House Needs A HazMat Team

My mother never cleans her home. My father recently had a stroke and I cleaned his room and found underwear stuffed under his bed with human waste encrusted on them. My father had several holes burned in his mattress. The bathroom also was splattered from floor to wall with human waste. There are fly strips hanging that have been there for years. There are boxes and boxes stacked in any open spaces making getting around very difficult. They refuse to let us go through old canned goods and discard the outdated food. I have gotten terribly ill trying to clean (even using rubber gloves and wearing a mask). She has 3 dogs and a cat that urinate and defecate on the floor.

My father is to come home from rehab soon and I don't know what more I can do. My mother argues about anything you try to dispose of. I tried to get her to have someone come in to clean besides me but she said they cannot afford it. Plus I am sure she would give them the same hassle about de-cluttering and disposing of things.

My mother has fallen three times in the past couple of months. She broke her knee on one occasion and it took her two hours to crawl to a phone. My father was not bathing appropriately or regularly, and now he will have even more issues with that after his stoke. My mother has become more mobile but she just won't try to clean up. My father just can't clean anything up.

What can I do about this? I don't want to make my parents mad.

From your description this has gone way beyond simply having a cluttered house or making your parents mad. As you describe it, this is a health and safety threat for both your parents, especially your father who isn't very mobile after a stroke.

If anything cries out for a team approach, this problem does. Obsessive hoarding such as you describe is one of the most difficult behaviors to change. The psychiatric literature is full of examples of this kind of obsessive-compulsive behavior. As the daughter you have no chance of "fixing" this yourself.

So, pull your team together. First, visit the Social Worker at your father's rehabilitation facility as soon as possible. Describe the house and ask to have a physical therapist visit in anticipation of your father's return home. Most rehab. facilities will do this. The PT will undoubtedly conclude that in its current state this house is not a safe place for your father to continue his recovery. The discharge planning team at the rehab. can then begin working with you to find alternative care for your father, at least for the short term.

Call your Adult Protective Services agency right away. The number should be in the Blue Pages of your phone book. Describe the conditions in the home and let them know that you are concerned that your mother is in imminent danger of hurting herself again in this environment. Ask the Physical Therapist to also make a report. The more reports from different people who have actually seen conditions in the home, the better.

Call your local fire inspector. The house sounds like a fire hazard. The Fire Inspector may be able to do something to force some cleanup. He, too, might make an APS report.

Call the Health Department. Call Animal Control about the condition of the animals. If the yard outside is overgrown and not up to code, call whichever agency in your area is responsible for enforcement. Encourage each of these officials to make their own APS report.

If your mother is mentally competent she can choose to live in conditions that do not violate any codes or ordinances, but this may be a way to get her some help. If your father is not able to make competent decisions after having had a stroke, then you, if you have Power of Attorney For Health Care, can step in and make alternate arrangements for him. If he's not competent, and you don't have any legal authority, then you might have to work with the authorities to get Guardianship.

If his doctors feel that your father is competent to make his own decisions, then you may not be able to prevent him from returning home to these conditions. However, you can certainly try by involving all the authorities. If he is legally competent and he insists on going back home, then the moment he goes home be on the phone to Adult Protective Services on his behalf.

However you choose to proceed, document everything you do and every call you make. Be prepared to make reports over and over again if necessary.

There is no way you can do all this without making your parents "mad." Get the authorities involved and they can be "bad guys," too. At this point, it is more important to insure safe conditions for your parents, who are obviously unable to do it for themselves. Better to have them mad at you than to carry the guilt of not having tried everything.