I want to bring my 61 year old husband home from memory care due to the expense. I have 30 hours home health/health aides that my insurance will cover, but I would need to hire nights and weekends. I thought about getting a CNA student to sleep here and just get up if he needs help (has an accident, taken to the restroom, etc). I can do it now, but I may be starting dialysis soon and then I would need someone to make sure if they hear the door alarm to go redirect him to keep him from wandering. He gets sleeping pills at night, so he isn't up much.
And no one is going to accept a “free room and board” situation… the ones that do are people you would not want in your house.
A rotation of paid caregivers will run you in the ground financially quicker than any memory care could. How would you handle it when one or more of them quit or can’t come in? Caregivers have sick days and responsibilities just like any employee.
Your husband needs way more help than you and some people can give. You know that. Don’t be foolish.
Nursing school is very hard and people study all day and night. No one has time to care for an elder.
I’m sorry you are feeling pressed.
You do NOT need some crazy person in your house overnight while you're trying to sleep.
Instead keep your husband in his memory care where you know he is safe and taken care of and you go talk to an elder law attorney about splitting your assets, so you can apply for Medicaid if and when the time comes.
Most people discover soon enough that the cost of in-home health care costs WAY more than facility care, unless you have family members doing the care for free.
So please call a lawyer today.
And having done night duty while caregiving my dad and my husband, I can tell you that it is difficult. They wake up, you take them to the bathroom and clean up the mess, then they're sundowning and you don't dare go back to sleep because they might wander or start turning on stove burners. Sleeping pills? Fine. However, if the pills don't keep them asleep as the dementia gets worse, you need to give more pills. Then they start falling down when they get up during the night and other times. You can't get them up. Or they break something. You have to call 911. No sleep again.
He is where he belongs if he's in memory care. The cost is horrendous (my husband is in memory care now). But my advice is to find - somehow - a way to pay for it. Otherwise you're taking on an extremely difficult task that could adversely affect your health, which is already compromised.
I'm sorry.