Can memory care places refuse "committals"?

Does the Memory Care facility you were interested in also have an Independent Living section? I wonder if some places tend to accept those residents who are already in place in IL, thus the Staff already knows about the client.

In my Dad's case, it was the Staff that highly recommended that my Dad move from IL over to Assisted Living/Memory Care. That took me by surprised as I didn't think Dad was ready for that. I stalled and sure enough Dad started "sundowning" and calling on the phone very confused. Apparently the Staff saw the signs where I couldn't.

disgustedtoo, time to look at other Assisted Living/Memory Care places as the one you described doesn't make sense asking the future resident if they want to move into the facility. In the mean time, try to get caregivers into your Mom's home to take care of her. Would she chase out the caregivers? My Mom did :P If your Mom accepts them, even better.

Then later down the road you can discuss cost when Mom is in a clear brain loop. Tell her 24 hour caregivers cost such & such. Senior Living cost such & such, more than half.

I know of a new place in Concord that advertises as an assisted living center with memory care. Here's the problem: Assisted Living cannot take in patients with outbursts or wandering problems. Check NH health laws.
Here in NY, same rules. If your parent is going to AL, they must comply with staff redirection, not yell or swear, not wander into other rooms or off the property. That means you medicate them into docile behavior or you find a secure lock up facility. I know many of us oppose "chemical restraint", but a few pills seems a lot kinder than locking them up.

I can understand why they do. As our eldercare attorney explained, memory care facilities are not nursing homes. They are specialized assisted living and often will not accept advanced or problematic residents. Basically, they want the fairly easy cases and they expect someone who is committed will not be asy. Things you might try...do they take day care patients? If they do, you can go with her & try and make it a positive experience. If she likes going for the day, she might want a place there to take a nap, and you can gradually move her in. The facility can also see if she is truly a problem they won't take on. You can find another place that does have day care or respite care if this one won't work. Learn how to talk to your Mom in such a way to indicate that she made the choices and you are following her wishes. If she doesn't remember, she has likely developed coping mechanisms that make her go along on some things so her deficiencies are not obvious. I called the day care facility the senior center to make my mom think it was a social activity.

What they are saying is, medicate her so she agrees to go. Properly medicated the patient is cooperative and accepting. Something for anxiety at first, possibly an antidepressant later. For example, Lorazepam relieves anxiety for about 4 hours. Clonazepam works longer. Alprazolam treats panic attacks. Citalopram treats depression. Find the right meds and she will go and have a good time there.

My last response seems to have vanished... The memory care unit is locked down so that residents cannot leave the building. The rooms are not locked, and I do not believe their plan is to medicate. She can get belligerent (usually at the doc office), but she was fine during our visit to the facility. So they plan to get her in the door and work on her, drawing on what pleases her (yummy food, maybe some activities), not medicate. The getting her in was the issue - them telling me she has to agree and they won't do guardianship/committal, and me saying that won't happen. Soooo, they say we have to come up with a reason to temporarily 'move' her and they work their magic? How is that agreeing? Whatever, so long as she goes, that's 90% of the battle.... They are hoping to do this in the next few weeks - talk with doctor, we get furniture in room and pay up... then we see what happens....

Now that I post again the message showed up. -sigh-. I also now see LindaVal's message. No Day care there, but that would not help. She lives about 1.5 hours away from where I live and this place is about 15 min from me. Driving to her place and home again takes a lot out of me, and I certainly cannot be doing that every day!
What you say about the committals may be true. In her case it is a combination of trying to figure out why she is so against the idea, but the bigger problem is even if you make some headway (like her responses during the visit!), that is all gone shortly after, so it was pretty much a waste of time trying...
Again, they have some kind of plan, so we shall see how this goes...
Being new to this system, I don't know how to see or respond to private messages, but to the woman who said her exes mom expects her to care for her - egad, nasty woman, move and leave no forwarding address!!! 8-O

It has been a long while since I posted to this thread. We managed to get her in though without the guardianship, but without her explicit agreement as well.

In case anyone else wanders into this topic, to see if there are any ideas to be had...

Mom was NOT anxious about moving. She was ADAMANT that she was fine, just forgets a little now and then and that's because she is old and is entitled to forget sometimes. She'd had a Rx for Lorazepam before, but only used it if she was having trouble getting to sleep, NOT for anxiety. I doubt it would have been enough to override her overdeveloped sense of independence.

She kicked out the caregivers we hired, who only had the tasks to check on her and make sure her meds for the day were taken. One hour a day only, to be increased as we felt she needed it. She was still able to take care of herself (eating microwave dinners was not exactly high quality food, but I do not believe she could follow recipes or cook stuff she used to make anymore) and "passable" care of her place. The concern was the short term memory was bad and despite her saying she never goes downstairs, the camera said otherwise. She also fell, badly bruising her knee, but did not get it looked at or call one of us (nighttime bathroom trip.) I did not want to wait until she started wandering, fell down the stairs or had a serious medical issue. I felt she needed a secure place where she would get better food, not have to worry about heavy duty cleaning, get some socialization (she was self-isolating) and would have someone watching over her. She would NOT even considering moving in with one of us, even for a short while - end of discussion.

She liked the place and the food when we took her for a tour and lunch, but as noted in another post/response, she in short order wouldn't remember even why we were there and much later that we ever went. Bring it up? She was looking at houses with my younger brother... -sigh-

They clearly understood our dilemma - mom is refusing to go, attorney says we cannot drag her out and must go guardianship, and from what others have said, apparently they at the facility consider this means the client is unruly. They got to meet her, they should know that she is not, but it was a brick wall, we MUST get her to agree to move in. The only way, at this point, was to come up with a lie of some kind, to make a "temporary" move. They assured us that if we get her to agree to come in and try it, they would handle it from there.

We did get the new doctor to recommend she not live alone (she said it to mom first, ooooh boy! Wrong thing to say to mom doc! She was already complaining, wanted out, questioned what this was all about and just went nuts over that statement!) I apologized for her later.

Older brother scheduled a flight to be here and facilitate the move with younger brother (I begged off the move, but was sure I would get the blame no matter what.) Because there was some minor issue with the heating system (it was late December), and younger brother put in a Nest, a programmable Wi-Fi access thermostat, I suggested he mess with the temp - make it too hot, then too cold. When she complains, we "check" it, say it needs repair, you'll have to stay at this place until we can get it fixed/replaced. I thought it was great - excuse to get her out, she has to stay and we can stall the return. They did not even try.

Meanwhile, however, mom managed to injure herself again just before this (cellulitis, open sore on leg, no idea how she did it nor did she call anyone to report it/ask for help)... Soooo, after ER trip and days of meds/cleaning solutions/bandaging along with serious bowel upset, likely the antibiotics, younger brother types up a bogus letter from "Elder Services" at the hospital, telling her she either moves to the place we choose or they come take her and put her wherever. Oh she was madder than a wet hen!! Why are they doing this to me? Why aren't they helping people who need it? I only heard the highlights, but they were able to get her in the door with this subterfuge.

Is she happy? Relatively. She won't likely ever accept the place until she regresses more (home may become a previous place.) Periodically she has them call and wants a ride home... but she says she is at the hospital, the one she used to go to way far away, is not sick, just needs a ride. I generally just say I can't right now, or it is too late tonight, maybe tomorrow. She then worries what will she do? They assure her in the background that they have a room for her and all is well. Long before the next day she will forget. I have asked them to "pretend" they got voicemail and say they left a message for me. That should be enough - she doesn't call to chat, cannot hear well on the phone either, so let's just skip the call to me! Some visits she can go to her room with no help (it is the first one outside the common area, which I chose for that reason). Other times she says she doesn't know where it is and asks the aides for help.

Also, for all those who say we should keep our parents/grandparents, whoever, in their own home or take them in:
***She was NOT safe alone in her own place. She had fallen at least twice at home and twice now at the facility. If she were alone, who would know if she was injured and could not move? That last injury just before we moved her could have led to her death (cellulitis is a serious infection!)
***In order to stay at home, referring back to that last sentence, she would NEED caregivers, but refused to let them in. We *might* get away with bringing them back for a short while, but then she can refuse to let them in again. She will *NOT* remember agreeing to anything!!
***She refused to move in with any of us, but if we *forced* the issue as with the MC place, consider that 1) younger brother is still working - who watches and cares for her during the day? 2) older brother is in NC, two days away from us, and really does not have the patience to care for her 3) neither has the experience or knowledge needed to care for a dementia patient, as they need socialization, exercise and the condition will progressively get worse - I do not see that happening! 4) I cannot physically take care of her because of my own issues and my house is/has been under repair and will be for some time, so it is not a safe environment for her (in addition the stairs and cats could be a real issue!!)

Anyway, that part of the saga is done. There is still a lot of paperwork for other issues that I must handle. Organizing and helping when I can the cleaning out the condo and doing repairs to either rent it or sell it is another full-time job. This is yet more reason why I could not care for her - just trying to juggle all along with handling any issues, doctor appointments, managing all her finances, that cleanup/repair part-time is draining, and having to care for her too? EEk. This all has been a long road already, having taken up too much of my time for several years just to get everything in place to get this move done, and who knows how much longer this will go on. Some stuff will eventually be done, leaving more time to visit. She is relatively healthy (High BP on meds, little to no hearing one ear only with a hearing aid that she is always losing, macular degeneration) so she could outlive us all!

Anyone needing more information or details can contact me directly. Cheers!

Thank you very much for the update. I'm glad you found a way to make it work!

Disgustedtoo, I applaud your tenacity on getting her moved to a safe place. You know, each POA is different, and mine allowed me to make that decision for Dad, tho no one asked to see it before I signed the lease for his MC. His situation was similar, but he didn't fight as much & spent 6 months at my house first. It was after a fall, illness & rehab that I said I couldn't do it f/t anymore. He is still unhappy at times, but he does feel safe there.

The memory care section is locked down - they are not locked in rooms, just cannot leave the facility. Despite what my brother preferred (just plain old AL), I KNEW she needed memory care. AL is NOT locked down, and is more for people who need help physically, so they do not have to be locked in.
I know she's going to be difficult, and I'm sure they know that (or should) as many who have this affliction do not realize what they are doing. So the plan is get her in first and work with her... that's their plan - they just do not do court ordered (aka guardianship) committals. By telling me that SHE has to agree, that put us in a bind. Is that light at the end of the tunnel, or the speeding train? :-}