My 92 year old mother is healthy physically but she has a severe short term memory deficit. She still lives in her own apartment and we have made arrangements for someone to see her everyday. “We” includes my brother and his wife, their daughter and me. I wonder if for psychosocial benefits it would be best for her to be in an assisted living facility. She seems happy but her latest saying is, “Come often and stay long!” I believe she turns on a tv at 5:00 pm until around 9:00 but otherwise sits in her chair listening to talk radio. She no longer reads. Is that sufficient and reasonable to maintain what is best for her? Or are we kidding ourselves that it's ok. She is, in my opinion, incapable of knowing how someplace different might help. Or does it?
I could try and push it but I’m not interested in creating a family rift. Historically he and his family have been the closest to her over the years.
Assisted Living/Memory Care can help her by providing 3 hot meals a day and snacks, socialization, activities.........help with showers, and about 1000 other things that she'll need as her memory continues to evaporate. Don't wait until it's an emergency before you place her out of harm's way. Most people don't even understand dementia and all the facets of it......so read all about it and then make your decision accordingly. "Psychosocial" benefits are only 1 of many, many benefits to living with caregivers who work around the clock.
My mother turned 94 yesterday & I cannot believe how far downhill she's gone in the past 6 months ALONE. It's staggering what she can no longer do on her own, including using the TV and the phone lots of times! If she didn't have caregivers to help her, I shudder to think how she'd be able to function at all with moderate dementia at play.
Good luck.
Your mom sounds terribly lonely, and while she's happy-ish in her familiar surroundings, you need to make some decisions about her living situation with the knowledge that she isn't going to be getting better in her current set-up.
As far as it being healthy, I think that’s a matter of opinion. Some will say if family comes by every day then she’s fine. But to me it sounds like she’s pretty isolated and is merely existing at this point instead of living. I’m leaning toward this being an unsafe and unhealthy environment but I don’t know it’s correct to say that AL would be healthier, because of COVID. It would be better because she would be amongst other adults & have daily activities to participate in