I remember the first time that I visited them at the "new" home. It had been about 8 months or so since T's wife had passed away. I asked T how his children were doing since their mother's passing. T's response was, "Well, I had to pay for the funeral, you know, and she left a bunch of bills that I had to pay!" That was it. Not a single word that actually answered my question. It was all about money. He spoke about her as if she had done this on purpose, like she was still alive and should pay him back the money.
Whenever the topic of his wife has been brought up to my grandmother, she talks about how nice of a woman his wife was. She even happily allows an old picture to remain hanging in the living room of T, his wife, and their 4 children before the separation.
In November 2011, one of my uncles (my grandmother's middle child) unexpectedly passed away. On the day that my family found out, my aunt went to T's home to check on my grandmother. My grandmother was sitting at the kitchen table by herself, crying. T was in the living room watching TV and said, "Crying isn't going to do any good."
After my uncle's death, my grandmother's symptoms became even worse. Sometimes, we could tell that she was confused about my uncle's death and couldn't quite remember that it had happened. She no longer had the ability to make phone calls on her own and had stopped calling us. She no longer remembered my or any of her other grandchildrens' birthdays (which started about 1-2 years earlier) and her own children's birthdays.
My uncle owned a condo which was left to my grandmother when he passed away. T immediately took control of the condo and refused to allow the family to be involved, even refusing to discuss the progress of its sale with the family. Since the next several months' mortgage for the condo had already been paid by my deceased uncle, my aunt brought up the possibility of allowing one of my cousins to live in the condo for a few months. T became angry and said "no," making it his decision. T then told my family that the bank would be taking over the condo and that they would be putting a lock on the door, so we had to remove anything we wanted from the condo right away. My family scrambled to get my deceased uncle's personal belongings out of the condo. Afterwards, without discussing this with the family, T had a member of his family repaint the condo, then putting it up for sale himself.
Now, I'm not positive about the timing of everything, but either shortly before or right after my uncle's death, my family and I found out that my grandmother had been diagnosed with Alzheimer's and Dementia. My grandmother, naturually, forgot and, therefore, could not tell us. T did not tell anyone. We found out about 6 months post-diagnoses when my grandmother randomly mentioned it in a conversation.
Around the time that T was taking over the condo and refusing to discuss it with the family, we were becoming very concerned about my grandmother's symptoms. We found a great program for elder people with Alzheimer's and Dementia only 10 minutes away from T's home that my grandmother could go to during the day a few days a week to help slow the progression of the illnesses. The program is free, however, certain assets could not be in the patient's name, including the condo. We discussed this with T, begging him to just get the sale overwith or just let the bank have the condo so that we could get her into the program. T refused and, to this day, we still are completely in the dark as to whatever happened to the condo.
We started discussing our concerns about my grandmother's condition with T. My aunt, who is only a few minutes away from his home, repeatedly offered for him to drop my grandmother off at her house so she could help my grandmother get some exercise since T never exercises, not even going to walks, and my grandmother loves going for walks, but lost the ability to go walking on her own. T never took my aunt up on her offer. He constantly left my grandmother home alone without telling anyone and continued to allow her to drive by herself, even though she got lost and scared several times and had to be rescued. If one of us called while my grandmother was home alone, she was unable to tell us where T was, when he had left, or when he'd be home. We attempted to talk to him about this, asking him to please stop letting her drive and to please make plans ahead of time so that she was not left home alone. My aunt continued to offer for T to drop my grandmother off with her whenever he had to leave the home. T ignored our concerns and refused our suggestions and offers of assitance.
Months passed. My grandmother (who also has diabetes) was getting no exercise, often being left home alone, and was receiving absolutely no intervention or regular treatment what-so-ever to address her Alzheimer's/Dementia and to slow down the progression. She gained a significant amount of weight within only a few months after maintaining about the same weight for as long as I can remember. She looked like a completely different person.
T continued to refuse to get my grandmother into the program that we had found near his home. The condo was still in her name. Even though T could have easily afforded for my grandmother to start the program, he still refused. My parents told T that they would pay for my grandmother to start the program until the condo was out of her name. T stated, "That's rediculous! I'll fight you on that!" This was about more than money for him; this was about power, control, and murder.
Yes, murder. T was (and still is), in my opinion, ensuring that my grandmother would get worse so that she will die sooner rather than later. In August or September of 2012, T secretly took my grandmother to an elder care lawyer behind my family's back. My grandmother was about 2 years into ther diagnoses and was forgetting day-to-day events at this point. T and the lawyer had my grandmother create a new will, establish him (a non-family member - a boyfriend) as her Power of Attorney (POA), and establish him as her Health Care Proxy (HCP). My grandmother has no memory of this. She had created a will about 10-15 years earlier establishing my mother, her oldest child, as the executor and splitting her assets among her children. My mother had been her POA and my aunt had been her HCP. At this time, T also combined my grandmother's bank account with his, even though they had separate bank accounts since they first started dating. Now my grandmother was completely and totally under his control. All of her assets were is his name and under his control. And she didn't even realize it.
Let me stop there, for now, and point out a few of the "Red Flags of Abuse" from the National Center on Elder Abuse (NCEA). The full document can be found at http://www.agelessalliance.org/assets/download/scripts/NCEA_RedFlags_web.pdf.
How could an ELDER CARE lawyer not see the red flags? Not do her research? Not contact family members? Allow a NON-FAMILY MEMBER to change the end-of-life paperwork of an elderly person with Alzheimer's and Dementia?
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