nothing dangerous, just regular aging stuff I’m not gonna get into.
My parents own 3 fully furnished houses in 2 different cities in the south. The oldest, biggest one should be sold because it is simply too big and too much work for them and I live and work 800 miles away.
There are other issues I want to discuss with them, mainly involving healthcare access, credit, several insurances, what to do when my father cannot drive anymore, hygiene, if they want to age in place AND only in place, but where exactly, DNR and intubation status, will and burial…
They are cognizant but I feel they really don’t want to talk about it and like many elder parents they wished these questions simply disappeared.
I’ve seen so much shit with eldercare and even having a plan doesn’t mean shit won’t happen, it means you’ll know how to react and who to call.
I was thinking about inviting my parents to a meal at a quiet restaurant, pay the waiter handsomely and have an extensive conversation there. I don’t want to have such a conversation at home because I don’t want them to resent the room where I question their ability to live as independently as before.
I don’t know if this makes me an asshole.
There is also a chance they storm out or start yelling at me and give me the silent treatment afterwards.
I hope at the very least they have their medical wishes filed somewhere accessible. In my time as a nurse I saw WAY too many people being kept alive but not living because adult kids assumed didn’t actually know what to do so their request was “everything” (including full code on a tube fed, bed bound, nonverbal, etc 90+year old. That’s no way to exit, long and painfully and at the mercy of others for who knows how long it takes with interventions constantly being used.)
Their only response so far has been “I’ll die in the harness”. That’s about it. Company wise everything is settled legally. But there’s nothing medically as far as I/we know. That’s exactly the kind of stuff my mom actually has worked out precisely, I have a copy of all those documents as well. That’s why we really want to have that conversation. But they are just not having any of it (yet). There’s hoping this changes. When a family member or friend passes away we try to prompt them to think about it, so far, nope :-(…