Nurse daughter long distance to mom with moderate Alzheimer’s

Hello and welcome. This particular board does not get much traffic. You might want to repost this on the Caring for a Parent Board also with your other post.

Yikes! I can feel the tires spinning with no purchase thru your entire post. Trying to deal with dementia in the beginning is a lot, the learning curve is insane. Take some deep breaths, step by step it is doable. You already have a major plus in your corner with the family appointment with a social worker. Many of us are never able to have that kind of help. May I suggest that you do everything you can to take advantage of a mediated meeting with your siblings. Sharing a basic framework of information before the meeting is crucial. Letting the social worker have access to a clear succinct picture of the current situation will help the meeting flow more efficiently so that you can focus on problem areas. In my personal opinion this first meeting is better without your parents. Once the siblings are on the same page then you can bring the parents in if you decide to do so. You say you will be handling the medical end but in order to do that you will need a general picture of how the finances and financial and medical power of attorney have been laid out. Literally, you need to read the paperwork. You need a clear picture of how much and how well your parents are now handling their ADLs and IADLs. You all need an understanding of how dementia progresses and how the right kind of communication with your parents can make or break your care plan. There is a youtube channel called dementia careblazers that has very helpful communication tips. This is one

How To Convince Someone With Dementia They Need Help

Go to Groups on this site and find the one called New Caregiver Help. It has a lot of good references about dementia and caregiving. (There are a few regular posts scattered thru there, just ignore them)

Try not to overwhelm your siblings with info, choose what you think is most important. There can be lot of frustration between long distance and close to home caregivers. Please try to leave the you could have and you should have outside that meeting door, and keep that first meeting to those most directly involved. I was unfortunately involved in one such meeting where sides were drawn up beforehand and all the spouses attended. Something that should have been a blessing was a complete disaster.

I will try to answer some of your other questions on your other post.