My mom is 79 and has a lot of the same issues, particularly with keeping conversations on track -- I have to steer her back quite a bit to what we had begun talking about or I'll never hear the whole story or get a final answer.

Forgetfulness gets worse with age too, which is why they'll tell you the same story 3 times in 20 minutes or struggle to find words ("oh, what's that thing called that...., you know what I mean").

Stress can cause all sorts of problems, but the clutter, etc sounds like depression. A lot of people your mom's age (and mine) refuse psych help because they think it's all a lot of "quackery" -- mine has been depressed since my dad died (nine years!) and quit after 2 sessions with a geriatric pdoc "because he made me do all the talking." Uh -- kind of the point. I think they were just raised that you sweep all that kind of thing under the rug, even though there is a lengthy history of mental illness in our family, beginning with her father that I'm aware of and possibly before.

Having said all that, my only suggestion is to contact your county's human services dept. and see about some elder care -- they're usually able to have someone come in to clean, prepare light meals, run errands, etc at no cost to the folks involved.

Good luck. You're a good kid.