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My mother (who is 62) has always had anxiety and alcohol issues, but these issues have greatly worsened over time due to life circumstances. She lost her job (due to constantly being late) over 10 years ago and never got another job, forcing my dad to support her for all this time. He moved out and divorced her a few years ago, but has been paying the mortgage and bills for her all this time. Now he is trying to sell the house but she refuses to move out, and has also become a hoarder in the years since he left. She refuses to clean or get rid of anything, and begins to cry hysterically and have panic attacks when we try to help her with it. She will also play the blame game with me and always says that everything is my dad's fault because he left her, and I'm just as bad because I'm a "daddy's girl" and "always take his side". In reality all I want for her is to get her life back and have some self-sufficiency, but she refuses to take any responsibility and expects either my dad or some other man to swoop in and take care of everything for her. I know that I don't have to take responsibility for her, but my dad can't keep affording to pay for this house and I can't take her in with me. All of this has caused her to end her 40+ years of sobriety and start drinking again, which makes everything way worse. She is scared of people and will only talk to us through windows and barely takes care of herself. I just dont know what to do at this point.

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I think we are expecting too much from APS. I dealt with our local one who chose to leave a challenged adult who weighed 400lbs by himself when they removed his Dementia mother. APS was called daily about the smell coming from the apartment and they did nothing. I got in touch with a friend who is a Social Worker and found she had worked with this family. She called the Health Dept and they took over.

Your mother is 62 and can collect her Social Social Security. It will only be 75% and probably not much since she hasn't worked in 10 yrs. SS only goes back 35 yrs of earnings when u start collecting.

"You can acquire a court order if you want to sell a co-owned property, providing you have a compelling reason to sell. This is known as a partition action. A piece of land of a property is much easier for a court to divide up between co-owners. But it becomes more complex when it comes to “dividing up houses”.

The above is what your Dad may have to do if your parents are co-owners. Then if she won't leave, he may have to have her evicted.
Just my opinion, but your Dad did your Mom no favors by continuing to support her after the divorce. The house should have been sold and the proceeds split. Then Mom should have found a job to support herself. Your Dad seems to be a good guy.

Mom is going to need to leave so Dad can get the house cleaned up for it to be sold. Your Mom needs to be evaluated for mental illness. If the doctors determine she has it and not able to work, then go to your local Social Service office and apply for Social Security Disability. Ask then about a SSI which is a Supplimental income. With that you get Medicaid for health insurance. Mom may qualify for food stamps. The problem I see, is when Dad sells the house and if she gets proceeds from the sale. If she has been able to get help, some of it may stop till she spends the proceeds down and someone needs to oversee that money.
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My SIL is a hoarder and her 2 sons are having an intervention to try and help her. I'm kind of holding my breath to hear how things turn out, b/c SHE is going to have to agree to getting help before anything can be 'done' about the situation. Her sons have hired a psychologist who specializes in hoarding anxiety disorders to go with them to this intervention, to act as 'the voice of reason' for them. She's 64 years old but there's no alcoholism at play with her; just the hoarding which is an anxiety disorder which usually worsens after a traumatic incident occurs. My SILs hoarding worsened after her sister died this past November. We were all expecting it, too.......now nobody has been inside her house since then. I can't imagine how bad it's gotten. God help her. And your mom too.

I wish I had some wonderful words of wisdom to impart to you, but I don't. This is a complicated situation compounded by other factors too, such as her relapse with alcohol and now barricading herself inside the house. I can't imagine how upset you feel and helpless in the face of all this, too. Perhaps you can call a psychologist who specializes in hoarding disorder yourself, to see what they say? Maybe they have an idea about how to proceed with your mom? It's worth a try, I think, because you have no direction to go in right now and you need a starting point.

Wishing you the best of luck with a very difficult situation. Sending you a hug and a prayer for guidance.
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Adult Protective Services (APS) needs to take guardianship of mom and work to get her sober and placed. Hoarding is a mental illness as is alcoholism (yes, there is a physiological aspect to it, too) because the brain wants what it wants and doesn't care about the other organs in the body. If it's financially possible, being placed in a recovery program at the Betty Ford Clinic could help get her sober and give her clarity on her hoarding issues. APS needs to place her and take responsibility for her.............I'm guessing they could remove her belongings while in the recovery program. It's not a happy situation, but counselors can assist in keeping her calm.
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There is more to "hoarding" than collecting stuff. It is a mental illness and it is easy to say we need to clean it up, we need to get rid of things but there is a psychological component to hoarding.
Add in alcoholism and that makes it doubly difficult. (My wild guess it she is self medicating the anxiety with alcohol)
Does she have a doctor that she can consult? Medication for anxiety might help.
This is but the tip of the iceberg though.
Where is she going to go once dad sells the house?
I hate to tell you she is not going to "get her life back and move on" without a lot of mental health help.
It may resort to having your dad have to file for eviction in order to get her to move out. And even if he gets the eviction it is not going to be easy to get her to move.
If she is a danger to herself, if she is neglecting herself it might be possible that APS could step in and be of some help.
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She's mentally ill, and isn't going to get her life back just like that. Perhaps a stay in rehab would be a good thing, and then put her stuff in storage. She may not be completely incompetent, so you may have to go the legal route to evict her, too, or get her into rehab.
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