Hi there,

I am new to this group. If anyone has any advice I could really use it, I will explain my situation...

We finally got my dad to go to a doctor where he was diagnosed with Alzheimer's and Diabetes. We did the whole, contact the doctor, have them call him asking him to come in for a routine checkup, have him come in and get diagnosed.

However, in order to be ruled "incompetent" for us to obtain legal guardianship to get him the care he needs, we were told he needs to return to the doctor for further testing. He went in for one of these next appointments, but they say he needs more. Now he refuses to go because he thinks the diagnosis is crazy. He thinks they are manipulating him because he forgot about making further appointments and then thinks they were trying to force him into it against his will when they call him to remind him about his appointment. He keeps threatening to report the doctors to the medical board. (He was also a doctor but had his license taken away when colleagues noticed memory lapses.) Basically in his mind, everyone who thinks he has memory issues is "crazy," and he expresses extreme hostility towards them.

He also has delusions and thinks that the original appointment to get him to see the doctor who diagnosed him was part of a plot created by a group of strangers who he thinks he met on a hiking trail and reported him to the doctor because they said they noticed "memory issues" and thought he shouldn't be out on the trail. He says he saw this group of people later in his bedroom and they were talking about killing him and stealing all his things. He often has delusions and hears voices of people plotting to kill him, and sometimes sees people who aren't there. So basically he has this idea in his head that there's a plot to get him to the doctor that was started by people trying to kill him. He's called the police on multiple occasions saying he hears or sees people who are planning to kill him but no sign of anyone is ever found... The police have told us we really need to get him into a home and they might report us to social services, but no one in our family has enough money to pay for a home for him or the legal power to force him to move into one.

I really don't know what to do. My dad is actually really lucid and intellgent in other ways, but he has these delusions. He's lucid enough that I don't think it would work to tell him we are running errands and then take him to the hospital instead to go to the doctor.

He also has a history of denial even before he had Alzheimer's. He beat my brother and molested me when we were children when he was drunk, but has always denied it. He denied he was cheating on my mom until she flat out saw his car parked at the other woman's house and confronted him about it. So denial behavior is not new.

I know this story sounds like I could be making it up, but I assure you, it is real and I am desperate for help.

My dad is kind of an a-hole and though there is a lot of resentment in my family towards him, we do want to see him get the proper care he needs. My sister (the one he didn't abuse) is currently living with him and caring for him, but my dad's finances are falling apart. He's had his driver's license taken away, and denies this until we show him the form to remind him. He gets extremely hostile and angry at any mention that he has memory issues, and occasionally physically attacks (especially my brother) when its mentioned.

Is it possible to get someone to the house to evaluate him to get him deemed incompetent? I honestly think it might be impossible to get him to the doctor to get the further evaluation needed to deem him incompetent and get him into a home. I think once he would see the hospital he would go nuts.

All of us kids are pretty young (in our 20s and early 30s) and we want to do things like go back to school and have careers instead of caring for him full time, but he can't cook for himself, forgets to bathe, wanders and gets lost, etc.

If anyone has any suggestions, I am in dire need of help and ideas. Thank you.