How to tell Mother she's not ever going home?

What did you tell her when she move to the AL? Was she aware then and has forgotten, or did the move involve some trickery and therapeutic fibs? If she is cognisant then I would tell her that the IL has terminated her lease because they felt she wasn't safe to live there anymore - I know that many ILs do that. If she has dementia then reason isn't likely to work and she won't remember anyway, so you may just have to continually repeat whatever works for the moment.

"When you're stronger," is a handy one. "When your doctors say it's okay." "We're keeping it under review."

Or, you can ask a staff member to help you with the handover: "Here's Marcia, she'll take you to the living room, your programme's just about to start." Try to time your exits with key moments in the facility's routine, say lunch or dinner.

You also have to tell her you love her, give her a hug and a kiss, and then go and not look back. Leaving your mother behind a locked door is hard enough without imprinting her standing there on your mind.

I witnessed this wanting to go home over and over at my mom's assisted living. She soon forgot about her house, but I was told other people can keep it up for years or return to asking to go home years later. They may not even be thinking about their adult home, but rather their childhood home, depending on how advanced the dementia is. I think the best thing is to make up some excuse as to why she is there and continue to repeat it, adding on months or weeks each time. Perhaps before you leave each day you could ask one of the care givers to divert her attention while you sneak out. I told my mom that I had to have surgery and so she had to stay and be cared for until after the surgery. Her heart is still kind, so she went along with it. I never told her she could never go home. Now she thinks of the assisted living house she is in as her home.