances of people in some sort of assisted living care and/or on any sort of assistance.  There are so many rules and you can lose benefits or the government can take your money if you have too much.  The government wants to pay as little as possible to support people, so it's a game.  I bet LW has NO IDEA on that aspect of the situation. 

Also, if grandma isn't 'with it' then it's probably fruitless to explain it to her.  Having those conversations over and over can be very painful and frustrating.  Especially if she has moments of lucidity and would use them to 'fight' with them over the care she needs. There's a line between allowing people their own autonomy and having to make decisions for them.  If grandma is past that line, then decisions are being  made to make it easier for all involved.  

I know people can be nefarious and elder abuse (physically, emotionally, financially) is a massive issue.  But that doesn't seem to be the case here. 

banana468

mrsconn23 said:

LW needs to butt the hell out if they are not making these decisions surrounding grandma's care.  I know there's been all sorts of conversations about money and caring for people in DH's family because it's happened a few times.  There's ALL SORTS of shit people have to do to protect the finances of people in some sort of assisted living care and/or on any sort of assistance.  There are so many rules and you can lose benefits or the government can take your money if you have too much.  The government wants to pay as little as possible to support people, so it's a game.  I bet LW has NO IDEA on that aspect of the situation. 

Also, if grandma isn't 'with it' then it's probably fruitless to explain it to her.  Having those conversations over and over can be very painful and frustrating.  Especially if she has moments of lucidity and would use them to 'fight' with them over the care she needs. There's a line between allowing people their own autonomy and having to make decisions for them.  If grandma is past that line, then decisions are being  made to make it easier for all involved.  

I know people can be nefarious and elder abuse (physically, emotionally, financially) is a massive issue.  But that doesn't seem to be the case here. 

That's what I'm seeing as well. 

In my head, LW is a young adult but not privy to all the aspects of the grandparent's life including whether or not the grandparent has the mental wherewithal to manage things and is watching out without all the facts.  

DH talks about the time that his grandmother called his parents' house panicking that a pipe must have burst because the house had flooded.  He went with his dad to the house and they ran to the basement, started pulling down drop ceiling tiles, listening for where there was a pipe that was leaking.  He went upstairs while his dad was downstairs and his dad yelled, "Hey!  Turn off the water in the bathroom!"  Grandma had turned on the water in the sink, started soaking her socks and not turned them off.  She then lacked the cognition to:
1) See the flood and have that remind her that the water was running in the bathroom.
2) She walked in the carpet IN FRONT of the bathroom so much that they could see the foot prints she left in the soaking carpet.  She DID NOT know she was walking on a soaking wet floor.  

She got herself dressed every day and was continuing to drive.  From appearances she WAS OK.  She wasn't.  And eventually she had a stroke and the dementia got worse.  And this is why they sold her house so she could get the care she needed because the cost to have it in house was just too much. 

charlotte989875

If Grandma needs this much assistance is she really asking how it’s all being paid for? Either she has a power of attorney and someone is making the decision about spend the money for her, someone is illegally spending her money on her care, or she is aware she’s spending her own money on this. None of those scenarios need to involve you telling her what you think about the arrangement. 

short+sassy

banana468 said:

mrsconn23 said:

LW needs to butt the hell out if they are not making these decisions surrounding grandma's care.  I know there's been all sorts of conversations about money and caring for people in DH's family because it's happened a few times.  There's ALL SORTS of shit people have to do to protect the finances of people in some sort of assisted living care and/or on any sort of assistance.  There are so many rules and you can lose benefits or the government can take your money if you have too much.  The government wants to pay as little as possible to support people, so it's a game.  I bet LW has NO IDEA on that aspect of the situation. 

Also, if grandma isn't 'with it' then it's probably fruitless to explain it to her.  Having those conversations over and over can be very painful and frustrating.  Especially if she has moments of lucidity and would use them to 'fight' with them over the care she needs. There's a line between allowing people their own autonomy and having to make decisions for them.  If grandma is past that line, then decisions are being  made to make it easier for all involved.  

I know people can be nefarious and elder abuse (physically, emotionally, financially) is a massive issue.  But that doesn't seem to be the case here. 

That's what I'm seeing as well. 

In my head, LW is a young adult but not privy to all the aspects of the grandparent's life including whether or not the grandparent has the mental wherewithal to manage things and is watching out without all the facts.  

DH talks about the time that his grandmother called his parents' house panicking that a pipe must have burst because the house had flooded.  He went with his dad to the house and they ran to the basement, started pulling down drop ceiling tiles, listening for where there was a pipe that was leaking.  He went upstairs while his dad was downstairs and his dad yelled, "Hey!  Turn off the water in the bathroom!"  Grandma had turned on the water in the sink, started soaking her socks and not turned them off.  She then lacked the cognition to:
1) See the flood and have that remind her that the water was running in the bathroom.
2) She walked in the carpet IN FRONT of the bathroom so much that they could see the foot prints she left in the soaking carpet.  She DID NOT know she was walking on a soaking wet floor.  

She got herself dressed every day and was continuing to drive.  From appearances she WAS OK.  She wasn't.  And eventually she had a stroke and the dementia got worse.  And this is why they sold her house so she could get the care she needed because the cost to have it in house was just too much. 

This is already a dread that myself, my H, and one of our other neighbors has for the two elderly women (C and D) who live on our street.  I've talked about them before (I'm buying the house).

One of them has dementia (C) and it's been gut wrenching to watch it's progression.  Even in her more lucid moments, she refuses to acknowledge that anything is wrong.  "D" fell and hit her head a few weeks ago.  It was a whole big thing!  Ambulance, multiple cars with sirens.  When my H picked up "C" two days later to go get "D" from the hospital, "C" thought they were going to Bed, Bath, and Beyond.  She didn't remember the falling incident at all or that "D" was even in the hospital.  

Part of our purchase agreement is that "D" (the only one who owns the house and the one without dementia) has a "life estate", ie she can live in the property for her lifetime.  But the likelihood is that she will pass away before "C" does.  Fortunately, "C" has family, though they live a state away and I've never met them.  "D" has told us they will come get "C", if "D" passes first.  And they did when "D" was in the hospital for a few weeks a couple years ago.

But I know there is the potential that we might be the ones forced to deal with that situation, though I really, really hope not.  Once D is gone, we cannot allow C to live in that house.  Not for greedy reasons, but because C does not have the cognitive abilities anymore to live by herself.  But she doesn't understand that either.

At any rate, that's my long example for just the pure evil that diseases like Alzheimer's and Dementia are because it robs people of their reason.  Their essence.  Who they really are.