Who will change our diapers when we are old?

OP, you're on your own. You've got to get off the bus on your own terms.

Hire a sexy male nurse

If you are concerned about this, start moving your money NOW. Medicaid will pay for Home Health Care Aides, But your money situation has to be sorted out...and waiting until you actually need help will cause major problems and you’ll say, “I wish I knew about this 5 years ago.” (5 being an important number.)

Do as R3 says. Make a plan, OP. Do not count on anyone. Otherwise you'll be shelved into some torture-prison nursing home and locked away. Or worse.

I worry about this every day. And there's literally no way to save enough money to deal with this without living like a hermit.

Make sure you name the pool boy in your will. Problem solved.

Medicaid won't save your ass. The nursing home industry pays for shit and the only people willing to take the backbreaking jobs as nursing aides are usually recent immigrants. With out new anti-immigrant stance, there won't be anyone to wipe your butt in the publicly funded nursing home when you need it.

Some nursing homes are not too bad. I had a friend with multiple sclerosis who ended up in one in her 50s - it was great (she died at 58). And she transferred assets in time to qualify for Medicaid (if you don't have someone you want to inherit your estate you don't have to worry about this part - but they have a 5-year lookback - any money you transfer during the lookback period is still considered part of your assets).

I forget the limit - you can't have more than $2000 in cash/stock etc. - something like that. If you have a partner (or anyone who lived with you - not sure if it has to be a relative) who helped take care of you for a couple years, they can keep your house.

So just plan on qualifying for Medicaid, going to a nursing home, and hoping for the best. Like the Zen proverb, life is getting onboard a leaking boat anyway - there's not likely an easy way out but maybe... Why waste time worrying about it now? (other than getting your affairs in order if you want your assets lost)

And R7 - move to Appalachia or the South - lots of non-immigrant poor there who work in nursing homes. They have no choice.

You’ll be apprehended by one of the predatory adult guardianship agencies, who will gain POA over you and spend down your money while you languish in an assisted living or a nursing home. Those nieces you mentioned? They won’t have access to you, your guardian will see you that. If you get unruly or agitated you can look forward to daily doses of atypical antipsychotics which will make you placid, dazed, and obese. Think this can’t happen and it’s just my crazy paranoia, think again. This system is well established in America and getting out of it is almost impossible.

You are crazy if you think Medicaid as you know it today will exist in another 15 years. Already, in NYS, Medicaid eats up 1/3 of the state's budget (about $70 billion)

NY has instituted many reforms but Medicaid's budget just keeps growing. In another 15 years it will consume 3/4 of the budget if things continue this way.

I'm currently working with a financial planner, tax consultant and an insurance consultant to make sure I have a solid plan that will take care of me when I'm older and in need of specific care. A somewhat minimal investment ($1,000 - $2,000?) to ensure I have all the facts and can make proactive decisions and plans now, not later. To wait until you have the need is not what you'd want to do.

If you have no savings, family or close friends to help manage your affairs when you need additional care I guess you are left with what's available. For me, if there is someone changing my diapers it won't be a friend or family member. I wouldn't put that burden on anyone.

Start planning now for your retirement years. If you wait, as we say in our DL world, it will end in tears.

Nursing home social worker here (in Appalachia— lots of working class whites providing direct care as someone said above). Look for a facility with a “non-restraint” policy, which includes no chemical restraints. At my facility, antipsychotics are only prescribed to individuals on a short term basis, and only if they have demonstrated to be a danger to others by physically lashing out in some of way against another resident. We don’t dope people up for being “unruly.” Although it’s true that many facilities do. There are other ways of redirecting behaviors related to dementia, although it takes a great deal more patience from staff and other residents. Although long term care is not an ideal outcome for anyone, there are facilities that try the best as they can to provide decent quality of life. And R10 is correct that states will change how Medicaid is managed and billed in the near future. In my state more money is going to pay for agencies to provide a few hours of care at home to maintain people there for as long as possible to delay the enormous costs of placement in long-term care. J look for the push to grow in the coming years.

[quote] I'm currently working with a financial planner, tax consultant and an insurance consultant to make sure I have a solid plan that will take care of me when I'm older and in need of specific care.

R11, can you share what they are advising you to do? Just in general terms.

This is my problem as well ... and I don't even have nieces or nephews (or siblings--or any relatives except cousins.) I'm totally lost as to how to handle my will, estate, etc. I don't want to burden anyone with dealing with stuff -- it it smart to get a professional (attorney? banker?) to handle post-death matters as a fiduciary/trustee? How about pre-death medical and financial matters should I become ill or incompetent?

Frankly, when I can no longer bathe, dress and feed myself I will kill myself.

I'm with R15. When I can't do the little that I care to do (make coffee, read, watch movies/TV, take a walk, delight in dogs and chat with people), then I am longer alive and hope I have the means to kill myself.

[quote] make coffee, read, watch movies/TV, take a walk, delight in dogs and chat with people

That's your whole life? Some people would kill themselves just over that.

That is not my whole life. I'm thinking ahead to what would be the bare minimum for me to consider a day well spent.

R17 should kill himself.

How odd to imagine yourself in diapers and your wonder is, Who will change them rather than How might I pull off a neat suicide? I won't want to be in diapers. No. That's enough life for me if I get to that point.

R15 i hope to go before the shit hits the diaper. Im thinking I only need to be around until age 75 max. My dad is preserved due to a gazillion meds at age 89 and he says he’s not sure why he needs to keep seeing doctors.

I have zero interest in getting to this point and I tell a couple of people all the time that I'll just off myself.

Not sad as I've planned far in advance. Who wants to go through this nonsense?

But we need to improve our profits!

1. Big Pharma

2. Your doctor

3. The hospital

4. Home health care

5. Hospice

OP, I've decided. No family member will provide me with personal care. Period. if I'm in an unavoidable, one shot, situation that's the exception, but no family members will ever supply me with personal care. I've already made my wishes clear. I want them to have a care worker do that and I want them to supervise and make sure I'm not mistreated.

R3 is right. A couple i know is going through this right now, and they transferred the sick guys house to the partner's name. they don't understand that Medicaid will not permit this, as there is a 5-year look back for asset transfers.

Is that because 5yrs is the Medicaid retro transfer of assets limit?

I intend to be a free-range eldergay.

Any day now. Any day now.

^^ gluten free too, i hope

They're doing it for me now!

Robots

I'll wear pull-ups. They gently hug my booty underneath my skinny jeans, and they're DYI ........ easy on-easy off, and completely disposable.

No laundering required !

Yes, R31, but yo' ass is not completely disposable, and you will have to figure out how you clean it every time you change your diapers. Or you'll stank. You wanna see ripe asses go to the public library any day and smell the homeless guys.

My top priority is surviving to the ripe old age of thirty.

I'll worry about changing my fig leaves when I reach that point, provided that I live that long.

Ever heard of disposable wipes, r32?

You might want to try them, Monsieur Fébreeze !

I’ll move to Mexico or somewhere cheap if I need that kind of care. Some place where a live-in assistant can make $20,000/year and feel well paid - so you don’t end up with a miserable, angry woman who lives in poverty in NY or CA. Amazing how different prices are for assisted living - $10,000+ / month in NY, $3,000/month in TX.

R3, where are you going to find these, home health care workers? Immigrants are overwhelming the ones who are in that profession and your president no longer allows them in the country. Good luck with that. Maine, has the largest shortfall and are already turning people away, because no one wants to live there, and the southern states and the east coast are where the few who can get into the country ends up.

Better to go out dignified

With boughten friendship by your side

Than none at all. Provide, provide!!!

Bidets, my friends, invest in a good bidet.

If you can’t wipe your ass, a bidet probably won’t be much better. One of those shower rooms makes more sense - just roll in and wash down like a car wash.

My new money making idea is a HoverRound that goes through the shower and sprays your undercarriage. Much like a car wash.

I hope programs that I linked continue to expand and improve. They provide one stop services for seniors who live independently but need medical services, attention and socialization day to day. I'm single and childless and so is my brother. We help our mom but there will be no one to take care of us when we're in our dotage. If I can stay out of nursing homes as long as possible, that would preserve my retirement funds. When I do go into a nursing home, it would only be for the very end and I should have enough money to pay for a short stay at a good place.

That's the plan....