I live in Williamsburg, VA but have been living in TN caring for my father since early April when my mother passed away. I am an only child and the responsibility for Daddy's care is mine alone; we have no other family aside from a distant cousin on my father's side. Daddy is only 75 but suffers from dementia, stage 4 COPD, stage 4 congestive heart failure and is an alcoholic. Thankfully, he is a very mellow drunk... but he is still hopelessly addicted.
My problem is that he refuses to move to Virginia (where my husband and son reside and where my HOME is). I have been living here in TN caring for him for four months now without a single break. He is convinced that he can care for himself and doesn't need me here. However, all of his docs have confirmed that he requires care 24/7and must not be left alone. He is becoming combative and blames me for what the doctors are telling him. For example: he has had three strokes in the last two years and had a TIA one week ago. His primary care physician has told him repeatedly that he must stop driving (he gets lost in his own neighborhood!). Finally, his doctor wrote the DMV requesting that his license be revoked. The letter arrived in today's mail and resulted in Daddy yelling at me and insisting that he will continue to drive, even without a license. I have disconnected the car battery but it is only a matter of time before he figures that out and sneaks off to drive to the liquor store. Same thing with the drinking. After he had two bouts of internal bleeding due to excessive alcohol ingestion (6 pints of blood in 24 hours last time this happened) the docs instructed me to dump all the bourbon and told Daddy he could never drink again. That went over like a lead balloon. He says they "don't know what they are talking about" and that a few cocktails never hurt anyone. He has periods of lucidity but is increasingly detached and demented.
In addition to refusing to relocate to VA so I can care for him he refuses to consider assisted living or a nursing home. Again, insisting that he can "take care of himself." This is a man who cannot cook, cannot clean, cannot manage his medication, heck- he cannot walk more than 12 steps without assistance and has fallen multiple times in the last year (fracturing his back in November!) I am at my wit's end. I don't know what to do... if I leave he will most certainly die from either a medication error or internal bleed due to drinking. If I go to court and have him forced into a nursing home he will hate me forever. Do you have any advice? Thanks so much in advance.
I don't know if there is a way that you can personally handle this situation. What I would do in your situation is to call human services for your father's county and have the situation evaluated. For you to have guardianship over your father would be hurtful and messy, I imagine. I wonder if it would be better for the state to assume guardianship. He does sound like he is at that point.
He will be mad at you, but he stays mad at you already. You can't live like this and need to get yourself to a safe shore before you drown. Call human services and see what they can do to help.
I'm in a similar situation right now with my father and I wish I had done somethings differently. I moved both of my parents from a small town in Utah to Portland, Oregon last year so that I could "help" them. I moved them into an apartment and quickly figured out that they needed assistance. I then moved them into an assisted living, which my mom loves, but Dad hates. Now his dementia is to the point I have to move him again to a Memory Care or Nursing Facility. Everything I've done just seems to have made things worse. I'm thinking I should have left them in their small town and relied on the government agencies, senior center, meals on wheels, hospital, private caregivers, churches, etc to help them. I think it would have been much less disruptive to their physical and mental states. The truth is, I selfishly moved them here with me, so I could enjoy time with them, plus I didn't want to live there.
I've seen a lot of posts on this site advising caregivers to "do whatever it takes to keep them safe". I'm not sure now that sacrificing their happiness and freedom is a fair exchange for "safety", if it means a small, dark, shared room in a locked facility in an unfamiliar town, with little stimulation, bland food, and strangers giving you pills and showers. I realize every situation is different, and I don't know anything about him, or you, but I would consider leaving him in TN. If he yells at you and hates you now, he may doubly so after the move to VA. We all want what is best for our parents but sometimes we don't know what that is. Like children, we can't protect them from everything, sometimes they will fall off their bikes or touch a hot stove, but that is life and life is risks.
I'm blathering and I don't know if I've made my point, but I hope you can get to some place of comfort and clarity with your decisions, whatever they are.
Hugs.
I am afraid you are going to have to leave. He may live another 10 years. What about your own health? You have done the best that you can.
I agree, both are horrible choices. But they are your choices as regards your father's care, only: looking after him is not your only priority in life. You have a husband, a child, a home. And, others will remind you, you have your own life to consider, which is no less important than your father's life.
This is about how much responsibility for your father's unhappy situation is truly yours. He is now in poor mental and physical health, but he wasn't always, and it isn't news to him that he was going to get old. The loss of your mother must have been a great sadness to him as well as to you (my condolences - four months is early days); but you didn't inherit her marriage, her commitment to him.
Look, you either pass the buck to 'the system' or you take charge. If you take charge you will get nothing in return but your father's resentment. It still can be the right thing to do, but be very clear-eyed about what thanks you'll get for it. Having said that: no, he won't hate you. He will be angry, and you will hear all about it, and it might feel and sound like hatred of you; but it isn't. He will hate the change that is being forced on him.
Looked at the other way round, HE has a choice. He can let you take charge, or he can let Fate take charge. You're less fickle.