Mother calls upset and crying

valkn

I apologize in advance for the long post.
My mother is in a facility that has all levels of care. She had been in independent living however due to multiple falls, shortly after Covid started, she was put in the nursing center and has been there ever since.  She was having a little difficulty with words previous to this but not bad however since she has been in an unfamiliar environment with unfamiliar nurses and no visitors allowed, she has been going in and out of reality.  She makes phone calls to my sister in the middle of the night not having any idea what time it is. I am long distance and my sister is local.  She has good days and bad days however in trying to figure out if she should go to assisted living or the memory care center, my sister took her to a Neuro last week when my mother was actually having a good day so the Neuro said she didn't appear bad but could not be on her own and not return to independent living. 
Since then my mother calls my sister or I frantic, crying and upset asking us to please come pick her up from her sister's house (who died over 10 years ago) saying someone left her there by herself and she can't walk home.
 A couple of days ago she called my sister and started to talk about her mother who died over 20 years ago as if she were still alive and my sister told her that she died over 20 years ago, then my mother moved on to speaking about her sister in the present and again my sister had to tell her that her sister died over 10 years ago, my mother became very upset and crying and asked why nobody told her about them dying.  My mother called me last night crying about her mother and sister dying and asking me why nobody told her that they died recently.  I started to talk with her about us going to the funeral together and some of the things we did and things that were said and she said yes - I remember and calmed down a bit and mentioned a couple of things she remembered but then right back into asking why nobody told her they passed away and how was she going to live without them.  She finally hung up because a nurse came in the room and asked why she was crying and she told the nurse she recent deaths in the family of her mother and sister and the nurse asked if she wanted her to sit with her for a while so my mom said she had to hang up.
Now tonight my mother called again crying and asking for me to come pick her up from her sisters house because she can't walk home and she wanted to go home, she would do anything to please come home.
It breaks my heart and I don't know how to respond to her.  I try to explain that there is nothing more that I would want than for her to be here with me but with COVID, its not safe. I know she doesn't understand but it's tearing my sister and I to pieces and we don't know how to deal with it.

sandwichone123

Valkn, I'm so sorry you're going through this.

Unfortunately, this is pretty common. It does break your heart, and there's nothing that can stop that. But there are ways to deal with it that will help your mother cope a little better.

One thing that's often recommended is to respond to the emotions rather than the factual statement. For instance, if you mother says she's been left there and she wants to go to her sister's house, you might say, "It sounds like you're lonely and you're missing your sister." What doesn't work as well is correcting the factual statements. You just have to let the errors pass you by.

There are lots of other people on the boards that can explain it better than I can, and I hope you are having some time to look at other posts that may discuss the same issue.