Meredith,
Another thought:
How is your mom mentally? Merwyn's mother couldn't figure out where all her money was going because Mer's brother had all these credit cards, car loans and home equity loan on his mom's house, and didn't have job, so he was getting his mom to pay the payments. He also lived at her home for free, didn't pay for groceries, car insurance, car payments or anything. Since everything was in Mom's name, she felt obligated to keep the payments up to keep her credit from being jeopardized. But, it took her having a ministroke and having to come live with us for a while before we realized the extent of what was going on. Her home was a mess because she COULDN'T clean (we just thought she didn't mind living like that). She would just put her mail in big plastic bags because she couldn't deal with it or understand it all and then hide the bags behind a big screen in her living room. Her memory was pretty poor and her capacity to understand stuff was limited. Older people will hide the state they are in and the only way to discover how things really are is to spend an extended amount of time with them.
Does your mom have her financial affairs in order? Who has medical power of attorney? Who has financial power of attorney? What are her advanced health directives? Does she have her funeral plans taken care of? How does she want to be laid to rest? Does she have insurance policies? Are they still valid, or has she let them lapse because she couldn't figure out what they were and didn't pay them?
This is such a difficult time for our parents and for us. My own mother had Alzheimer's and I got her to get things taken care of financially and medically just before she went down hill drastically. It was so hard.
I am sorry. I know this is empty nest forum and I guess I should have posted in the taking care of parents forum. I'm really sorry.