My mother lives independently but it is becoming clear that she will need services soon. She is 89, has suffered from severe hearing loss for 30+ years, wears hearing aids but struggles to hear in a social setting so she isolates herself, cognitive decline has accelerated over the past year. She no longer cooks for herself. Gets confused often and her short term memory is failing. She drives short distances but that is concerning. She is physically in great shape. I think she could remain independent for a while if she had services. Needing suggestions on how to get started looking for information on the cost of assisted living, nursing homes and memory care.
Memory Care= for those with dementia or other cognitive conditions that may also make them a flight risk since most if not all MC are locked.
Nursing Home= Old term Currently more appropriate term is Skilled Nursing facility. this is for people with medical conditions that would make their care impossible in other settings. Most Memory Care will not take someone that has "tubes" so any "ostomy", intubation, IV's, feeding tubes, and the like would need SNF. And anyone that needs equipment to be transferred. Currently I think Rehab and Skilled are the only ones that can use equipment. Oxygen may be another thing that can be used in SNF due to the highly explosive nature it needs to be kept safe.
Assisted Living= People that can do most ADL's but may need some help with them or meds.
Cost of each one of these depends greatly on the are you live in.
It also will depend on the level of care that a person needs.
If mom owns her home if you take the total cost of ownership like mortgage, insurance, taxes, all utilities, food and all the other things you may find that the cost might be the same as AL.
The other option is hiring caregivers and keeping mom home. You would have to compare cost of caregivers and how many hours you would need and if you need 24 hour care.
How do I know this? My husband had dementia, and I took his keys from him. I found him one day trying to put a key to a tool box into the ignition, as well as well as the house key. AND, I myself, noticed my own memory loss some 4 years later. What did I do. I immediately contacted a Veterans organization to donate my car. I am on memory medication, which helps only a little. In this case, I placed myself into a facility where I can progress from independent living to memory care when the time is right. My son has no idea how I did this, with short term memory loss. To him, I was still the fiesty old lady, who had a very important government job, who suddenly after retirement got dementia. Didn't even recognize that. I myself knew what was causing my stupid actions. I myself took my car to a place where I could donate it. No one told me to do this or to stop driving. I did it on my own. If your parents cannot do this on their own, do it for them. If they are driving with dementia, and kill someone, believe me, the courts can go after you, the children. Be there for them. Protect them and yourselves. Nuff said.
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You will need to call around to ALs and MCs in your area to find out costs. Every State and specific area are different in pricing. I live in NJ, in the South. I am sure that our ALs are cheaper than those up near NYC.
I'm going through something similar with my mom's hearing. Mom has actually been death in one ear since childhood, and poor hearing in the other ear.
She always read lips and we just always new we had to look at my mom when we talk, never really even thinking of why, it was just natural.
Anyways, recently she can't hear at all but won't get new hearing aids. ( She only needs one, there's no help for the other ear) Im figuring out it's not her ears, it's her mental decline. It's taking longer to get information into her brain. I have to talk slower and wait longer for her to comprehend what I've said. And it takes longer for her to answer. And she is using her hearing as an excuse.
Just wondering if that maybe a little of what's going on with your mom
my mom lives in a facility and it is not perfect but the private caregivers for her keep her content and she is not lonely.
My MIL is like your mom and needs services. We are all actively involved with her so we decided to hire a caregiver/driver/housekeeper and we posted an ad in Craigslist gig. It was 10 dollars for 30 days and we received 29 applications in 3 days. It is important to write a specific job description and also inform the applicants how to respond. I specifically asked applicants to please detail how their background and experience matched the job description. Only 6 people did that! And only 4 people were better with 1 person being heads and shoulders above the rest. We did a FaceTime interview, she sent me a copy of her valid driver lic and her references. After I phoned each of them and found out the duties she performed for them; I was ready for a face to face interview. It was and still is a match. She has been with my MIL for a year in June 2024. My MIL is difficult AND I put that in the ad. “A person with easily hurt feelings will not succeed in this job.” She experienced this after a couple of months but hung in there. I really think my MIL tries to test people and find their breaking point. Best wishes.
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