How should I handle the car key situation?

you do whatever you need to , to keep her safe. My dad once wandered out to the garage 20+ times in one day ( hubs counted) to ask if that was his car out there, and where the keys? It was non stop repetition.. We finally told him "he lost the keys" and it would take awhile for the new ones to arrive." It is a long hard slog.. but eventually they forget.. If we are lucky! My FIL left my obviously impaired MIL drive until she ..A hit a kid on a bike ( luckily not hurt but very angry) and B rear ended a carload of day workers who called the cops! Even then he was willing to take her to renew her license. Thank God the DMV sent a letter saying she needed a full driving test to renew.. he never took her!

My family member is a retired fireman. He has been to many accidents involving old people, most of whom were 100% in the wrong. Why? Because someone said old person, it's their fault. Yup, dementia, it will be your mom's fault, no matter what, because she won't be able to prove otherwise. Is it worth it? Not for our family. I got rid of mom's car.
Don't know if you remember or even heard of what happened a number of years ago where an older person with dementia hit some people, didn't even realize he did it. The poor man...and the people he hit.
If I were you, have her take a driving test or lesson, or have the DMV or doctor make that decision for you, so it's not your fault that she cannot drive. That would be heartbreaking too. Dementia sometimes turns into a tape loop, the same scenario or thought will keep playing in their minds. You cannot feel guilty about that. Best thing, go to her next doctor's appointment and ask him straight up with mom beside you, is mom still capable of driving safely?

It would be better to remove the car. My aunt said if the car was there she would drive it. Of course she might just start asking you were is the car?

Whatever works, get her off the road. We kept my mom's car when she got lost a couple of times, but asked her to please not drive. She had stopped at my son's house to ask how to get to the bank. He drove her from his house. Then she didn't know how to get back home from his house. All this within 10 city blocks. Another time she found herself way west of her house and stopped to call me for directions. My son and I went to get her. She insisted that she would drive when she wanted, but just once got no further than the next street and realized she had no idea where she was going, so returned and never tried it again. We never had to hide the keys. Her car was used to take her and her dog places. If your mom has early dementia she might be convinced to not drive now and be afraid to try later. It depends on how willing she is to admit to her dementia.

The only issue that I can see with giving her the dead fob is that one of her helpful friends might look into replacing the battery for her.

You mentioned she is paying for this car. If it is not safe for her (or others around her) to be driving, why keep the car at all?

Whatever you can do that will satisfy her at that time is ok to me. 😉

Notify her car insurance company about her diagnosis. It will be up to them whether or not they are willing to insure a driver with dementia. Without coverage, you may have an easier time with your mother about selling the car. On days she understands, you can blame the car insurance company. On days she doesn't, no amount of explanation will satisfy a person with dementia.

If the car is in good shape, the sooner you sell it the more money you'll get for it, which will help pay for care.

My mom knew a woman who killed a kid that was riding his bike. It does happen! Comes to a point it is dangerous to drive and the family has to stop them from doing so. If the person doesn’t have a family who stops them?

I was lucky I guess, my mom and dad did not fight me about driving and we gave the car to my brother.

My friend disconnected something on her mom’s car, thinking that it would solve the issue. Her mom called AAA out and they fixed it. She started driving her car again, so I doubt the dead fob would work. She will get it replaced with new one.

Disable the car (put it on axle stands, take off the distributor cap if it's got one, e.g.). Then at the very earliest opportunity, e.g. when your mother next shows awareness of her dementia, agree its removal and sale and bank the money for her.

The trouble is, a dead key might stop her actually driving it onto the road but if you can get into a car and release its handbrake and steering lock you can still do a heck of a lot of damage. Seen it happen. And that's apart from the worry and anger she might experience when she can't make the key work.

Also: where does she want to go most regularly, and what could you set up as alternative transport for her?

I had this issue with my father. We talked it over, and he agreed to be assessed by an outside party. People usually believe paid consultants more than family. We found there were policemen willing to give assessments in their spare time for a small fee. Of course I stacked the deck by talking to the policeman ahead of time, but I do not think it was needed.
Soon after the assessment we removed the car when he was receptive. Eventually we gave it to my daughter and let my father be a hero, but I also would have sold it to a business who buys cars as I did with my FIL's car.
Your father would need to be present to sign the transfer, but that is only a one time project, it is better than replaying the battle again and again. Looking back on the before and after, I would have kicked in some money to help make it happen.
Playing up the positives, such as the money from the sale, helps. Going to lunch or some other positive activity afterwards is also good. Getting a good price is not important as getting rid of it quickly.
The battles fade when the car is no longer there.

Before my FIL's dementia got worse he too thought he could drive but he got lost once and another time had a minor fender bender. As a family we decided no more driving. We knew by telling him straight out it would cause a huge fight because in his mind he was perfectly able. My husband disconnected his car battery and he could not figure that much out. When he asked us to call a mechanic we always brushed him off "oh tomorrow we will" or "not today there's too much stuff going on." At this point in time he no longer has a car (although he forgets that sometimes) but we gave him a bunch of old keys that go to who knows what and it makes him feel secure, like he's in control.

I think you might unintentionally be straying into some ethical hot water, here.

Your mother is paying for the car (is that some kind of finance deal? Any way to wind it up or transfer it to yourself?). It is her car. Is her licence valid? Her insurance?

I'm not saying woo-hoo let her drive if she wants to; but you can't keep her property, allow her to carry on paying for it, and prevent her from benefiting from it all at the same time.

If I were you - in fact, this is more or less what I ended up doing, because I couldn't afford to insure both cars and mother was heartbroken at the thought of losing hers; so was I but we all have to make these little sacrifices humph - I should get rid of your car and buy hers from her. If you haven't already, it is also time to notify her insurers and your local DMV people.

From there, it is reasonable to ask her to pay a proportion of the running and/or finance costs equivalent to how much use she gets from the car. So, say half of your mileage involves taking her to appointments (that'd be a lot of appointments! - but you see what I mean), then she pays half.

Has she given you power of attorney, by the way?

I hid the keys to my wife's minivan. But she found the spare key to my ford pickup and tried to use it. When she could not get her vehicle started, she just gave up.
But she would still go sit in the passenger seat to go somewhere. However her dementia was so bad by this time she coud not tell me where she wanted to go.

Yes,I think that is a very reasonable thing to do.But it might raise other questions like why can't we fix this.It depends on how badly she wants to drive.Have you explained to her that the Dr says it's unsafe for her to drive now?

I have a good friend I give rides to places. When her vision got to the point I knew she had no business driving I went with her to her eye appointment. (I always went in to the appointment with her as she is also hard of hearing and needed me to "hear" the doctor for her and remind her of what he said. Anyway, at one appointment I asked the doctor several times in front of her if he felt it was time for her to give up driving. He wouldn't answer. Just skipped over the question. Maybe I should have called them ahead of time to let him know what was going on but he was no help at all making her give up the car. Finally she had a retina detach and even though they were able to fix it, she had a stroke in that eye and lost her vision in it. She was already blind in the other eye so that took care of the driving problem. She's still going strong, but with me at the wheel instead of her.

So you’ve told her she can’t drive? But then you would give her the dead key fob? It sort of send a mixed message. As long as the car is there she will continue to ask.
Do you have POA? Personally I would sell your car and use hers and you make the payments. Is it nearly paid for? Or sell her car off and when it comes time get a different car.
If you can’t do either you could put a club on the steering wheel so she can’t drive it. But I wouldn’t give her the fob if you are telling her she can’t drive. I know it gets old answering the same questions.

Her doctor didn’t tell her “no”? If they are aware and have diagnosed her, especially if she is on medication for dementia they should be your ally. It’s usually much easier if they tell her; somehow it’s easier when it comes from the doctor. Another way might be to call Motor Vehicle, and tell them what medication she takes for dementia, which is what my daughter did for her father. With the letter they send canceling the license you might inquire from the car company if they can give her a buy back or cancel her lease. Let her keep her dignity because she might feel that’s all she has left. I found everything is easier if you talk about things you’re going to be doing with your loved one, and make lists of things you want to do “with” them. It’s a lonely scary world when they start to lose the power they had to control it.

When getting a dangerous driver off the road, all’s fair.

Never had to deal with this,since sweet mom gave up driving on her own

I worked on a Memory Care Unit . The patients could see the visitor parking lot from the dayroom windows. Several patients thought they "saw" their vehicle parked there. Some would demand to have their car key as they "knew" that was their car they saw. Took a lot of distractions and "fiblets" to redirect attention.
Having a car represents freedom and independence. One thing you could do is remove car from sight and say it is being repaired. Taking out battery is another way to prevent driving, but best that car is out of view.

At least she only has one. My mother had more sets of car keys than I ever knew a person could. Just when I thought I had them all, another set would turn up!

Country Mouse has, as always, good points. My mom put her car in my name 5 years ago. I explained to her how expensive her insurance was because of her age. I still use that car to take her for rides, but I have 2 cars that I pay for now. I'm okay with that, but you might want to get rid of yours and put hers in your name? Find out all the gift laws that might be associated with a transfer such as that. I have no idea.

Yes. And no it's not mean. We did that with my Mom and she didn't know the difference.

This answer is just something to giggle about. Comic relief! Because all of us can become tired, even frustrated. It’s normal. I’m trying very hard and have managed to (most of the time) successfully remove the guilt over getting exasperated at times.

Okay, the giggle part, for those of you who have raised kids, remember how they would swipe the remote control and change the channel on the television?

Well, being a new mom and not knowing what to do (babies don’t come home with an instruction manual) I thought I could solve the problem by removing the batteries in an old remote and let my daughter play with that one. DID NOT WORK! haha. She started to cry! She knew it didn’t make the picture on the television change.

Also, my kids never wanted to play with toy keys. They would always swipe my keys. So allowing them to play with an old set of used keys did work when I gave them those. Kids are so smart! They know what they want. Can’t do that with old car keys though for our parents. Haha.

Our parents become like our children and know what they want! Just like giving our kids everything isn’t good for them, same with our elderly (senior citizen kids), we can’t give them everything they want. Not good for us either, we would go totally insane!

I was lucky that my mom accepted gracefully that she could no longer drive. I think she looked at me as her personal chauffeur! That’s another story though. Haha.

We have a Maxima of about the same age. Without a working battery you can't even open the doors. But if she can figure out how to undo the fob, there's a key inside. Betcha didn't know THAT. So if the battery is dead, the car will still run, it will just show a little icon that the battery is in need of replacing.

You could actually get her a dummy key, or take the one you have and mess it up with a screwdriver or something so it simply doesn't work manually.

Be warned, to re-program the new fob is about $200.

But $200 against the possibility of her her having a horrible accident is pennies.

I’m not sure if this is different in different states. In mine, a doctor can order a driving test. Or if you know anyone in law enforcement, sometimes they will watch out for someone who shouldn’t be driving and cite them for an infraction ( probably won’t be hard to find one ) . Then they will lose their license . It seems like someone in authority carries more weight than a family member. We went thru this with my stepfather, IMO he knew he shouldn’t be driving( at that time he could not even remember how to put up the car windows up or down) but my mother refused to take his keys and claimed the dr said he could drive around the neighborhood ( filled with kids) but not on the freeway. His dr. was a quack and refused to order the test. I think they finally had a close call and she started driving. When he passed away, she was nervous driving but we just took her keys when she got to the dangerous stage. She assumed she lost them like everything else lol. I’d just say something like “ oh they must be around somewhere ( leaving out the “at my house” part lol) , we can find them later” and change the subject. Eventually, she made a deal that my husband have her car and drive her when she needed to go. Is limited by his schedule and we need to take her to the dr anyway so it’s ok. Imo safety issues like that can’t be negotiable

Try an anti-theft steering wheel lock, buy at any hardware store. Tell her it's to prevent theft, of course.

When mom's eyes became bad, my dad said 'give me your licence or I'll have Ministry of Transport take it away ... you won't need a road test with me if your eyes improve' - so she did & when she had work done on her eyes she said to me 'I think I'll go get my licence back[it had expired by then]' - I said 'it will be very expensive' to which she answered 'no it's not that expensive' - I said 'but all those ads on radio to get everyone else off the road when you are on it will be costly' - she said 'you don't want me to drive anymore' & I agreed - that was the end of the issue 

Several years before I told my kids 'don't get in a car with your grandmother .... come & get me for permission then I could drive' - safety first!

Lots of good answers here. Just the other day, my mom 95 who I am taking care of 24/7 took my car keys and tried to sneak out the back door to go home. She is living in her own home, my bf and I have been living with her for almost 5 years now since my dad passed away in 2013. She has frontal lobal dementia and is constantly wanting to go places at odd times of the day. The home she talks about is with her parents. (both deceased more than 50 years). So getting back to her taking my car keys, I asked for them back politely, she put them behind her back and said No. I asked for them again, then she threw them out the back door. (not far landed on the porch) She was going to drive herself home. She was not in her right frame of mind that morning. Then she started ranting about how I have everything and she has nothing and that I am keeping her prisoner. She said she hopes the police come to take me away and all my family. Then I said will if they come and take me away, who is going to cook, clean, bathe you, wash your clothes, take you to your drs?? She said the police. I said no, that is not their job. After that she quieted down and went back to her chair to sit down and watch her tv program. Keeping the car and keys out of sight is a good idea. Hugs to you all having to take care of your aged loved ones.