Talk about feeling guilty. Over the last 10 years, we have been helping my husband's aunt that has no living blood relatives. In the last couple of years she has had a couple of hospital visits and she has always come here for a few weeks to ensure strength and wellness before she goes home. (I'm a nurse so I'm pretty comfortable with wound care etc.
However, this year she fell in January, went to rehab in February and came to my home on March 1 for an estimated 6 weeks until her cast came off for therapy. She is still here. All of a sudden when we started talking about going home she starts with aches and pains. I feel bad, but I have two kids that still live at home, a house to run plus a full-time job. I've got no help here. I'm showering, laundering and cleaning for her. I'm afraid to hire anyone because of look back and honestly I'm trying not to encourage her. I really think she is afraid to go home on her own, but she has always told me she wanted to die in her home.
She doesn't have much money and her widowed daughter-in-law owns the house she lives in... another long and very sad story. If said DIL finds out she isn't in the house it will instantly go onto the market.
I'm feeling trapped and I think I am overthinking everything.
I have services set up for her in her house, I have a lifeline and elder care services and she isn't budging. Thanks for letting me vent.
Yes of course Auntie wants to stay with you. It’s her best option. She won’t make any other choice until you make it quite clear that this isn’t going to continue. Sit down with her, tell her that it has to end, and talk about her options. She can go home and hire in-home care, if she has the money to do it. I don’t quite understand your comment about look-back - she doesn’t own her house, so she may not have many assets, and if she is paying for her own care it shouldn’t affect Medicaid look-back, should it? She can apply for Medicaid and move to a NH, perhaps you are willing to help with that.
It might help to get in touch with one of the agencies and talk about it all with them and her together. Older people (everyone?) can get the picture more easily with someone that they can’t argue with and that they know they can’t influence. You’ve done so much already, it’s hard for you to say that you have reached your limit, but everybody has one.
It is time to be blunt. Tell aunt the day she will be leaving and the day her services at home begin.
Then turn over the care to others in her life. If Aunt ends having no one then she may need the help of a licensed Fiduciary, but I would see to it that I didn't step in to be POA or anything else.
Aunt should be spending her money now for her care. Lookback isn't a problem as long as SHE is hiring people to care for HERSELF. That doesn't mean, of course, hiring YOU. That she cannot do. It would look like gifting.
It is time simply to embrace the facts here. You don't want to be full time caregiver to your aunt, nor should you. Let he know when she needs to move home. Let her know what assistance you can offer her in hiring her own help. She may need to consider placement in time. Her own money to support her own care, then medicaid.
I am sorry you took this on. You did mean well, but you are ending painted into a corner that has made you uncomfortable. But again, sad as all of this is, your aren't responsible for it.
Does Auntie have the financial means to pay for AL? She doesn't even own a house to sell... Medicaid in most states only covers LTC and she has to be assessed to need it. So, don't go making plans for her at AL unless: 1) she is willing to go (you can't force her without evicting her if she has all her faculties; and, 2) she has to be able to pay for it in a facility that hopefully has Medicaid beds for when she qualifies.