My mother is in the early stages of dementia. She needs care, love and support. When I realized her condition I hired a sitter. And now have established POA. I handle her affairs and spend time and nights with her, even though I live in a different city. I have four other siblings. My oldest brother said he would support my every effort to make sure our mother is as comfortable as possible, now he is making excuses and not wanting to support the effort, he stated that he his own family to take care of, and seems to put others needs, before my mothers needs. All of his children are grown and out of the house. He and his wife are retired. I have another sister that is a sitter and is 61 years old, and all of her children are grown, she lives in the same town as mother. She stated she worked 80 hours a week, and could not stay at night, but rops by some days. My youngest brother has a drug problem. My youngest sister is married, and lives in my mothers hometown and stays with my mother and waits on her most of the time when I am not there. I am thankful for her. The sitter is there with mother from 8:00-3:00 giving them all a break. On occassion there is no one to relieve the sitter, and I have to pay extra. My youngest sister will come when she can. My mother has been so good to my siblings, and their children. What do you make of this situation?
Is it fair? No! But I don't suppose you really believe that life is fair. I would think that your mother's dementia would discourage that notion if you were inclined to believe it before.
So, each of the five of you gets to make a decision about how much and what kind of help and support to contribute to mother's care. You can try to influence those decisions, but you can only control the actions of one of those five, and I'm sure you know which one that is.
Speaking of "fair," when you say you hired a sitter for your mother, I hope you are paying her with mother's money. The other topic that crops up here all the time, and can really be ugly, is conflict among siblings about who is getting what from the parent's estate, and who paid what for caregiving, and who owes whom for mother's care. Sigh. Ugly but real. If at all possible, the parent paying her own way helps eliminate the "unfair" arguments. Mother needs this. Mother is paying for it. If that reduces the financial legacy the kids can divide, so be it. The child who is taking on the biggest caregiving role has no responsibility to see to it the estate is kept intact for the other children.
Best wishes to you, bobcatwild123.