My mom is 94, living alone/independently, still decisional, but has age related problems such as pain, walking, balance, and memory loss. My question is, I am arranging for state aid for in home care a few hours a week. But what do I do when I see she is having more and more difficulty living alone. How do I get guardianship so I can have her go into a home? Or, my hope is that while she is still decisional and still has her mental capacities, she'll make up her own mind to go into a home. How do I facilitate her making that decision? The homes we visited were very nice, Medicaid paid homes. But they had only studio apartments with kitchenettes. My mother is used to a nice large 1 bedroom apartment with a great kitchen. She has been living there over 10 years, so the change to a retirement home is something she just doesn't want to do. I am afraid she'll fall again, or her memory will fail more and the stove won't get turned off, or the water will not be shut off, etc. And bad things could happen while she lives alone. Thanks.
So you wait for that to happen. So sorry, but you cannot force them to go anywhere without a court order and guardianship. I do know of a couple who burned their house down; both ended up in a nursing home after that.
If she still has decision making capacity, i think I'd point out to her that if she goes on visits to these places now, she'll possibly have a choice about where she goes.
My very smart mom decided, based on visiting friends and just shopping around various rehabs while in her 70s and 80s that there was one particular place that she never wanted to go. Good for both her and us, because when she had a stroke, we had a list of mom's own making about which places were okay with her.
Put it to your mom this way. " Mom, we need to visit some rehab/ AL places. Yoou might have a heart attack and need to go someplace to get stronger. I want to know which places would be acceptable to you".
Otherwise, as Pam mentioned above, you will need to wait until there is a medical crises. That is usually what happens. That happened to my Mom who spent her final months in long-term-care as she refused caregivers and using a walker. Once Mom passed, Dad put the house on the market and went to live in senior housing which he really enjoyed. He wished he had moved in earlier, as he was meeting a lot of new friends, and enjoyed all the great meals.