Are any of you making plans so that YOUR children don't have to go through what we went through/are going through with our parents?
My siblings and I had a frustrating, frightening two to three years with our parents, both of whom we lost in the last two years. We had no training in dementia or dementia care; we had no idea what was happening to my dad as he became forgetful, difficult and demanding (I WILL drive if I want to! Those people at DMV just have it in for old people, and LIED about my vision!), and then began with the hallucinations. Mom had memory problems, but always remained sweet. Dad demanded to live alone at his home (with my brother and I visiting three times a day for his care) after Mom went into a nursing home and then died. When things got really bad (wandering the streets in the middle of the night or calling the police looking for my (deceased) mother, thinking he was in a hotel, wanting to go "home," we got him into memory care by sedating him and lying to him. My issue is that I really dread treating my own children like that, and intend to write them a "handbook" on what to look for should I go this route, and a letter allowing them and encouraging them to find a nice memory care facility for me if that time comes. As you suffer (many of you) with parents' dementia, etc., are you thinking about how to help your children if it happens to you? Any suggestions for all of us?
Dealing with my elderly parents lack of planning has been a train wreck and a nightmare. Both my parents are secretive and paranoid people. They have always made it completely clear that their affairs were none of our business. They were self employed and owned property and inventory but never put a penny in savings. Now that Dad has dementia Mom expects us (her children) to take care of everything...selling property, liquidating the business, cleaning out the properties, paying off their enormous debt with the proceeds and making sure they still have money to live on and Dad still thinks he is going back to work. I won't go into what this has done to all of our relationships but suffice to say it's been horrible. It's also been a HUGE wake-up call.
I'm 59 and my husband is 62. We are self employed, each running separate businesses. A few months ago I made the decision to close mine down and liquidate before so I don't wind up like my parents. I bring in half our income so I still need to work full time. As I transition out of my business I'm substitute teaching to supplement my drop in income and to get experience. I found a buyer for my inventory...pennies on the dollar but that's the way it works. I'm OK with that. That money will give me time to find a a full time para professional position (assistant teacher for special needs kids).
My husband and I live and work in a mixed use building which we own. It is not elder friendly at all plus my husband does all of our repairs and maintenance. The building is old and it's already getting hard for him to keep up. We just put the building on the market with plans to buy a two family when it sells, we will live on the ground floor and rent the other unit. This will give us some rental income. My husband will rent a small office space for his business when we move. We are both going to have to work as long as we can as we have little savings and will only have SSI to retire on. No debt thank God, credit has always given me the willies.
Meanwhile we have spoken with our kids and told them we are making up a will and putting together instructions for medical situations. We cannot afford decent long tern care insurance and we will never be able to afford assisted living so those are worrisome things.
We are deciding now how to do DPOA. Most likely it will be for each other with an alternate. We are not sure who that would be. I want to talk to the kids about what this means so they will be fully informed. We are going to be completely transparent with all of them in all these matters. My sons get along really well and I don't ever want to jeopardize that.
The rest is in a higher powers hands....
I wasn't blessed with children [modern medical technology wasn't around back then] so I need to look out for myself. I have been frugal and saved like crazy since I was 5 years old.... was hoping for a world wide travel in my retirement but that isn't going to happen.... will use that money for my OWN assisted living which feels like just around the corner for me due to all the stress :P
Windy, I did the same thing regarding legal documents as soon as I noticed if I didn't do something now, we would be using an old Will which would have turned into a financial nightmare. Learning from that, I signed my own Trust, Will, etc. last year, so glad that is done.
I am seriously thinking of downsizing as each year my yard feels like it has doubled in size when it comes to caring for it... same with the house. I learned from my parents that gluing themselves to their large single family house isn't the best way to spend your final years. I don't want to have to search for someone to buy me 20 lbs of fertilizer for my yard when I am 95 [like my parents are doing] or be out trying to shovel snow. Or climbing ladders. Or not wanting to pay for help... [sigh].