Caring for an elderly person and being FT nursing student

[LonghornChic, BSN]

Hi all,

My situation is kind of odd but here it goes. Bear with me because it's pretty dense:

I have an 82 year old male neighbor who I have known for 10 years. Aside from Parkinsons, he really has no other issues. He has generally lived by himself with no issues. His family is very uninvolved (his daughter literally lives about 5 blocks down the street and has not visited him since last year and his son only visits when he's having to hide from the law). My husband and I have always been the type of people who will give you the shirt off our backs to help someone out, family or not. In the last 3 years, we've becoming a little more involved in my neighbors life (take his trash out, take him meals every other day, do minor home repairs when needed, given him rides, etc.) but this last year has been a very difficult year for both my husband and I and our neighbor.

In August of 2014, my neighbors home burned down in the middle of the night. Luckily for him, his "fugitive" son was spending the night and saved his father from the fire. Unfortunately, his dog of 10 years died waiting at the foot side of his owner. Seeing that this elderly man had nowhere to go (his daughter asked him for $250 in monthly rent plus groceries if he decided to stay with her) we offered him our home to stay until WE could figure things out.

His home had no insurance so my husband decided to build him a small studio apartment on the neighbors property. It took about 2 months to build and he designed it to where it was ADA acceptable given that my neighbor used a scooter to get around in. We stocked it with gently used furniture, appliances and other necessary items such as toiletries, pots/pans, etc. We also tried our best to replace most of his burned clothes. Since his scooter burned in the fire, my husband and I drove 2.5 hours to buy an affordably priced used scooter to help him get around. My neighbor moved in and we check on him daily. But then things started going downhill.

**Here is where my problem starts. Over the last several months, I've noticed that the older gentleman's Parkinson condition is getting more pronounced to the point where he has fallen several times already but luckily hasn't broken anything. He has also had trouble cooking for himself and I've found myself preparing him mechanical style food daily. His fixed income does not cover groceries and land payment (he's still paying off his property). I clean his home and wash his clothes weekly because he no longer maintains his home (again issues with movement). I've also started going through his mail to ward off any scam mail that he has unfortunately fallen for before. However, last month he fell out of bed and spent an entire night on the floor until my husband found him the next morning. He developed cellulitis and I took him to the hospital. I was there with him for 3 days. NO ONE CAME TO VISIT HIM, even after we called his so-called family. I have gone through the ringer with Medicare trying to get him home health, PT, meds and other possible services. I have also applied for Medicaid to see if maybe this time they will cover him. About a week after his hospitalization, his attorney called me to get some paperwork signed (he lost his adjoining property last year also but we loaned him some money to save it and now we are stuck in some legal limbo). Seriously, you can't make this stuff up! Anyway, I told the attorney about the situation he was in and the attorney suggested that both my husband and I come with my neighbors to sign paperwork. So we come in and suddenly the attorney hits us with a Medical Power of Attorney for our neighbor. I felt ambushed and almost forced to sign it. My little old neighbor seemed relieved to have us there to sigh and I felt bad if I didn't seeing that he was alone and all.

I signed it but now I feel incredibly overwhelmed with just the thought of starting clinicals in the fall (I'm a junior in the UT Austin BSN program) and having to, in a sense, have a full time job taking care of my neighbor. Has anyone ever had to take care of elderly or their parents while attending nursing school? I feel so confused and lost. I feel like this little old guy is now our responsibility and we can't just leave him there alone or "pass him off". I know he can't live alone but he's also not ready nor willing to go to a nursing home. I'm in communication with the Nurse liaison at his doctors office and we finally had a home health care assessment today but I still haven't been able to find him any help with a home care attendant due to Medicare restrictions. All I know is that once August comes, I will not be able to dedicate as much time to him as I have been this summer and that makes me feel awful. I know that I am far too involved for someone who is not even family but we are really the only "family" he has and to abandon him now would be inhumane. I'd appreciate any input, advice or words of encouragement.