My dad passed away last October from Dementia at 87. Mom is 82 and doing good. In 2010, they sold their house in CA and moved here. I built them a house behind my house, and for ten years, they where great. Then dad began forgetting things, lying about it, and blaming everyone else for what he did. Nothing huge, but he progressively got worse every year.
He got the to the point where he couldn't start the chain saw. I bought battery powered one that he could use to cut up logs for firewood. It was less then half the weight, and he was able to keep busy, but not go off into the woods with it. That helped a lot!!
As he got worse, I started sabotaging things so he couldn't use them. I "broke" the tractor and I disconnected a wire on his SUV so he couldn't drive. I mow their yard every week, I take out the garbage for them, and I fix what needs fixing. Mom is good at telling me what needs to be done. Dad would lie about it so he didn't look bad. He was very vain, and would never admit to not being able to do something. Instead, I just worked with mom, and got it done. At first, he would try to help, or just stand there and stair at me. It was annoying, but I knew he had dementia, so I ignored it. Eventually, he couldn't do that anymore, and the odd thing is, now that he's gone, I still look for him to be watching me while I'm doing things. Weird what you miss when it's gone.
The last couple years where really bad, but they also flew by. My best advise is to just take over what needs to be done, assume nothing, do not believe them when they say it doesn't need to be done, and make it part of your weekly chores.
Another thing that was brought up in another post, do not trust them to have a proper Will drawn up. My parents went to lawyers to have their Will made several times in the last couple of decades. It was always notarized, and as far as I know, legal. When they moved here to Texas, I thought they went to a lawyer to have their Will done. I was given a copy of it, but I didn't look it over since the previous will was done by a lawyer, and legit. This time, dad went cheap and did it himself from something he found online. HUGE MISTAKE!!!
When he passed, the Will wasn't legit, and mom had to hire a lawyer to get it all straightened out. That took six months, but it's still not 100% since the insurance company and Social Security both owe her money and they are playing games about paying it. Mostly they are just stalling since everything has been filed. My best guess is they hope she passes away before they pay her, and then they hope it will be forgotten. We're talking about less then $5,000 so it's more annoying then critical, but it's her money, and they need to pay it. If their Will had been properly done, this would not be an issue.
