It's disturbing to read that a nursing home can just kick you out after you can no longer pay. If you have no family (or they can't pay for you, or are unwilling to take you in) what happens? They just set you out in a park somewhere? I'm serious! What do they do?
I've been personally acquainted with one person (a former brother-in-law) who through his own laziness did not get the Medic-Aid paperwork--proving that his mother was now officially out of money and now qualified for Medic-Aid--done for his elderly mother. BIL was warned and warned but didn't complete the paperwork in time and got a phone call from the head of the nursing home that his mother resided in that if they didn't get that proof of that paperwork by the end of the day, they were going to "strap your mother to her wheelchair and roll her out to the curb!" So his wife had to race down to the nearest Medic-aid office and managed to do it for him. So would they really have done that if they hadn't gotten proof of the paperwork?
I sometimes think so because 4 of my co-workers were in a kind of related situation with their mothers who resided in nursing homes:
1) mother was placed in a nursing home without the dementia-lockdown feature, daughter assured the facility that mother didn't have that wandering-off kind of dementia (she was in denial about it, I think), mother wandered off, staff brought her back & called daughter saying we think you should move mother to a lock-down facility, daughter said please let her stay because I'm sure she won't wander off again, facility says okay, mother wanders off again, facility after bringing her back calls daughter and says if mother wanders off one more time, we won't go after her but we'll just call the police & tell them to look for her and keep her there at the police station 'till you pick her up. So daughter had to go get the mother and keep her at her house 'till a spot opened up because she didn't want mom to be at the police station.
2) Another daughter gets a call from the facility that her mom resided in that mother was disruptive and upsetting the other residents and staff and you need to come pick her up and find another place for her immediately. Daughter says I was just leaving to go teach a class, let me just get my class started--the powers that be frowned on cancelling classes at the last minute--so I'll be there in about 30 min. Facility says no, if you're not here in 10 min. we're going to strap her to her wheelchair and roll her out to the curb! So she had to cancel class and go get the mother.
3) Another daughter's father-in-law also had the angry kind of dementia, beat up another elderly man who resided there putting other old man into the hospital and the facility called daughter saying come get him right now; daughter says I can't leave work right now, I'll be there when I get off this afternoon, no they say, the cops are here, other old man's family is saying they'll sue if your dad isn't taken out of here immediately, so she had to go get dad and take a leave of absence from work 'till the nearest facility that would take violent people had an opening.
4) Another daughter's mother came down with dementia, daughter tried hiring caregivers because daughter wasn't old enough yet for retirement so she could stay home with mother, mother was violent with caregivers so daughter had to take an unpaid leave of absence from work for 2 years and take care of mom 'till a spot opened up in the only facility here in town that would take violent residents on Medic-Aid. After mother was finally moved into the facility, daughter then had to work many years longer than she had planned and had taken such a financial hit during that 2-year period that she ended up losing her house & had to move into a tiny little apartment.
You know, a few summers ago, Huzz and I were on vacation and at a restaurant in a resort town where the only people who can afford to live there are very wealthy, I mean we're talking if not in the 1 percent, close to it. Well, we overheard a conversation at the next table of a bunch of 60ish-looking women at the next table; from their conversation ["I wish my husband's patients or all his employees would realize he needs a vacation too, etc."], all of the women but one seemed to be very wealthy and the one seemed to be middle class. Well, the rich ladies were telling the middle-class gal that they wished she would retire and put her elderly mother into a facility since it was keeping her so busy that they never got to see her much anymore. Middle-class says she couldn't afford to retire and didn't want to put mother into a facility instead of taking care of her at home since the nearest decent facility that took Medic-Aid was 2 hours away. A moment of stunned silence and then "Dear, why can't you afford to retire?" Middle-class: when Dad died, he left Mom broke and me with having to pay his funeral expenses and having to take Mom into my home. Rich Lady: But dear, your Dad had a good job, didn't he? Middle-class: Yes, but he and Mom lived paycheck-to-paycheck. Rich lady: And dear, why in the world is your mother on...Medic-Aid?! Isn't it that...that WELFARE program?! [Said in a horrified tone.] Middle-class: Since Dad left her broke. And the rich ladies all had horrified/disgusted looks on their faces and literally kind of drew away from her. Huzz told me afterward that he couldn't believe that these rich women had never heard of Medic-Aid, that you would've thought that they had at least overheard their rich husbands griping about it with their tax attorneys for crying out loud. What gripes me is how some people are so spoiled and sheltered from the reality for too many others in this world, I am really sick and tired of it.
If ever there was a case for assisted suicide....
