Dad has become unhinged about money. How/whether to take control of his finances completely?
My mom took care of all my parents' finances, and since she died last year my dad seems to be increasingly losing it. My sister has POA and manages as much as she can, but my dad is holding on to control even though it is clear he does not understand money and trying to just makes him more anxious. He keeps tens of thousands of dollars in his checking account because it's the only account he thinks is real money available to him, and when my sister tries to get him to transfer some to interest-bearing accounts he gets suspicious and refuses. My sister has tried to get him to have his statements and credit card bills sent to her so she can take care of them, but he insists on receiving them himself and every time he gets a credit card bill, he panics that he is "in the red" because he does not understand how a credit card functions and he thinks that a bill means that he has a negative amount in his bank account.
Whenever he gets a statement or bill, he insists on having my fiance drive him to his bank so he can "get this all straightened out" by talking to the bank manager, and the poor bank manager spends 45 minutes explaining to him how credit cards work, and that he has plenty of money left, but he quickly forgets the whole conversation and insists on going to the bank again in a few days. He has failed to pay his credit card bills, despite multiple entreaties by me and my sister, but he still insists on having the bills sent to him.
My sister can write checks from the trust account she created after my mom passed away and has done so to pay for my mom's funeral, and to take care of our disabled brother.
My sister and I are wondering when it is time to do something more drastic to just take him out of the picture entirely with managing his finances. He gets so anxious every time he gets any communication from the bank, and talking with us or the bank manager makes him feel better for a few hours but he is soon back to the same obsessive and deranged thinking. It also feels like it is our responsibility to protect other people from our Dad, and forbid him to go to the bank again...the manager is saintly and kind but there has got to be a limit to his patience.
If we can't convince him to let my sister take care of the bills and statements, what alternative is there to continuing in this way? His anxiety over his money--not to mention his unwillingness to use any of it to help his kids--colors every interaction. It's gotten to where spending time with him feels very heavy and depressing...especially when I think of how generous and competent my mom was, and how sad it is that he begrudged even giving her a decent gravestone :(
4 Answers
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Another really helpful thread on this site had suggestions to put all his bills on autopay and check his statements online. There's still the problem of him harassing the bank employees every few days...we may just have to start refusing to bring him there! It is embarrassing the way he behaves toward them, and his impatience and bullying with retail staff in general.
Is he on any medication for anxiety and depression? I have found that geriatricpsychiatrists are often very good at explaining to elders what they need assistance with ( their finances , driving, cooking) and also with prescribing the right meds to allow for some peace of mind.