How to handle a parent who is in denial they are sick with a potentially fatal disease?
My mom is 65. We lost Dad 3 years ago unexpectedly to a stroke caused by undiagnosed liver cancer. Mom has never been the same since. She’s totally helpless and completely lost without my dad. She was always a dependent personality never able to function or cope on her own. Her health was iffy before dad now it’s slowly deteriorating. Severe OsteoArthritis, Hypertension, last year a mini stroke that took some of her vision and now a diagnosis of Chronic Kidney Disease in April. Her kidney function is now down to 10 and the doctor wants her to start dialysis when she’s ready. The problem is, I know my mother as long as she “feels good” she will never voluntarily go on dialysis. She knows her kidneys are poor but since she “feels fine” she refuses to accept she is sick. My family lives with her in my family home to act as caregiver and add financial stability. And I see the symptoms as described with CKD slowly increasing in frequency and severity and she chalks it up to anything else as the cause but her kidneys. She told me when first diagnosed that she would cooperate with the doctors and me and do whatever necessary to help herself. But now I think she said that because at the time she didn’t need immediate dialysis and the doctor told her that she could make the choice when to start based on how she felt. But I shouldn’t have believed her when she promised she would. She had terrible white coat syndrome and is even more petrified of hospitals especially since my dad died. She won’t see any counselors only stating that she won’t get anything from it because they don’t tell her anything that helps her feel better. She can’t go to an assisted living facility b/c of financial issues and she’s not old enough for the good ones in my area (you have to be 70 or be permanently disabled). And honestly I don’t want to send her to a home I want to help her but she won’t help herself and tells me that I’m just being silly and melodramatic and overzealous. I don’t know what to do. We have an appointment with the nephrologist next week and I know she will go in there and tell him to his face that she’s fine and she’s not. I will argue and contradict her and she will ignore me and brush it off as me being overprotective. The doctor believes me but we can’t force her to do dialysis without her consent. And she’s not mentally disabled she is in sound mind so legally taking control is out, she’s just stubborn and afraid. I’m lost. I already watched one parent die and I couldn’t stop it now I’m terrified I’m going to have to watch the other do it and she’s doing it willingly. I don’t know what to do. Help.
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