When do I stop 'helping' Mom?

Your mom is 93. Her days of independence are over. I’m sorry to sound harsh, but it’s true.

For your own piece of mind, stop arguing. Try and keep her safe. Eventually, safety may also be something that becomes too difficult for you. Can you lift her in and out of shower/bed/toilet? If not, it may be time to consider a facility where she has 24/7 help. You then would be free to visit and spend quality time with her, rather than all your time arguing/being a drill sergeant.

Yup. For me personally the last paragraph says it all, and that's the tack I would take. It would be all I COULD do, to be frank, with everything else you are doing. If someone is to get her up and moving it may be her caregivers who come in to give help.
My brother, who was diagnosed with probable early Lewy's after a car accident went to rehab for a month. There they had him up and around and exercising and his balance was so improved by their balance exercises. But would he do them at all when he went home? Nope. And in the end I think his refusal and his claims that I was managing his life too much was just as a result of all the losses one after another, and the fear of more losses of al control. He just needed to have SOME control of SOMEthing. And he wouldn't do them at all. I gave up. He was 85. I just simply gave up.
At some point there is not more you can do without changing your relationship more and more and more each day. You can sit with her and tell her that when she cannot be on her feet anymore you cannot keep her at home with you, nor afford 24/7 caregivers in the home (if this is true) and your wishes to make her walk aren't so much being a task master to her as it is to hope you can keep her on her feet so she can stay with you. Perhaps the fear of getting bed bound will motivate her, but this is so sub- conscious that I doubt it.
I wouldn't go there anymore. Or at least I would do it once a day matter of factly getting her up and moving, or I wouldn't bother. She's 93. You are heading toward the inevitability of the loss of mobility. It is hard to accept.
That's just my advice. Others might keep going for it, keep trying. And again, at some point, no matter what you do, the inevitable is right there with you. I sure do wish you luck and welcome you to Forum.

CoffeePaula, I feel your pain! My mom is 84 and was hospitalized due to Covid and a bladder infection. We found out that she has several small strokes before her hospitalization and I can see that it has affected her choices. Her bladder infection is an ongoing thing for her which is not helped by her lack of fluid intake, it makes the infections recur frequently ( she is currently on number 4 in the past 7 months). She was in the hospital and rehab for a total of about 7 weeks and had PT in rehab to help her gain her strength and walk/move around better. Then we had about 3 months of in-home PT that she did really well with. The problem began when the PT ended due to her insurance.

I explained to her that I (58 years old) with my bad back would not be able to lift/turn/move her if she became bed-ridden and would need to place her in a nursing home (her greatest fear), if she didn’t continue the PT exercises to keep her body strong and be able to be mobile. She uses a rollator walker now and has not been doing her exercises. She is completely exhausted after going to a doctor appointment (and she has many), and is currently on the fast track to becoming bed-ridden. I have stopped arguing with her, I did tell her that I was not going to push her to keep up the exercises and that this would be her decision as to whether or not she ended up in a nursing home sooner rather then later. It appears that is not a huge concern for her right now. It just makes me more bitter about having given up a rewarding career that I loved to take her into my home and care for her instead of putting her in a nursing home where she can be cared for.

I feel horrible that she has made this decision, whether she realizes it or not. Do not stress yourself out with this. My relationship with my mom is not the best and hasn’t been for years. I resent having to care for her for many reasons and hopefully you can avoid feeling the way that I do.

My best suggestion is to not argue with her, but you will also need to accept that she is making the choice to do nothing and must accept the consequences. Good luck to you!

After 4 yrs I gave up advising/ helping my mom. I now am her daughter only and let nurses give the advise.. life is so much better!

I used to tell my mom quit driving … the walker .. 😉😉
I would argue with her regarding doing her exercises.. I became a nag .. lost the daughter in me..

I would encourage her, but let it go ..

CoffeePaula, I use to be a gym rat for decades, but now at a mere 76 doing even simple exercising isn't all that easy due to normal age related issues.

So I can just imagine how I would feel at 93. I would be telling people to STOP IT and let me enjoy what I have left in the life.

My mom used the same words on me "drill sargeant" for pushing her to do p.t. Unlike with your mom though, I was the only one who would push her hard enough to make progress. She'd say she was tired or didn't feel good or always found a way to weasle out with the therapists... Unless I was w/ her at the rehab when it was time for p.t. As long as I was doing the exercises with her, then she would do them.

When it came to walking though, that was a different story and she'd always try to cut it short with the therapists using any number of excuses. They let her get away with all of them and would say "Ok, do you want to go back to your room then?" She'd say yes, but I was thinking No!

So instead of going back to her room, I'd say "Come on mom, let's walk down this hall and go see what's happening upfront, we can talk to your friend at the desk there." From there it was "come with me (down this other hall) to the dining room so we can get some snacks & juice," (snacks were a motivator),.. Or let's go out to the courtyard and sit in the sun so you can get some Vitamin D & we can call so & so while we're out there.. So she'd trudge along with me from place to place.

The end result was she'd get more than 5 x the amount of walking in vs. what she got when I wasn't there.

Is there somewhere outside of the house that you can walk with your mom? Like out to the mailbox, depending on where that is. Or any other idea you can think of where she's getting exercise without thinking she's getting exercise?

Those are the only suggestions I have. If she's not motivated by accompanying you to whatever destination you're asking her to walk to, then as others have said, you could just let her be. At some point however, if she doesn't build & maintain strength, she'll become immobile & her future options will be more limited. Maybe she's fine with that. If so, then let her be. If not, keep trying.

Sounds like you've been quite creative. I definitely think it's harder with it just being the two of you inside the house. Games with hitting or kicking a balloon or light-weight beach ball back and forth with my mom while we were otherwise just visiting was another thing I could always get her to do She thought it was kind of fun and it was amazing how she could move in order to bounce the ball back to me! :-)

What I have found is, unless your Mom has something to live for or can get a positive outcome consistently and immediately, she isn't going to do what needs to be done.

The way I think of it is this. When we are young, we want to travel, go places, meet with friends, etc. Hence it is in our best interests to be without pain and to take the advice of others on how we can be healthier and live better.

However, when you get to 80s and 90s, you figure you could die any day, so unless you have something to live for, you are not going to work toward improving your health. Saying things like "your pain will go away" may or may not work because as a senior, if it isn't a pain here, there will be a pain somewhere else. She doesn't give a damn to "get stronger" until you show her why "getting stronger" will benefit her immediately.

At the age of 96, my mother didn't give a hoot about how she used her walker, how strong her leg muscles or abs were, etc. until she decided that we would go on a cruise. For 8 months, she ate healthier, did the exercises her PT gave her and took care how and when she walked. I swear she was the oldest person on that cruise ship who walked, with her walker, at the various ports in Greenland.

Once the cruise was over, she declared that was the last time she would ever travel as the plane rides were too difficult for her. Back home, she reverted back to not doing exercises, complaining about her aches, etc and of course, physically, she can no longer walk like she did in Greenland and needs 24 x 7 watch.

So regarding your question, I would back off. There are some of the exercises you need to do to maintain her ability to get out of bed, use the toilet, and walk around. You could turn the exercises into a game. Talk to the PT person to see what alternate exercises you could do that would strengthen the same muscles.

The other option would be to find a tangible goal that she is truly interested in and link the exercises to that goal.

I'm the exercise police. I told her that the day she is unable to walk from her wheelchair to the car, is the day we stop going out for drives.

So far, she is willing to keep up with some of her exercises. It turns out that the exercises also help her stay regular without meds/herbs and also help her circulation so that it isn't painful to sit, stand or walk.

It is tough getting old. It is a lot more work than I, as a child, ever realized.

You need to acknowledge that your mother will do as little or as much as she wants to do in terms of working on her mobility. You can tell her if she doesn’t have some mobility she will have to go into a nursing home. Maybe that will scare her into doing more.

Your mother will start falling at some point soon. It’s not an if any more. It will happen. It’s important she has a medical alert device so if she falls EMS will come. Get a lock box so that the keys are available so EMS can get in easily without destroying her front door.

Having a home health attendant for four hours a day is a good start for her to get used to having some help for her daily needs.

Try not to get too annoyed or frustrated. I know it’s hard. Good luck to you.

As an OT and as a daughter, I have accepted that "No-Kay" is sometimes the best and only response I can give to the situation in front of me. You are obviously a caring daughter and want the best for your mom in maintaining her safety and her independence. She has told you and shown you that either by her deliberate, self directed choice or by her current cognitive abilities, this is what she is going to do. Keep gently reminding when you feel you can. Embrace no-kay when you can't. In many ways dealing with my dad has much overlap with dealing with my teens. You know what would work but for their own reasons they won't do it. If she does something that is immediately dangerous, step in on that. For all the rest, trust yourself to be able to deal with the consequences of their decisions, recognizing the frustration that comes with that. Just swing at the ball that is pitched at you, one at a time. Truly best of wishes to you!