Yeah, I wish I could give you more hopeful thoughts, but my wife and I have been together for ten years and this situation has always been either right on the surface or bubbling just beneath it...My regret is that we didn't do more in the times when she wasnt really bad off instead of being more reactionary following some colossal fuck up. In our case, this is an INCREDIBLY difficult person to deal with, one who lives in complete fucking denial, even at this late date--my hope for you is that your mom will be more receptive, start attending meetings and start putting things back together.

Sorry Bob-O!

I look at all this from a different approach.

My mom passed away 13 years ago, and in the warped sense of how it sounds, I'd love to be in your position. You do the best you can with the best of intentions is all you can do. She needs to humble herself and accept any help along with making an honest attempt to help herself as well. Doesn't always lead to happy endings, but you do the best you can with the resources you have, and it will bring some sense of accomplishment and peace....I hope that makes as much sense as it does as it did in my mind.

I agree totally that she needs to be as close to us as possible (for the reasons you mention - especially contact with people), and that is my primary goal. I'm looking into every possible option to make this happen. The biggest obstacle are severe financial limitations. She only gets slightly more than $1,700/mo. in Social Security, and while I don't make a terrible salary, child support and IRS debt eat up the majority of my take home pay, so I quite literally have no extra cash available to help fund this. Finding something close enough that she can afford will be the biggest challenge. Not to mention coming up with the cash to buy her out of her current lease. And to get all this done in the next 7-10 days. Mission: Improbable.

She does seem receptive, but she's also not the world's strongest person emotionally, so she'll need tons of support from me, my family, and as many of the treatment support resources we can possibly leverage...and even then, it's probably only 50-50 that she'll succeed. I'm hopeful, yet realistic. Those tend to kind of cancel each other out in my outlook.

I know what you mean, Dov. I love her, and I'm glad she's still alive. But I also don't want her to suffer. Her quality of life right now is extremely poor, so my focus is on trying to help her improve that as much as possible.

As I get older, this is what worries me the most. How will I exist when I can't even bathe or feed myself? Sure I've got a little $$ saved for "retirement" (which keeps getting farther and farther away), and it'll probably last me a year (if that), at today's retirement home prices.

I'm luckier than you, in that I have 4 siblings, and we all love each other and will be able to watch out for each other. My Mom is 93, and has almost completely lost her last marble. Her carehome costs over 4k a month, and our inheritance shrinks by a large chunk every month.

You've got a tough situation on your hands. Best of luck- I hope you're able to find a good solution. We're rootin' for you. If I come across any info that I think would help, I'll let you know.

Edit: I think it's time to change my sig.

Much appreciated, Finchy! I am fortunate in that I don't have to worry about my inheritance shrinking, because it doesn't even exist in the first place. We po.

I'm very sorry to hear about this. I really don't know what to say, and I feel very fortunate and grateful that I most likely never be put into such a tough situation by my parents or in-laws.

You'll be in my thoughts. I hope this situation gets better.

Thanks so much - I really do appreciate you saying that.

I figure ain't nothin' anyone can really tell you you've not heard before and really it's just mostly words anyway. Life's just a bitch sometimes and I wish you luck in keepin' your head up and makin' it through. Just remember to take care of yourself and know that you're doin' the best you can.

I really am trying to do the best I can, but still often feel as if I'm falling short. Thanks for the words of encouragement, though.

There's an easy way to get out of her current lease - walk away, leave the keys. I wish them luck on tracking her down. Her credit is the least of her worries at the moment.

$1700 a month seems to me to be plenty.

Basement Room Rental within 5 mile radius of you - $500
Food - $300
Phone - $20 (plenty of pay as you go plans)
Utilities - included with rent
Car / Gas - $100 (not sure if she has one, but in case)
Household Items - $100
Clothes / Fun Money - $150

Add it up and there is > $100 left over a month. Plenty of people live on less. Now, finding that $500 room isn't necessarily easy, but I bet it is out there, especially with you vouching for her and living nearby. Hell, it could be doable up to $750 with some tweaks of the budget.

Good call. Her credit is not the point, and a lot of places won't go to court, and if they do, well, enjoy getting the judgement and taking in $50 a month. I'd make it two miles, ditch the car, and try to get her walking if it seemed feasible but it sounds like she may be in too bad shape for that.

I don't have any other practical advice but I'm sorry to hear of your troubles. No easy way to help folks who are too sick to work and who you won't see suffer if you can help it. Good luck.

Yeah, her credit's already shit as it is. Only two issues with wilked's proposed budget: (1) she has a $350/mo. car payment (which may just end up having to get repoed if we can't figure things out), and (2) there are no basement rooms (or basements) in Texas.

It looks like she's being discharged from inpatient alcohol rehab sometime later this week. We're supposed to have a meeting/planning session with her treatment team tomorrow, at which time we'll discuss/review possible options. As much as we're all not wanting her to return to her apartment, that's starting to looking like an increasingly unavoidable scenario with each passing day (at least until something more long-term can be arranged elsewhere).

There are no easy answers/solutions, and I'm starting to come to terms with the fact that no matter how hard I try to set up a positive, viable outcome for her, the reality of the situation is likely to trump even my most determined effort.

If she's determined to do herself in, you don't have a ton of choices. You'd have to do something pretty radical to turn this around without any of her help.

Late to this, but sorry to hear about this situation with your mom. Good luck with everything, and hopefully it'll get better very soon.

And that's what makes all this so frustrating, she says time and time again that she desperately wants to live and isn't ready to die, but she's just got no self-motivation to improve whatsoever. I'm just going to have to be at peace with doing the best I can to help, but not blaming myself if/when things go awry.

Thanks, Tommy.

She needs to stop paying for the car immediately. Decide if she is above or below water on the car, sell if you can, but she cannot afford it and each payment she makes on it going forward is a mistake.

Maybe there are no basements, but there are garage apartments and just plain old spare rooms. I would hit up Craigslist and see what you can find. Good luck!

Sorry I haven't thrown my support in earlier than this. I've tried to read this thread a few times and i couldn't get past the initial post. I don't have any family members that are analogues, but i've had a lot of musician friends who were hell bent on slow self destruction.

There's really no answer, until they want to not die. I phrased it that way because wanting to live isn't enough to change some people's minds.

Good luck bob, fingers crossed for you and your family.

No solutions from me, just sympathy. Depression and addiction are both awful. I hope your mother can find a way to overcome them both.

Sorry to hear that Bob, life is pretty shitty a lot of the time.

There must be some psychological root to your mums problems. Is it simply down to her losing her job? Maybe you need to come up with some sort of project that she can get involved in and be kept busy by. If it's loneliness perhaps she can move in with you or at least near you. Maybe she misses your dad. Perhaps everything is linked to her general health, it must be pretty crappy to feel ill all the time. I don't know, I can only guess.

Anyway, I think with these sort of problems you have to get to the root of it instead of simply reacting to the aftermath. Then you can actually do something towards alleviating the problem.

Very insightful, Darrin. Just about everything you said is true. She completed her alcohol rehab inpatient treatment about a week ago, and is currently in a physical rehab facility to get herself back up to full strength and regain her balance/equilibrium (issue that was contributing to her falls, along with the alcohol, of course). She really needs to be more steady on her feet before she's able to be discharged. Should be another week or so.

We found a great place for her that's about a mile away from where I currently live, BUT there's a 3-6-month waiting list. That may actually be OK, though, as her lease still has another 8 months left on it. The key now is making sure she is regularly attending AA meetings and has productive daily activities (volunteering, etc.). She absolutely must get out of her apartment every day. I'm more hopeful now that I was back when I first started this thread, that's for sure.

Bob...I hate that you're having to go through this as I know what you're going through. I buried my mom last December after many years of suffering with Alzheimer's. I wish I can say that the hardest part was dealing with her illness but it wasn't. For me, it was the nursing home and funeral costs. My mom, like yours, was living off of her social security check, so we encountered many issues. The funeral costs, in particular, were the most stressful.

In any case, what I would suggest to you is to look into every government program that can assist with her bills. That's what I did. I was lucky because I had the help of a social worker who helped me fill out every financial assistance application that was available to my mom. As a result, I was able to secure a nursing home for her as well as Medicare and Medicaid, which paid for everything. I also called the church my mom used to go to and asked if there was anything they can do for her. They donated $3,000. I also called the Alzheimer's Association and asked if there was any financial assistance available. They contributed towards my mom's nursing home bill, plus they gave us 100 free hours of nursing care. I also started a pre-paid account with a funeral service and made sure that any funds left over monthly in my mom's account went to the funeral services. It wasn't much (I think about $20 to $30 a month) but it helped in the end. My out of pocket expenses were still pretty significant because the cemetery fees (aprox $1,500) and plot ($5,000) were expensive. But while she was alive, I was able to set her up so that she got care, otherwise the alternative would've been frightening.

Good Luck to you man. It's a grueling process. I really would suggest you call your local welfare office. I'm not sure what's available to you in Texas (NY was pretty helpful) but I'm sure there's something. Even if you can get your mom foot stamps, it helps. As for your mom's depression, maybe you can convince her to volunteer at a local charity. It'll be something for her to do a few times a week.

Great information - thanks so much, Chris!