How can I approach my mom about hiring a companion? Her reliance on me for 100% of her social interaction is too much!

I managed to talk my father into hiring a companion for three hours a week once a week. I wish he would have gone it for twice a week but he was too cheap. She was a great help. The problem was that even though my father didn’t want to hire her for two days a week he expected her to be on call for him if he wanted her. I could not get him to understand that he needed to schedule her time and not assume she was at his beck and call.

Piper,

I know it's difficult, but you have to dig hard!

Going to see a therapist was the best thing I have ever done for myself!! She has taught me that my needs matter!!

I have gotten to the point that although "yes" I care about my mom and her needs matter, my needs matter too!!

Ask yourself, what is the worst thing that can happen by telling your Mom what you need?

My guess is that it can't be any worse than what you're dealing with right now!

I thought I was living between a rock and a hard place. I have learned that I put myself there!

Imagine yourself out of the equation and then ask Mom what she wants.

(((Hugs)))

Just in case anyone is not getting why I am setting out a list of needs, here is Maslow:

https://www.google.com/search?q=maslow%27s+hierarchy+of+needs&oq=maslow&aqs=chrome.1.69i57j0j0i433l3.5038j0j4&client=ms-android-samsung-ss&sourceid=chrome-mobile&ie=UTF-8#imgrc=ZahGHUn-uQXSTM

I think that I'd read back over the POA's in detail to see exactly what it says about when these go into effect and possibly even discuss your situation with a lawyer with these documents in hand. My mother's were written so that I did not have to wait for an official declaration of incompetency by a doctor or court, and thus, I was free to act when I did. This sounds harsh, but you may have to stick to your boundaries until an emergency takes place in which you will have to use your POAs.

What's cruel is that YOU don't have a life b/c you're too busy seeing that your mother is entertained.

Get a 'job' and be unavailable to her from 8 am to 5 pm every day. In short order, she will be agreeable to either moving to Assisted Living or hiring a companion. You cannot be disturbed during those working hours, PERIOD. That's the first step in forcing your mother to create a life of her own or to cry uncle and admit she needs a DIFFERENT lifestyle that doesn't require usurping YOUR life in order to function.

As long as you are there FOR her amusement, why should she agree to anything else OTHER than using you for her amusement? Enabling her is disabling her.

Last but not least, any human being with dementia is in need of Assisted Living. A person doesn't have to be drooling or totally catatonic in order to 'qualify' for AL. In fact, when I moved my folks into AL, it was more for my father than my mother; she just 'went along for the ride', at least in HER mind. She wound up making a better life for herself there than she would have elsewhere. And when the time came that she 'needed' AL, it was there at her beck and call. Whether your mother agrees to AL or not is another issue for another time. Just don't kid YOURSELF that she's 'not ready' or not qualified for AL. She is.

Hire “companion” to do things FOR YOU.

Ask mom if SHE will help your new “household manager”, “personal assistant”, WHATEVER, help you stay organized, dust, shop, get gas in the car, do laundry.......

Don’t TELL her “assistant” is for her.

Helpful for both of you.

Piper, it seems to me that you have 2 separate issues here.

1. Mom interupts your life to fufill her need for socialization.

2. You are afraid that if you refuse her, there are legitimate needs that she has that will go unmet.

A. Your mom has shelter.

B. What is her source of food? Can she still prepare meals? I often see you write "I made X and I know mom likes it so I invited her to dinner". Are you in reality making sure she has enough to eat?

C. Companionship and access to "fun". This requires a conversation with mom: don't decide she needs a companion. Teĺl her "mom, I am going to be less available (due to new job, medical treatment, doctor's orders for my health, trip, whatever) and I want to make sure you have what you need. You come over here a lot; since that outlet won't be available, what do you think would be a good substitute?". You can certainly lay out possibilities, but I wouldn't decide beforehand for her.

I think it behooves you to find out what SHE sees as the solution.

Dear "ExhaustedPiper,"

I know I've commented to you on other threads so forgive me if I don't know the answer to this question (I did check your profile first) - do you have any siblings or are you an only child? ***I just saw the answer below - you do have siblings. So my question is do your siblings live in the same state or another state(s)?***

I call it an overdependent parent, a smothering parent one that may have been overprotective or the newer term "helicopter" parent and it creates enmeshment which is extremely difficult to break from - I know because I've lived it my whole life.

Was it always this way growing up or just when you became her caregiver?

If your mom has dementia then she should not be living alone for her own safety. At the very least she needs an overnight companion to stay at her house at night. She can go to adult day care during the day or even to her town's senior center.
As for her not agreeing to an assisted living or an in-home companion, who makes her decisions for her? You say she has dementia. That means you make her decisions and that's the end of it.
Either it's hired home companions and adult day care right now, or it's a nursing home. I know this sounds harsh, but this is how it has to be. As you've said, there is no way to set boundaries with a person that has dementia. It's not going to happen.
Then you have to make yourself a bit more unavailable. Don't take all of her calls. Instruct her companion(s) that you will call your mom several times a week to talk, but that they are not to let her call you and that they are not to call you unless it's an emergency or it's important.
You'll see if you get your mom good workers that she likes and gets along with it will do wonders for her. The only way you'll get good workers is if you hire privately. Don't use an agency. If you hire privately you can do your own back round checks and check up on their references yourself far better than any agency can. Most care agencies will hire anyone and they don't bother making sure they're good people or not because the pay is so low. Hire privately and you not only save money (always cheaper than an agency) but the worker makes usually double in pay or more than an agency charges. If you're paying $25 an hour to an agency, the worker is getting $10 an hour or less. If you're paying $20 an hour privately, the aide is getting the money directly, will do better quality work, and you're still saving.
I had a homecare client a while back who was dead set against anyone coming into her house. When I started she had moderate dementia, mobility issues, and mild incontinence. Her husband was still well off and independent. He insisted that either she work with homecare services or he would place her in a nursing home. It took a while for her to get to know me and used to the idea of someone being in the house. Then she started enjoying life again. I took her shopping, out for lunches, over to visit friends, all kinds of stuff. She had a couple of good years. If she was allowed to make the decisions herself she would not have allowed any help and would just have remained sitting on her couch all day alone while her husband was out. Please make this decision for your mom. She will be happy you did.

Our Beatty , who often comments on Forum, said this, and I found it so profound that I wrote it in my Commonplace Book.
"No other solutions will be found if you continue to be all the solutions."
It is so short, so beautifully put.
You already know this, and know you are enabling, but you have a caregiver personality, a fix-it mentality, an insistence that it can all be made better. So you are having a hard time mplementing changes that you know are needed.
I trust you will do it; change takes time. You already are writing that you recognize what you are doing.
I guarantee you when you first gently say "I am sorry Mom, I can't be your answer to everything. I am tired and frustrated, and for my own mental well-being I have to back away and leave some solutions in your own hands; and if you cannot find the solutions then I guess we need to agree that not everything can be fixed", your Mom will be angry. She may shout (as my daughter did) "But I COUNT ON YOU. I NEED YOU. You are the ONLY ONE who can do this". I suggest you tell her what I told my daughter: "I am so sorry. I am telling you that I canNOT fix anything anymore".
She will be unhappy. So be it. Life's FULL of unhappy times we all have to fix ourselves or live with. That, in fact, along with the good stuff, IS life.

The boundaries you’re struggling with aren’t for her, they’re for you. It’s for you to decide what you will and won’t let into your life. A fence around you that keeps out what isn’t good for you, with a gate that lets in what is good for you. And boundaries do apply no matter the person involved. Don’t explain or justify the need for companion help, no big conversations about it at all. I hired a wonderful helper for my dad, she worked 4 hours a day doing all sorts of things with and for him. She was good at what she did and made a friend out of him. There’s nothing for you to feel bad about, hire someone and let the person know fully what’s expected and what the situation will be like. And be less available, mom will depend on who’s there. I wish you well

Exhausted, are you her durable PoA? Your profile says your mom is only 76 yrs old. I'm an only child to a single mother and she lives next door to me, so I can relate. She is the last of 8 kids and so her siblings raised her and her sisters were basically her only friends. At 91 she luckily doesn't have too many cognitive issues but she did always have some boundary issues. For now I've had to work on my own thinking, reminding myself that I'm not her entertainment committee, reminding myself that for some challenges (like dementia) there are just not going to be perfect or quick solutions and I have to rest in that reality.

I guess any suggestion others put forth for you will depend on what legal authority you have and what your and your mom's financial means are. If you are her financial PoA I'd start by hiring an agency companion. You can insinuate this CG through a therapeutic fib. Does your mom like to play card or board games? Does your mom like to go out on errands or car rides? You can start by having this CG do these things with you and your mom so that she gets familiar with her. If you find a compatible person, then your mom will at least not feel like a total stranger is being interjected into her daily life. Transitions are hard enough for people with dementia, but not impossible. My 2 very elderly aunties in FL love their companion but it took a couple of misses with CGs and my aunts' realization that they just can't do everything themselves any more. Their companion performs light housekeeping, meal prep, takes them out on errands, walks with them, chats, plays cards, etc.

If you are not your mom's PoA and you are not able to convince her to assign you (or someone), then this is a much different situation. If I had the financial means I would maybe still try to ease a companion in on my own nickel but eventually would need to have my LO pay for it.

I know others on the forum will have good suggestions for you. I wish you much peace in your heart.

She wouldn't get much interaction in a care home at the moment anyway. All of the communal rooms and activities are suspended, and residents are having to stay in their own space - in the ILFs I visited, one is quite strictly supervised, and at another the residents seem to have figured out their own "bubbles" so that the client had bubbled with her upstairs neighbour, and the two of them were interacting but only with one another...

Meanwhile, back with your mother. You'll have to help her make the relationships and form the connections. Join a book club. Go to lectures at the library. Sign up to taster sessions at day centres and the like. Talk to people of her age. You might meet some interesting people that way, and your presence will certainly add something to the events, and if you're really lucky your mother will make friends that she likes enough to bother to take it further independently.

Hiring a companion... you can try it if you like, but what sort of companionship do you think you'll get? She's looking for natural social interaction and you can't really package that in $/hr. Any befriending networks/services in your area, have you looked at those?