Help with moving unwilling mom to senior living

@CincyD

Hi and welcome. I am sorry for your reason to be here but pleased you found this place.

Your mom isn't in denial, she has anosognosia. This is a condition in which a PWD can't recognize their own cognitive impairment and loss of function in their day-to-day life. Trying to convince her otherwise will feel like gaslighting. Best to stop that and figure out some work arounds to make the move easier for all involved.

In your shoes, I would create a therapeutic lie, aka fiblet, for why they're moving. It could be something relating to their current home— "the water/sewer main is being replaced and we'll need to move elsewhere until the water is back on", "the house will be tented for termites", etc. We told dad "his doctor ordered PT, so we arranged for him to stay at this fancy rehab". It generally helps to present the move as temporary and not your decision as it allows you to kick the can down the road and not be the one responsible for her being out of the house.

Selling and packing will just agitate her. She's likely too impaired to participate and will just make the process harder for those doing the work. When I moved my parents, dad was never involved. I moved them twice after he was diagnosed. The first time he was conveniently in rehab and was discharged to his new apartment near his doctors until they cleared him to go down to Florida. The second time I sent her and mom to a nice hotel for a weekend and worked with my minions to set up the house so it would be completely unpacked when they arrived Sunday evening.

Again, in your shoes, the latter would be my choice. You could talk with FIL about what he wants moved and how he wants it set up and use a mix of professional movers, sons, and yourself to make it happen while they're at a hotel of visiting friends/relatives. After they're safely moved, you or someone you hire can complete the task of clearing out the rest. Since you'll likely be downsizing, Mom'll probably be paranoid about her stuff. With dad we did have a storage until temporarily so I could tell him stuff was in storage and show him a badly lit picture of his stuff on my phone as proof. I continued this long after I'd donated what mom decided she didn't want or need.

The other caveat. This may or may not be applicable to your parents' situation. My first choice CCRC (aka senior living) administers a cognitive assessment for all potential residents as part of their interview process. While they allow current residents to age-in-place with dementia in their MCF (or apartment with a spouse-caregiver) their business model depends on residents living independently for several years before needing enhanced levels of care. YMMV.

HB