The four grown children agreed.
Their father, William Carey, a retired electrical engineer and business executive, was sinking deeper and deeper into dementia. They had found a memory care facility about a mile from their parents’ home in Chelmsford, Mass., where they believed Mr. Curry would do better.
But their mother, Melissa, who was 83 when her family began urging her to make the change in 2016, remained determined to continue caring for her 81-year-old husband at home despite the mounting toll on her health. . When her children brought up the subject of a move, she “wouldn’t talk about it,” said her daughter, Shannon Curry, 56. Sometimes he cried.”
However, Melissa Curry’s memory also falters. She would forget to give her husband his medication or take the wrong doses. The family worried about falls and fires. Even after they convinced her to take on a paid helper several days a week, the couple were still alone most of the day as well as at night.
As the weeks went by, “we were really at a standstill,” Ms. Carey said. “Are you still your mother?”
Enter the broker. Through a friend, Ms. Curry learned about Elder Decisions, a company that offers “elder family mediation.” Her parents and siblings agreed to give it a try. Crystal Thorpe, the company’s director and founder, and a co-facilitator, Rikk Larsen, interviewed family members over the phone and then scheduled a session around the parents’ dining room table.
Often associated with professional disputes or divorce and custody cases, trained mediators can also assist families facing a range of vexing elder care issues: appropriate living arrangements, caregiving responsibilities, communication and information sharing, and health and financial decisions.
When families seek mediation, “they want to do what’s best, but they have different perspectives on what ‘best’ might mean,” Ms. Thorpe explained.
Sometimes a court orders elder mediation, which usually involves guardianship or estates and inheritances. How often this happens depends on state laws and an individual judge’s enthusiasm for the process.
“It would be great if more judges said, ‘You need a mediator. choose one from the approved list,” said JulieAnn Calareso, president of the New York chapter of the National Academy of Elder Law Lawyers.
Increasingly, however, families are seeking private elder mediation before disputes end up in court and jeopardize or destroy family relationships.
“If families can avoid litigation — the cost of it, the stress of it — they’ll have a better outcome,” said Beth Polner Abrahams, a trained mediator and elder law attorney in Long Island. “There will be no winner or loser – there will be compromise.”
Mediation differs from arbitration, in which an arbitrator weighs the arguments and makes a decision that the competitors agree to accept. The mediator remains neutral and helps the parties reach a consensus on their own, focusing on the needs and wishes of the older person.
Even people who lack legal capacity can often make their wishes known, Ms Thorpe said. When this is not possible, mediators can rely on the person’s previous statements or documents.
Mediation also differs from family therapy, although sessions can become just as emotional as participants become angry or tearful, nurse old hurts, and air grievances.
“These are messy situations,” said DeLila Bergan, an elder mediator in Denton, Texas, and co-chair of the Association for Conflict Resolution’s elder mediation division.
“We’re not trying to make everybody happy and cheerful and loving each other — that’s a job for a therapist. But we can keep them talking and focused on the issues, and keep it calm, no naming names.”
He recalled a dispute over a family home that a widow was preparing to sell to finance her move to independent living. One of the children felt he “owed the house,” Ms. Bergan said, because he had lived in it for a few years and contributed to the renovation costs.
“But there was no consensus on that” among the other children and grandchildren, Ms. Bergan said. “The fighting got really bad.”
Over three months of negotiations, the family reached a compromise: the daughter would buy the house at a price acceptable to the mother. Even if resentment continued, “it was a deal everyone could live with,” Ms. Bergan said.
Sometimes, the parties document the decisions in a memorandum of understanding or a to-do list or care plan. Families may agree to share information with a private family website or text chain.
The process and any resolution reached remain confidential — which is valuable, as some families are embarrassed to even acknowledge that they have sought mediation. Mediators can then stay in touch at the family’s request to facilitate communication.
Because elder mediation is a fairly new field, with no national certification or licensing requirements, approaches and costs vary. A mediation can last for 90 minutes, three hours or a few days. Some mediators are also lawyers or social workers. Some bring senior lawyers or financial advisors into the process.
In Texas, Ms. Bergan, who works alone, charges $1,500 to $2,500 for most elder mediation cases. In more expensive Massachusetts, Elder Decisions, which typically uses two mediators, charges $400 to $500 an hour.
But the alternative can be disastrous. Litigation lasts months or even years and costs tens of thousands of dollars.
To find trained mediators, families can consult the Association for Conflict ResolutionThe Academy of Professional Family Mediators the mediates.com, and look for professionals who provide elder mediation. (Their ranks are still thin, but mediation is increasingly online, making it more widely available regardless of where family members live or where the mediator practices.)
It doesn’t always work out. If key family members refuse to come to the table, “mediation without them being present would not be appropriate,” Ms Thorpe said. “If there’s a sense of coercion or suspicion of abuse or neglect, that’s not appropriate.” It expects participants to show good faith, a willingness to tackle a solution.
When mediation works, it can maintain or even strengthen ties, allowing families to celebrate birthdays, graduations and weddings together despite past conflicts. “They should be able to stand by their parents’ graves together,” Ms Abrahams said.
William and Melissa Curry and their children, with the youngest participating via loudspeaker from South Carolina, spent about an hour and a half talking with Ms. Thorpe and Mr. Larsen.
Shannon Curry described their meeting in late April as “a problem-solving meeting where everyone feels heard, everyone gets a say,” including her father. “We talked about a compromise. What can you live with and what can’t you live with?” he recalls. “It was mostly a very loving effort to find solutions.”
With her mother’s agreement, the family moved Mr. Curry into his new apartment a few months later. Less isolated than he had been at home, he became friendly with staff and other residents and seemed to enjoy the activities. His wife visited once or twice a day, taking him to meals and exercise classes, and also seemed to benefit from the social interaction.
He died aged 82, eight months after moving. Four years later, his wife died in the same memory care facility, aged 88.
Not every family can resolve their conflicts with just one mediation session, but in this case “it was a huge help,” Shannon Curry said. “I wish we had done it two years earlier.”