wood deck keeps peeling

I am 70 years old and I can't keep scraping and re-staining. The deck was in poor condition when we bought the house. We cleaned it up and put semi transparent behr stain on it. Two years and had to re-do. At some point we switched to solid stain (a real mistake). The stain is almost gone on half of it and the wood is weathered. The other half has most of the stain sticking stubbornly. I wanted to get all the stain off and have someone sand it so I could use oil based semi transparent. I have tried to remove it with stain stripper. I gave that up after 3 applications and little to show for it. I am now trying heat gun to remove most of it, and then sand it. The top layer peels off with heat (even sun at times)in some places, and it is a bear to get off other places. One man says I should give up and put a new improved behr stain/paint on it--but I have no faith in behr. Another tells me that even with the work I plan, the oil based will be uneven color. This will be the last time I am going to be physically able to do this job. My knees are aching, and my arthritic hands are complaining a lot. So I want to do it the best possible. In research, the oil stain seemed best and can be re-done without this peeling issue as needed.
I would welcome advice on this job from experienced source.