When your parents get old and don’t think too well any more, most people try to help their parents do get along.
First of all my father is having trouble w/buying things off the TV and ordering things. I can’t get him out of the house most of the time but he’s 77 and very, very slow moving.
I got a phone call from my fathers bank from a rep who said my father has been over drawn many times in the last months and this month has over 400.00 in over draft fees. The rep said the bank thought he was incompetent and that I should get power of attorney over his account. Well I let him know what the bank said and made him a ledger and the bank changed his account # and gave him the third degree. He’s a stubborn old man and won’t listen to his kids.
Here’s the pisser. I told one of my brothers what was going on and he called bitching about how he wasn’t going to let anyone saddle him w/his parents bills. That he was going to come down and get power of attorney and just give dad a little money and on and on about what was his was his and that he works hard and how I was too soft and I should have never let things get this far.
Well fuck you too. Ya don’t want to help by taking him anywhere, your too fucking busy to visit, call or do anything with him. Ya tried to saddle me w/our mother along w/my father and won’t see her or talk about her but ya think I should take care of them and then you want to tell me how to do it when you ain’t got a clue about anything. Well no one wants your money, no one has asked for your money. Sorry that you don’t think he should have the chance to straighten it out on his own, but I do. I want to be able to say I tried to help him, to let him feel like he’s important that he can do things on his own that he’s not helpless.
Yah you say you care about him, that it’s not my fault he does what he does, but all I hear you saying is, “You shouldn’t let him answer the phone” “You should let him write checks” “You shouldn’t let him give money to his chruch”
Damn it. That man gave you life, fed you and did alot for you all his life. The least you can do is treat him like he’s a person and not get on you high horse all the damn time.
God I knew if I told him what was going on that he would be an ass again. Everyone of my brothers and sisters have an opinion and tell me what I should do.
NEWS FLASH I’VE ALL READY DONE ALL THAT! NONE OF YOU ASS’S WANT TO TAKE CARE OF HIM BUT YA WANT TO TELL ME WHAT TO DO AND DON’T LISTEN TO A THING I TELL YOU.
I will not let them know about anything anymore no matter how freaked out I am.
Sorry I just had to get it off my chest. Not much of a rant but I feel better.
POA is an excellent idea. So is a durable power off attorney for both health care and financial issues. Talk to a real lawyer about the details. A friend of mine whose sweet little ol’ lady mom was being victimized by scams got the bank to agree to notify him before permitting any large withdrawals from her main bank account.
Here’s what MAY help you convince him to give you the POA and especially the durable. Describe the scenario that would ensue if he were hospitalized for a prolonged period of time and unable to attend to things properly. His bills would go unpaid, credit ruined, maybe taxes and/or mortgage or rent unpaid, and so on. You just want to be sure that in such an instance all his stuff is safe for him.
Second situation: He is sick or injured and is unconscious. Somebody needs to tell the doctors what measures are permitted and which or not. Without a POA for health care, and an advanced health care directive (“living will”) both you and the doctors will have difficulty in deciding these things, and what is ultimately done may or may not be exactly what he would really want. This one may actually be easier, since it’s a way of his exerting control over what happens to him.
I sympathize greatly with your situation. My sister and I went through a period of declining ability and logic with our father in his last 5 to ten years. Without the POA and other specifications it would have been even worse. As it was, he made several foolish financial decisions, but at least during the last year when he was mostly hospitalized, we were able to tell the doctors what to do, apply for Medicaid on his behalf (he had gone through virtually all of his assets) and see that his bills were paid.
Two years ago, my uncle (who lived with my grandmother not because he wanted to, but because he was legless and either couldn’t get a job or just plain didn’t want to) passed away from liver and kidney failure. My grandmother, who is in her mid 80’s, put together th e whole funeral and paid for it out of her savings, along with some help from my aunt. My two cousins didn’t help one bit and even tried to change the funeral service a few hours before it began because they ‘didn’t like it’.
Then, as we are getting ready to motorcade out to the gravesite, my cousins badger the driver of the hearse into letting them go directly behind him as they are the sons of the deceased. CG (God I love him for this) and I were driving my grandmother and aunt and saw what went on. After my cousins went to go herd their heathen children into the car, he went up to the driver of the hearse and told him in no uncertain terms that what my cousins’ said was wrong and that since we were carrying the mother in OUR car, we were going first. The hearse driver nodded mutely and t he look on my cousin Casey’s face as they were directed BEHIND us (they got to be second in line) was priceless. He was as red as could be.
A few weeks later, while talking to my aunt, I found out that Casey and his brother Eric had tried to throw my grandmother out of her own home because they’d heard the deed to the house was in my uncle (their father’s) name. My grandmother had already given them some of his clothes, his posessions, even his van, sportscar and his speedboat. But that wasn’t enough for the greedy bastards. They wanted the house too and were shocked when they were told they couldn’t lay a claim to it.
I hope after that my grandmother cut them out of the will. Would serve the bastards right.
IDBB
Sorry, kids on the internet last few days and burning CD’s. I just got the chance to get on and read the post.
Thanks guys that all helps. I’m all ready on his checking account and he’s said he’s not going to get anything else off the TV. He knows I’m just watching and if it comes down to it I’ve got a cousin whose an attorney and he works pro bono for family.