How to help my elderly Mother-in-law?

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pacoenelsaco

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Good evening my brothers and sisters in Christ. I come to you all seeking advice because I can’t seem to find that much information online and because I am a rather simple man and lack knowledge about things of this nature. I hope you all can help me out because I am extremly confused about what to do with this situation concerning my Mother-in-law. It’s a rather long story, but I’ll do my best to keep it as brief as I can so please bare with me.

About 4 years ago, my mother-in-law had a run in with a thief who broke into her home. After that happened, we took her into our home so she could be safe and so that she could have a stable place to stay until she got back on her own feet. Problem is, ever since she had that run in with the thief…she’s never been able to get back out on her own. She’s spent the past 4 years moving from place to place either staying with myself and my wife, her sister, or with family friends.

There’s a whole slew of different reasons as to why she never got back out on her own. But basically in a nutshell, after a year of staying with us, she moved to a different county to stay with her sister far from where she lived before and was no longer able to keep her job due to transportsation problems. She doesn’t have a driver’s license and so she was basically forced to quit her job because getting back and forth to work was becoming to troublesome for her sister and so she began collecting social security retirement funds. Problem with that is that for some reason, she was only able to collect partial social security funds because she hadn’t worked enough years to start collecting full social security. In Maryland, they’re saying that she has to work an additional 3 years from now before she can start collecting full social security payments. This is really troublesome because now she doesn’t make enough to live on her own (so she’s forced to stay with other people) and she has no driver’s license so she relies heavily on public transportation (which we all knw doesn’t exsist everywhere). So we thought about possibly putting her in a senior citizen home so then this way she could stop floating around and living with family to family and finally be back out on her own. The problem with this is that almost all the senior citizen homes we’ve spoken to in Maryland have a supremely long waiting list and they kinda rely heavily on credit checks. And of course as luck would have it, my mother-in-laws credit is terrible.

So as you all can probably tell, my mother-in-law is in quite a bit of a jam. Recently she just got word that her sister (whom she’s currently staying with) is about to move down to South Carolina and has no plans whatsoever of bringing my mother-in-law with her. So once again my mother-in-law is trying to come stay with me and my wife (which would make this about the 4th time she has come to stay with us in the past 4 years) and to be quite honest, we’re getting a little sick and tired of having her stay with us. Because just about everytime she’s come to stay with us, she’s been disrespectful, she’s started arguments with myself and my wife, she’s tried taking over the home and telling my wife and I what to do and how to raise our kids, and many other bad habits that have really gotten under our skin. Granted we have brought this up to her and the more she stays with us the better she behaves, but even so there are still little moments here and there where gets on our nerves and my wife and I both feel like it’s about time she starts taking care of herself instead of relying on other people to live. My wife and I have only been married for about 5 years and so we really just want to have our personal space without having someone else who isn’t direct family staying with us every few months. But at the same time, we’re trying to do the right thing God taught us to do and that was to help those who need help. Still, it would help a lot more if we could help this woman out without having to worry about dealing with drama almost every night we come home from work. Plus we honestly and truly don’t want to have to keep helping this woman if it doesn’t look like she’s ever gonna get her life together.

So in conclusion, I really don’t know what to do about this woman anymore. My gut insticnt is telling me just to tell her we can’t help her anymore. But I’m trying to be respectful of my wife’s feelings towards her mother and I’m trying to conduct myself like the Christian I was raised my whole life to be. Do you guys know of any government or pubic services that can help out my mother-in-law for the kind of jam she’s in? Something that can possibly get her a roof over her head and back out on her own? Something that doesn’t rely so much on credit checks and actually cares about helping people out? I would really appreciate any kind of help, advice, or reference you guys could offer. Thanks and God bless…
 
How old is she? That makes a big, big difference for eligibility for Medicaid nursing homes. There’s no point in trying to put her into any other kind, as it doesn’t sound like any of you can pay for it.

Also, could you find her a roommate?

If she could just learn to drive a little, she might be able to find an even older old lady to live with and help. If you did host her again, that might need to be the condition–that she needs to be working toward her driver’s license and saving for a car. I mention driving because that is a major big deal for the very elderly–it often isn’t safe for them to drive, and yet they still need to go to the bank, the grocery store, the post office, and so forth. If she could find a very elderly old lady with an extra room who could afford to feed her, even her partial Social Security would go very, very far.

I feel for you having to deal with so many lengthy MIL visits as newlyweds.
 
It does not sound like she needs a nursing home or assisted living, unless she needs help or cannot care for herself. If she can make her own meals and get around, handle her meds, etc, then she just needs an apartment. You want to look for low income senior housing. You can find low income senior studio apartments starting around $350-$400 which would include electric, heat, and water. Most of them are close to a bus route so she can get around.

Nursing homes are for people that cannot cook or clean, need someone to give out meds, and need help from a nurse or aid. Assisted living is similar but it does not have as high a level of nursing care. A lot of independant people may choose assisted living if they don’t want to cook and clean.

Call a few of these places. I’m sure one of them can advise you.

Housing Resources for Seniors: Maryland
portal.hud.gov/hudportal/HUD?src=/states/maryland/homeownership/seniors

Catholic Charities Senior Communities
catholiccharities-md.org/senior-housing/

Howard County - Senior Housing Options
howardcountymd.gov/seniorhousing.htm

Baltimore County Md. Aging - Senior Apartments
baltimorecountymd.gov/Agencies/aging/housing/apartments.html

Senior Housing - Montgomery County, MD
montgomerycountymd.gov/senior/housing.html

As for her social security, is her husband deceased or are they divorced? If deceased, she may be eligible for part of his social security, so look into that.

Was your mother-in-law or her husband in the military? If so, she may be eligible for income or services.
 
Also, call your local social services department and find out what the income limit is for Medicaid. If she is eligible, get the application started soon. It is better to have it in place when going for medical and nursing care than to be Medicaid pending. If she is eligible, most likely her meds will be covered which will be a savings she can put toward housing. Many times there are free services to help with the Medicaid process through senior organizations.
 
It really all depends on how old she is. If she’s still young enough to rebuild her life, take her back, but get her into counselling. She has gone through a traumatic experience and most likely is suffering from post traumatic stress disorder. The longer she goes without therapy the harder it will be for her to regain her stability. If she’s religious a faith based counsellor would be best.

If she’ solder, close to 70 or even 65, I think the situation is harder. Then you will have to discuss this with the whole family, everyone who is close to her and try and work out a solution.

My husband and I found ourselves in the same situation twenty years ago. My mother, a WWII survivor suffered from a lot of emotional issues, one of them stemming from a robbery, also. When my father, who was fifteen years older had to go into a nursing home, I knew she would be totally unable to live on her own.

Though we had been married just over a year my husband agreed to take her into our home. We were able to create a separate apartment for her, but my mother had a large personality and we knew she was there. Mostly it went well, we did have some difficult times, strangely always between my mother and I. She lived with us for eleven years until she was unable to cope physically and had to go into a nursing home.

She died five years ago. I am so glad we took her in, and there is hardly a day that goes by when I don’t wish I could have her back, loud, opinionated but extremely loving.
hope this helps. My prayers are with all of you.
 
Because your mother-in-law was robbed, that is a traumatic event and she probably has Post traumatic stress disorder. She should get counseling for that. It is not uncommon at all for crime victims to suffer from PTSD, since her life seemed to turn for the worst since the robbery. The other posters gave great links to other aging agencies but I hope she is able to get some therapy for the past trauma.
 
You should help her to the best of your ability but that does not mean that you have to allow her to live with you. She had a very traumatic experience. She should have gotten counseling on how to deal with this. It sounds like she has a variety of behavior and spending issues. This is all something a good counselor could work on. We cannot blame landlords for being concerned about getting paid the rent. She could have a payee for her Social Security who could pay her rent and then give her the remainder.

There are inexpensive retirement homes for elderly women. There are Section 8 elderly housing projects which cost only 30% of adjusted gross income. Ideally, she could learn to work at least part time again, both for the income and for her self esteem.
 
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