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Resistant Caregiver

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My father has Alzheimer’s. He doesn’t converse anymore, answers questions with yes or no only. He is becoming incontinent, though if he is prompted frequently, he is fine. The bed is usually soiled in the morning. Despite all this, he is a happy, loveable guy. He lives with my mother and she is the problem. She has social phobia which has intensified with age. They live in an adult community with many amenities which she will not use because of her phobias. She does not want contact with strangers, sometimes not even with people she knows. Sometimes I get the feeling she does not want me there. She does not recognize that she has these phobias. My father has a wonderful aide who comes in 5 mornings a week for 2 hours to get him up, showered, dressed, medicated & fed. He loves her. He goes to adult social day care 4 days a week. He is gone from the house from approximately 8-3. He loves it. My mother cannot stand to have the aide there. We (my sister, brother & I) think Mom feels she has to be 'on' whenever someone is around her and it is very stressful for her. On the days my Dad does not go to daycare, he doesn’t get out of bed until afternoon, then Mom feeds him breakfast. He may stay up for a while but then goes back to bed. We feel he does this because he cannot do the things he used to and bed is the only 'safe & comfortable' place for him at home. Mom will let him stay there forever. She actually said to me one day 'That's exactly where I want him'. In other words, away from her. Twice in the last 3 months he has collapsed in the morning and rushed to the hospital because he had not eaten since breakfast the day before and his blood sugar dropped and he passed out. The problem I am writing about is that she resists all attempts of help. We went through hell to get him the morning aide. And now we are going through hell again to get the evening aide in. All because she does not want people in her house. We tell her Dad needs this care because she cant (or wont) do it. We believe she wants Dad gone....she wants him in a nursing home, so she can have what she calls a peaceful life. The other day she actually said 'Let someone else take care of him at a nursing home'. She yelled at us "Do you know what this is doing to me?' We told her that is part of the reason we want more help, not just because Dad needs it, but she does too. She is really depressed and angry, but wont accept help. We have to force it on her and she is getting worse & worse. She will not go to support groups, does not use the internet and won’t even talk to Dad's daycare director who is wonderful, caring and a registered nurse. Mom calls her 'the idiot'. Has anyone ever had this problem? Does anyone have any suggestions how to help her?


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