How to Know if Your Elderly Loved One Can Live Alone

Seniors often have elderly loved ones who are forgetful. Forgetting where you put your glasses is one thing, but for a diabetic who forgets to take an insulin shot, that forgetfulness can be deadly.

Seniors often have to deal with an elderly loved one who cannot live on her own. Sometimes, the person doesn't recognize the fact, so you'll have to monitor the situation as well as take control and convince the elderly person that it's time to seek outside help.

It becomes more difficult because we're all proud people and no one wants to admit he needs help. So, your elderly loved one may hide things from you. It's up to you to stay on top of things.

Things to consider:

Distance. If you live far away and can't make trips to drop off groceries or the like, there needs to be someone else to pick up the slack. If an elderly relative is far away with no support system, the need to have someone living nearby, relocating the relative or coming up with a system so someone will be there in the event of an emergency becomes imperative. You don't want to wait until a critical moment to think about this. Moreover, you have no way to monitor that the person is actually taking care of herself.

Driving. With extreme diminished physical abilities, your elderly loved one may (and should) not drive. That means he can't get to the doctor's, grocery store, department store or the like. If he lives far away that puts a huge burden on others to get to him. And since there are increased medical, pharmacy and grocery visits you will have to drive to the person, get the information, do the errand, deliver it, then return home. That's a lot of driving.

Mobility. The elderly can't always bend to put groceries away, reach behind items to get necessary items. At times he may be immobilized entirely. That means he can't meet his day-to-day needs living on his own.

Upkeep on the home. Mobility plays into this as well. A leaky kitchen sink may have been a breeze for the person to fix, but bending down, then contorting into a confined space may be a thing of the past. The home may start to go into disarray. In addition, some medical conditions will start to inhibit his ability to care for his home which may beget other medical problems. A Catch 22 situation.

Personal Hygiene. The loss of mobility and some forgetfulness may leave the elderly unable to do simple hygiene things. Stiff joints make it tough to brush hair or teeth. Then there is the whole issue of subtle depression. After an elderly loved one lives alone for a while, he starts to realize that people aren't visiting the way they once did. He may have outlived most of his friends and his loved ones, so visits are sparse. After a while, the elderly will develop a "what's the point" attitude when it comes to personal hygiene. Something as simple as shampooing or dying the hair and dressing in fresh, clean clothes isn't so important when no one is coming by.

Depression. They say being alone doesn't mean being lonely, but if you've outlived all of your loved ones and friends, human nature dictates that you'll get depressed. You'll have to keep an eye on your loved one to see they are fighting to maintain independence or because he just doesn't want to admit that he's lonely. A good cue is whether or not the person keeps you on the phone to talk about mundane things a little longer than he normally would. That tells you the person craves human attention.

Health. Diabetes, eyesight issues, gout, arthritis. All of these things multiply as we get older. Couple this with depression and lack of mobility and health issues that may not have been that bad could escalate.

Safety. Eyesight and mobility issues invariably lead to accidents. An offshoot of this is safety in terms of having your elderly loved one being taken advantage of by people who appear out of nowhere, show a lot of attention, then proceed to divest the elderly of his money.

Finances. If all of a sudden mom is getting notices for non payment, and you know there is money in the bank to pay those bills, perhaps you need to start talking about whether or not mom should live alone.

It's a fine line. You never want to take a person's independence away. We're all proud. You're dealing with someone who made contributions to society and all of a sudden he can't. Still, if your elderly loved one can't do it all, it's time to have a serious discussion as to whether or not she should live alone.