Actual decline vs. learned helplessness...

I have had many of those concerns about my mom, especially over the past year. She is in an assisted living facility, but truly doesn't do anything for herself except to hoard food, menus from the dining room and the daily newsletter. She also saves the meal ticket that might come with a meal brought to her room. WHY? It's very frustrating to say the least. She accuses everyone of stealing her stuff, even the tail end of a banana that is extremely black. Staff cleans her dinky refrigerator once a week removing all the food from the previous week.

Mom rarely has her oxygen on when I visit. She has COPD and congestive heart failure. She needs the oxygen to stay alive. When I remind her to put her oxygen on, she acts like she has no idea what it is for, or even how to put it on. "What do I do with it?" she asks. It needs to go in your nose mom. She does have dementia and it makes it even more challenging.

Conversations with my mom are difficult as she doesn't hear, or even try to. I write almost everything down, but by the time I answer a question, she forgets what I was responding to.

Even though I feel a lot of what mom does is "acting," she truly has dementia and really can't cope with reality. I am guessing it only gets worse.

I think it's probably dementia. It causes great confusion on how to do even simple tasks in this case. Actual decline is often accompanied by confusion and difficulty in doing tasks wheras learned helplessness is often accompanied by stubbornness if you can ask if a person is able to do tasks like making a sandwich or putting laundry away.

OP, sounds more like depression than dementia. Social contact with a peer group might help reinforce norms.

people get tired when the body gets old....tired in many ways..
.I hear your unspoken question "are they making my life/work caretaking harder on purpose..&/or don't appreciate what I do"
The answer is no & no. Its not personal...Their behavior would be the same no matter who was there
Having a disease label don't change anything for the better
Then they are given medications . The side effects for meds given for dementia are an increase in the intensity of the symptoms they are supposed to alleviate.
People are who they are...as they get older their negative patterns take a more dominant role
You might consider treating this person the way you like to be treated

"Be the change you want to see"
Mahatma Ghandi