Indifference

I find it incredible to believe that my alerts to the authorities that my cousin, Allan Barton,was a abusing my aunt has met with nothing. Because my aunt is "competent" whatever that means does not mean that she is not being abusing.

This is the second time my cousin put my aunt into a nursing and attempted to sell her home from under her. He knows he is not a beneficiary under her Will as she is giving her home to charity so he has to get ahold of the money before she dies.  A power of attorney is a dangerous document in the hands of someone who thinks he is entitled.  A power of attorney is not a blank cheque.  Because Allan is also the executor of my aunt's Will, he does not have to tell anyone anything.  He is doing it now with the Power of Attorney.  He controls all the evidence so he cannot be made accountable.   If you are a crook it does not matter what the law says.

I suspect I am not considered credible but someone who has an agenda to defraud her has.  And the agencies will not do anything because they did not do what they were suppose to do in the first place.  As to her medical condition and housing she was not given informed consent.  All of them believed my cousin who said she needed nursing home care.  This is a lie. She has always had for the last two decades had hired help/companions.

A few years ago my cousin volunteered to look after my aunt, she did not want him to do so. To keep peace she just let him.  He made her redecorate her house at great expense.  She told me she did not want him to do it but like aways she agreed to keep peace.  The reason for the redecoration was to make the house easier to sell.  Of course my aunt did not know that.  He told her it was to freshen up the house.  Her house was immaculate and tasteful there was no need for him to force this on her.

In defense of my cousin, when he was young he was very very good, but now that he is old, he is very very bad.

I was at a recent meeting where Isobel MacKenzie, BC Senior Advocate, said once you go to a nursing home you never leave. Helen escaped once in 2014 but this time she may not be able to if she does not have a home to go to.

I have no agenda except to follow what Helen told me and what I believe is her true wishes and that is she does not want to live in a nursing home and she does not want to sell her home. She told me some stupid reasons why Allan told her she had to live in a nursing facility.  I told her not to believe him and just say you want to go home. I do not know what happened after that as I have not been able to talk with her since. And when I tried to talk to Allen he said it was none of my business. My cousin is a control freak.

I cannot say Helen cannot be influenced to make a bad decision but at 100.5 years old who would believe that she has free will.  Being competent does not mean that she cannot be abused.

My cousin wants to spend all his time in Chilliwack. He has a love interest there. He wants to abandon Helen and leave her to die alone. He was never in Vernon full time anyways. He just supervised her care.

At her assisted care facilitly she does not have 24/7 care.  She only has a call bell.  Let us say she is in medical distress, her door is closed, she cannot access her call bell, what then.  Even if she could access her call bell what happens if a nurse's aid does not come running.  Helen might as well have a call bell at home with a direct alert to 911.

Prior to Allan's attempt to sell her home in 2013 I thought he would never try it again.  He did.  This time he did everything possible to poison my relationship with my aunt. Up until 2014 I had no problem with Allan.  My cousin worked for over a decade in nursing home administration so he knows how easy it is to defraud an elder.  He would have seen it happen every day at his work.

And for all the authorities I will be demanding how did they handle my complaint. Just telling me they investigated it is not going to to be good enough. What are they going to do, talk to the abusers: those that did not do their jobs.

Telling me that my aunt at 100.5 years and is allowed to make a bad decision isn't good enough. No one is so stupid to believe a woman of that age is totally competent.

Because her doctor, Dr. Tim Gilhooly, recommended that she be put in a nursing home because my cousin told him that would be the best place for her to go because he does not want to supervise her and there was no one else, is not true. Dr. Gilhooly is the one that cemented what would happen to her based on $administrative expediency. He did not want to determine if Helen had other alternatives.  He is more to blame than my cousin for forcing her to do something she does not want to as his true duty is to protect my Aunt from abuse.    He abandoned her. Therefore, he also abused her.  My first contact was with Dr. Gilhooly on July 4 2016.  He refused to talk to me although I left messages.  Instead of reassessing the situation he hide.

I cannot believe that no one understands what elder abuse is.  Lying to a senior is despicable.  And that means keeping pertinent information from her that would affect her ability to make a good or bad decision. And also preventing those that might be advising her.  From what is in the legislative acts a patient is entitled to have others counsel her and also for time for her to make a decision.  This is not what happened.

Just a note.  My aunt does not require COMPLEX care so there is no reason for her not to be in her home which is also the mandate of the government that seniors remain in their home for as long as possible. That means the health authorities and doctors have to have a good reason why they are being removed from their homes. Nursing homes are the place of last resort and not for the convenience of relatives. I have not been able to determine how much the government is subsiding/paying for her incarceration.  I am sure they are as she was getting home support from Interior Health.


I was just at a senior's meeting at Oakridge yesterday and the talk was about living in assisted/supportive housing. It took all my restraint to be polite and not to argue as to the cons..


In recent months I have been to three meetings about seniors and each one of them said no to power of attorneys because they are abused so frequently.  There is no need for someone to pay one's bills.  Pension monies are now automatically deposited and other bills can be paid automatically as well.  So what is the argument for them except to defraud.

The terrible thing about a power of attorney is that the giver can believe that she cannot tear it up.  She might not know or she might fear retribution from her family.

Isobel MacKenzie the Seniors Advocate of BC said that she has seen over and over again competent seniors being forced to believe that they are becoming incapable when in fact it is because those around her keep telling them and they soon become to believe it themselves or it is easier for them to acquiesce than fight. Who is to protect them.

Another note: once you are in nursing care, you always die alone.  Even if staff knows you are dying, and they do know, they will wait until the next shift who will call you.  And it is always a "painless" death in the middle of the night. And it is common for those with powers of attorney to tell the nursing facility not to contact them until the relative is death. Of course the relative does not know this and the relative dies alone and a natural death is not without pain.