I had a gentleman who lives in another state contact me on my Raleigh Real Estate website about listing his 92 year old mother’s home. He said she had gotten ill over Christmas and could no longer live alone. He needed to find a senior continuing care facility in the Greater Raleigh area for her to move too because all of the family lived too far away to take care of her long distance. The long term care facilites were very expensive and he needed to know what the house was worth. 
I met with his mom, who was the sweetest thing in the world and didn’t look 92. I hope to be so lucky. I gave him a price and he was pleased then he tried to take the hardest step and here was our dialog:
Hi Linda,
I have talked to my mother and she is so indecisive I am not sure how to push her forward at this point. She doesn’t feel that she knows where to go and doesn’t know how to go about making the decision. She feels that she needs to make a decision on where to go before going forward. I try to provide help but she is very hard to deal with. She needs to be gone from that house!
Bill
Parents Need Help and Time to Process a Major Change
I wrote back:
Hi Bill,
In my experience with situations like this all elderly parents and especially moms have to know where they are going before they can take this leap of faith. Older people really have a hard time with change and this is her nest where she feels safe. Help her get rid of stuff. She is overwhelmed with how to physically move and everything she parts with she will need to grieve. It is part of letting go. If she is giving her extra things to family members to enjoy she will feel good about letting them go. She will feel she is helping and providing which meets the motherly need in her. If she has to take her life long positions to the Goodwill or dump she feel wasteful and have a hard time letting things go. Help her get rid of things in positive way.
I would also suggest that you take her to visit her choices. Hopefully she will see the fun she can have there instead of being alone. She needs to have a goal she is excited about to work towards because this is going to be a lot of emotional and physical work for her. The unknown is not going to get her motivated. She needs to see her new life.
Hope this helps.
Linda
So What Happened?
Hi Linda,
Again I think you are right on target. It is like the Lord intervened as the day after you sent your email a woman who lived behind my mother and who had been friendly with my mother for years emailed and asked what she could do to help. I sent your email to her and she said she will do what she can. She is younger by far than my Mother’s other friends who can’t do much to help her. I don’t have much ability to deal with it being an only child and three hours away with a disabled wife and two dogs to take care of so I really need someone in the area to help her. Hopefully this woman will be able to be a catalyst to get things moving.
Bill