My father drinks a bottle (1.75 L) of Kessler whiskey a week, straight out of the bottle. He also drinks about a case of beer a week. I think that is too much to drink with his medications and medical history. He lives in his home with my 84 year old mother with a paid care giver coming 4 mornings a week. He has a host of medical issues with congestive heart failure the most serious. We had a mini-intervention at his doctor's office last summer but he is adamant about continuing to drink. He says he's worked hard all his life and now deserves a drink and doesn't think it's a problem. I agree with a drink - preferably a cocktail - a day, but he doesn't quit there. He starts drinking first thing in the morning. Gets sloppy drunk occasionally but mostly just cranky. My mom has mild dementia and has put up with my dad's stubborn personality all of their married life. He does not physically hurt her, but I know it hurts her to see him drink. The neighbor buys the alcohol for him but he is also the neighbor that checks on them several days a week. His doctor said we would need to be careful if we took away his alcohol suddenly due to withdrawal issues. I don't know whether to push for alcohol abstinence? He obviously isn't able to limit himself to a drink or two a day. Or do I just let him be and drink himself to death? I don't want to put him through rehab at this point. I'd appreciate any advice. Thank you.
What you need to prepare for is to remove your Mom from that home if you are her PoA . Whoever is her PoA will need to have the authority activated through an official medical diagnosis by her primary physician.
If neither of them has a PoA and they are unwilling to assign anyone, then you will need to call and report them to APS and continue to call APS (I think you can do it anonymously). If APS determines that your Dad is a danger to himself or others, they will either remove him from the home or your Mom.
The neighbor buying the alcohol... not sure they know what "liability" means. But it's true your Dad requires a medical detox so that cold turkey doesn't kill him.
Alcoholics get a specific type of dementia called Wernicke-Korsakoff syndrome (aka "wet brain"). It's due to blocked vitamin absorption from the alcohol consumption. He may get cirrhosis eventually, as well.
I'm so sorry for this situation. It's going to get ugly for a while and then eventually an "event' will happen that lands one of them in the hospital or a facility during a crisis. Please stop romanticizing that he, at 86, is going to voluntarily stop drinking and that the neighbor will stop buying him the booze. The neighbor probably drinks, too.
Also, there are Youtube videos Al-Anon (podcasts) that you can listen to. These were a lifesaver for me when our meetings closed during the pandemic. We lost a slew of meetings here in Washington, DC, during the pandemic and many have not resumed in person. We also lost our service center for the DMV area since no one wanted to take on the roles to keep our area service center open.
I had plenty of elderly clients who drank and one who does now. I asked him about his drinking. He would sit in his own filth until one day I got so fed up after cleaning a nasty toilet that I told him that I was going to talk to him the way I used to speak to my husband. He was like; Oh no! I told him point blank that if his visiting nurse were to come and see him in those nasty clothes and unwashed smelly clothes in the bedroom that he was headed for a call to the APS if he didn't straighten up his act. I told him that I am a mandated reporter for any client who is showing signs of self-neglect. Also, I told him that he needed to purchase sheets for his bed.
Well, a week later after the talk, he ordered new sheets for the bedroom, seven new shirts, underwear and at least five pairs of new pants. He is going to order a new quilt for his bed. I haven't been seeing too many beer cans like I did in the beginning. Yesterday, he was ready to talk about his younger years how he would drink and party. Also, there were all types of cleaners for me to clean the kitchen and bathroom plus some Febreeze air freshner to spray. I can now go into the apartment without a N 95 mask now.
As for your 86 year old dad, alcohol has become part of his biochemistry. Leave him alone about the drinking. Unless he is raising hell and getting sloppy drunk threatening to kill everybody, there is not much you can do. If he is just sitting in a chair while throwing them back and talking smack as we say here in this area, I would just ignore his behavior. Make sure he gets to his appts. and such. Unfortunately, it's not much you can do for him at this point. Drinking has been part of his entire life.
The neighbor who is buying your dad the hooch is an enabler. Even if you told the neighbor to stop, your dad will find someone else or have the liquor store deliver the goods.
I understand how you feel though. My mother was an alcoholic and was taking medications. She died at a young age. She almost made it to seventy.
You don't say how long your father has been an alcoholic, but that doesn't matter.
You asked us if you should "let him be" an alcoholic.
Whomever helped in the mini-intervention wasn't very good at it, because no one "let's" someone be an alcoholic. No one lets someone eat pototo chips, either. The sad truth is that:
YOU HAVE NO CHOICE IN THIS MATTER WHATSOEVER
I will do my same old-same old recommendation here, K. That's to get yourself to Al-Anon meetings as fast as you can. Attend them religiously. This is the first and last of what you will learn there: There is nothing you can do for any alcoholic but decide whether to stay or to go. That means whether to cut him/her from your life, or to accept that you are dealing with an alcoholic, and do that with the knowledge and tools you will learn in Al-Anon. This may be helpful for your mother as well, or it may not.
You don't tell us how old your Dad is. It's really fairly irrelevant. With this level of drinking and with a failing heart he will not long be here. Your Mom has likely known that, and she'll likely choose to last the duration. Support her. Don't stress your mom with things that cannot be changed. Together with her practice the serenity prayer, and I say that as an atheist who uses it almost daily.
My heart goes out to you, but you have no control over what your father does with his life. I think it's unlikely your dad will change. Should he wish to go to an AA meeting with you then tell him you would be happy to attend one with him, no matter he's sober or not. Stop talking to him about his drinking. It is needlessly stressing you both. But that's about it. Tell your mom you are there for her and will support her when she needs you.
I am so very sorry. You are so very not alone. Alcoholism is rampant across the world. I know that's no comfort to you. I am so sorry.
You can say something like "I'll keep that in mind" if you want to be polite, or just ignore them. Sounds like you're doing great.
My grandfather was like that. Drank and smoked all his life and lived to be 96 years old and God bless.
Your father is not giving up the booze at his age, nor should he be expected to. If your mother is bothered by it, move her out of the house. Like you said, he's not harming her. If she has dementia, you may want to start making some plans for what her future is going to look like. As for your father, leave the guy be. He's right. He worked all his life and now if he wants to drink, that's his business. So long as he's not driving.
And bring your mother as well if she is open to it. And perhaps even your neighbor as they are enabling your father by supplying his drug of choice.
Just please make sure that your father isn't driving and jeopardizing the lives of innocent people on the road ways.
You'll never be able to live with yourself if he were to kill or seriously injure someone because he was driving drunk and you did nothing to stop him.
I have a different slant on this. Unless you live-in 24 hours per day, you really don't know what is truly going on.
Presently, I live in a beautiful place in the South. It's an independent living (IL) along with assisted living, memory care etc. Happy Hour is held 3x times per week. I am astonished at how much women especially here drink. I work remotely, mother needs assistance and I need the help with her too.
I was taught a lesson here in not judging people. What I thought was a negligent son who didn't come to visit his mother or didn't move her to the assisted living wing because it costs more money was truly not the case. A resident here would roam the floors at night in the IL which is basically an apartment, knocking on doors. Afraid to be alone, crying, dressed in her nightgown and stocking feet.
She would come into the dining room with a cylinder of prescriptions on her walker. Still in her nightgown, here there is somewhat of an "unspoken" dress code, no pajamas allowed. She would fall all the time even getting up from her dining room chair. Many of us would run to her rescue to button up her robe for her own dignity and seat her so she wouldn't feel alone and unsteady. We thought it was balance gait issues due to Dementia.
This became a routine event and we all were embarrassed for her when she would enter the dining room.
When the son kept stalling saying I'm coming this weekend from out-of-state, far away and took his sweet old time; we all thought I want to speak to that guy and give him a piece of my mind. The lovely library here, in the morning when I would check the mail this woman would be sleeping in two chairs put together still in her nightgown, all night, the chairs smelled of urine. Her blanket, other belongings would accompany her. She needed what I thought at that time was the assisted living or possibly a nursing home. She was too afraid to sleep in her apartment alone and her son kept saying to the resident's neighbor who would phone him, "I've done all that I can for her".
One time she entered the dining room barefoot, I told her to go put some shoes on. She had so many runs in the rescue the firemen and EMT's were on first name basis with her.
Dinner was always disruptive due to her behavior.
They held her in Memory Care until the son arrived in person to protect herself and everyone else but she threw a tantrum, as her erratic behavior progressed out of control.
Fast forward, son arrives takes Mom to live back in her home in a wealthy neighborhood. Word travels fast around here. So the story goes after her departure when the son took her out of here, the resident's room was full of "empty" liquor bottles.
What we all thought was Dementia was really Alcoholism. The mother lasted "one" day at her home and we were told she fell down the stairs and died. The Betty Ford Clinic really was the match for this type of behavior. The son lived far away because he couldn't take it anymore. We, "I" living here as a neighbor couldn't take it anymore because her behavior took our peace away at mealtime.
How do you know how your mother is being treated? Is your father wetting the furniture as this resident did here at this place? He has probably lost his appetite from the drinking but does your mother eat?
A facility with the elderly will not be able to handle this situation. They might just write it off as Dementia if you are not truly honest. Other residents should not be subject to this.
Enough said...
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