Alzheimers caregiver problems. Sigh...

April 8, 2018 11:49 PM

I think I'm handling Mom fairly well, but hit a (maybe) big rock in the road today.

I'm was the 48 year old son who took in his 72 year old mom when she received a diagnosis of mild dementia. Flash forward 11 years and she's advanced to full Alzheimer's. It's like the movie "Benjamin Button" in that it seems she's reverse aging, getting more childlike all the time. She can't drive anymore, so I'm promoted to chauffeur, as well as keeper of appointments and medical records. One good thing is she's never combative. I'm lucky that she ran through her savings, I don't have to worry about con men robbing her.

I'm trying to keep her semi active. I send her to an adult "social model" day care for three half days a week, I have a PT person come in and work with her twice a week and I hired this PT person to come in for the full day on Wednesdays, to get her up, showered, and off to day care, and do some light cleaning and laundry, then pick her up. Sometimes she takes her for hair or clothes shopping, so I get a little breathing room.

I work 3pm to 11pm, so I hired a CNA (Certified Nursing Assistant) to stop down around 5:30 for a couple of hours on my work days. She serves up some dinner, cleans up, showers mom and changes bedding if necessary. It's just an informal arrangement that I pay her cash for. I'll call her Kelly.

I've never had any problems with Kelly, but we only communicate by phone and notes. Mom's never said a bad word about her. But...

My next door neighbor spoke with me today and told me he saw Kelly doing a "drug deal" in my driveway. I asked him how he knew, he said he "just knew." He's a great neighbor but also a recovering addict, so I don't know if I trust his assessment. Some former addicts I've met claim to have a kind of "addict radar" that lets them see trouble coming from far away.

I really like Kelly and had never seen any problems, but this may be due to our circumstances, we really don't own anything of great value, mom's drugs don't have any abuse potential.

I've started to get gnawing doubts in my head, which really don't combine well with stress I'm feeling just from being a caregiver. I really don't see my doing anything without more evidence, except worry.

Any suggestions? I never saw myself as a primary caregiver, but these are the cards I caught, I'm going to have to play them.

posted by anonymous to Human Relations (17 answers total)

You are doing a great job. It seems like Kelly is also doing a great job, she may also have a side hustle.

Whether or not you want to do anything about that is totally up to you. If you think she is doing an impeccable job and your mom's drug have no resale value/aren't getting short, you could just drop a hint next time you speak to her on the phone that you have neighbors who are home during the day and have nothing but time to watch the neighborhood and love to pass on anything juicy they see. If she is doing something and is at all discerning she will knock it off immediately and you won't have to think about it again.
posted by stormygrey at 12:04 AM on April 9, 2018 [14 favorites]

I wouldn't waste a moment worrying about this. Your neighbor saw something he thought was suspicious. He just had a gut feeling. I have a gut feeling that something about Kelly is an easy target for biased suspicion (maybe she drives a crappy car because CNAs don't make a lot of money, maybe she's a racial or ethnic minority). I may be totally off-base here. I don't mean to suggest your neighbor is malicious or bigoted. He is being a good neighbor neighbor trying to look out for you, but he saw something and jumped to a conclusion. Without anything more, rest easy.
posted by hollyholly at 12:11 AM on April 9, 2018 [31 favorites]

Help for your situation is VERY hard to get. Until you are positive about Kelly, why not keep her? Maybe you could try asking her about her driveway activity. If she is dealing, she may quit, or just lie.
Good luck to you, you are doing your best for your mother.
posted by Cranberry at 12:17 AM on April 9, 2018 [2 favorites]

You have lots of evidence that Kelly is good at her job; the evidence that she's a drug dealer seems to consist of "I just knew". Extraordinary claims require extraordinary evidence, so I'm on Team Kelly here: unless there's actual evidence, rather than someone guessing something, I'd carry on as normal.
posted by matthew.alexander at 1:09 AM on April 9, 2018 [6 favorites]

+1 Team Kelly. Nul points for nosy neighbour. He might have your mom's best interests at heart but the evidence is all pro-Kelly right now.

If you remain worried, could you take a couple of hours sometime when Kelly's there? Find a project at the house you need to do and get to know her a little better from chat and observation. You'll probably calm your own nerves.
posted by giraffeneckbattle at 1:40 AM on April 9, 2018

You can use your existing wifi system and put the cameras of an old phone or tablet trained in the driveway. An app called ManyThing costs like $5 per month and you can use it to watch your driveway, who comes and goes and when.
posted by jbenben at 2:45 AM on April 9, 2018 [5 favorites]

Advocating for the devil here: IF the neighbor is right, and IF she gets busted, or something unpleasantly drug-related happens, and IF the neighbor is questioned, or volunteers, it has now been established that you had some prior knowledge.

(Yeah, I have DARK THOUGHTS, and yeah, I don't sleep that well, thank you for asking.)
posted by Chitownfats at 2:55 AM on April 9, 2018 [3 favorites]

FWIW, I'm the type to get intuitions like your neighbor does, and I think he is wrong about what he saw.

That's why I am advocating for a camera system. You'll know soon enough. I think your neighbor has a bias and misinterpreted something. I'm sure he meant well, but you can't fire Kelly because of something you did not see that has one zillion innocent interpretations (a roommate or family dropped off or picked up something like a house key, money for a utility bill, important paperwork, a birthday card, a cupcake or similar because Kelly was having a tough day... I could go on...)

There's an 80% chance this is entirely innocent. Meanwhile, considering your mom's condition and the number of caregivers, I highly recommend some kind of camera system, especially the ManyThing app.
posted by jbenben at 3:47 AM on April 9, 2018 [7 favorites]

it has now been established that you had some prior knowledge

This has not at all been established. What has now been established is that you heard one person provide wild speculation based on something they told you they saw. This is not even hearsay level. The only "knowledge" you have is that you now know your neighbor says he thinks something, and that even being very generous and taking his account as a faithful recounting of events (which is not a particularly fair assumption when discussing eyewitness accounts), he doesn't say he definitively saw anything damning, just that he saw enough to give him a "gut feeling." Leaving aside the question of whether your neighbor is lying, or that he is not lying but is wrong (my guess), you absolutely have not been given actionable information upon which you are legally or morally obligated to act in order to avoid suspicion or whatever this answer is meant to imply.
posted by solotoro at 4:41 AM on April 9, 2018 [28 favorites]

I have been a full-time, singlehanded caregiver for a parent ... not with Alzheimer's, but in an equally all-encompassing and ultimately hopeless situation. With that background knowledge, my advice is to protect your network of care assistance At. All. Costs.

You have no proof that "Kelly" is doing anything, and frankly even if she's got a side-hustle going, as long as she's not stealing from you and it's not affecting her work with your mom, that's her business not yours. Your neighbor is proabably wrong, and in your situation, the simultaneous fragility and gravity of a caregiving support network is nothing to trifle with. Until she offers you a dime bag at a friends-and-family discount, leave her be.

That said, I agree with stormygrey that a hint or two about being noticed will probably nudge her do do her business elsewhere *if* there's anything going on. "Oh, Kelly, just wanted to let you know ... Neighbor has seen some suspicious looking activity and thinks we've had some prowlers around. I'm going to put up some security cameras, and I'd appreciate it if you'd keep an eye out and let me know if you see anything that looks odd."

You're accusing her of nothing and making no assumptions, but unless she is the dumbest of stumps, she'll take whatever it is elsewhere.
posted by mccxxiii at 5:04 AM on April 9, 2018 [20 favorites]

What if your neighbor is right and he did see drugs being exchanged for money but what if it's just pot? Caring for an elderly person with advanced Alzheimer's is really, really hard, and I wouldn't begrudge a low-paid CNA a little relief.
posted by rada at 7:50 AM on April 9, 2018 [3 favorites]

What if it was Kelly's lunch? Seriously. Need more information.

/had a mom with Alzheimer's
/good care is worth its weight in gold
posted by oflinkey at 10:07 AM on April 9, 2018 [5 favorites]

I agree with everyone else. Sounds like Kelly is doing a good job and on the off chance that she does have some kind of side business going on, it's not interfering with her ability to give excellent care to your mom. I'd be inclined to suspect that your neighbour, like many people who have recently given up some kind of "bad" habit, now sees "evidence" of it everywhere. They might have the best of intentions but their intuition might not be very reliable.

Would you be equally concerned if you thought Kelly had been seen buying pot or something in a park or at a show in her off-hours? If not, and the proximity to your home and mom is what's bothering you, a casual mention that the neighbour has eyes on the house should get her to take anything even remotely controversial elsewhere.
posted by rpfields at 10:53 AM on April 9, 2018

I would take a slightly different approach, (and maybe it's a bad idea and other commenters will say why) putting myself in Kelly's shoes, I'd want to know that there is a neighbour watching me and making assumptions about my behavior. So, talk to Kelly about it - not in an accusatory way, but but more of a lighthearted "you won't believe what the neighbour said" way:

"hey Kelly, I heard the weirdest thing from the neighbour, he saw you talking to someone in the driveway, and for some reason thinks you were doing a deal. yea, I think that's nuts too."

This gives her the heads up that someone is watching, but that also you are on her side and don't want her to get in trouble with a nosy neighbour.
posted by 5_13_23_42_69_666 at 11:38 AM on April 9, 2018

I'm going to go against popular opinion here and suggest you take steps to look more closely at your caregiver. First reason: a relative hired a neighbor lady to look after his elderly dad. That nice, friendly neighbor lady persuaded his dad to open up new credit cards for her use. By the time he died, she'd run up over $40K in debt on his cards - cards his son never knew about, because it never occurred to him to periodically run a credit report for his dad.

Second reason: my next-door neighbor, suffering from dementia, had her addict granddaughter living with her, supposedly to look after her. The situation quickly deteriorated to the granddaughter selling drugs and herself right from grandma's house, and then to moving in an ex-con diagnosed with schizophrenia to live with her and grandma. Their long-term goal: get grandma to sign over the house to them. Their short-term goal: loot the house for everything they could sell for drugs.

Third reason: my mom lives with me and has dementia, too. At the time it was still okay to leave her home alone while I worked - until I found out these lowlifes were coming over and sweet-talking her, too, trying to get her to give them the keys to my house (which, fortunately, she didn't have, but she kept demanding I give them to "that nice couple").

The point being, if your neighbor is correct and your caregiver is making drug buys in your mom's driveway, your mom is not safe. That caregiver is irresponsible at best, potentially criminal at worst. What if she comes up a little short and helps herself to something of your mother's? What if she invites the dealer in, telling him/her that it's a safe place do some business with some other people? You're not paying anyone to conduct criminal activity in your mother's presence, but if that's what's happening and you let it happen - yeah, that's what you're doing.

For your mom's protection, you need to monitor her care, using cameras and maybe even the occasional unannounced visit. Trust - but verify.
posted by Lunaloon at 3:55 PM on April 9, 2018 [1 favorite]

Advocating for the devil here: IF the neighbor is right, and IF she gets busted, or something unpleasantly drug-related happens, and IF the neighbor is questioned, or volunteers, it has now been established that you had some prior knowledge.

Even if it were knowledge (it isn't), the likely legal consequences of this "knowledge" are...nothing. I'm sure if you think about it a little, you'll realize it is not possible to criminalize knowing that a drug deal once happened somewhere and maybe might sometime happen again. There are real problems one could reasonably expect to result from a caregiver dealing from the driveway on the sly, but they don't include your or Nana's arrest.
posted by praemunire at 7:25 PM on April 9, 2018

Maybe someone owed Kelly money and could only give it to her when she was working with your mom.

I mean, I'm on a phone plan with my ex-brother-in-law, and I hate paypal so I pay cash. I have handed him money out my car window in the parking lot of his work with barely stopping. It would look like a deal to anyone who saw it.
posted by frecklefaerie at 9:24 AM on April 17, 2018