Advice please about moving away from Widowed Mum

Also op, sorry if I've missed it, but do you have children? If so, where do they live and is that a factor at all?

She goes on cruises and coach tours?

With her terribly "thin skin"??

Honestly OP she's really taking the piss with you!

She can sell up and buy a warden controlled flat or retirement flat within (but no closer than) 1/2 hour of your new location.

Warden control / retirement flats have community rooms and social activities. She won't be isolated and there's help immediately on hand should she need it.

I think you need to be really firm on this because she sounds quite manipulative and wheedling to get her own way - which is to live with you (absolutely DO NOT DO THAT)

It's hard to say what's reasonable here. I mean, I wouldn't do it in my circumstances, but I don't live in yours. People will judge you as selfish. It is selfish, but most people people are it's just the extent which varies. Your mum is being selfish too, I can see both sides.

I think the most reasonable thing here is to think of compromises. Can you get her to move to the new area? She sounds fairly wealthy, are you too? Could there be some kind of second home situation for you or her or both to allow you/her to split time between areas a bit more easily?

This post reads very differently from your first post. I at first had the idea your mum is not very independent, and can't really get out and about. If she is fit to go on three cruises a year, the not getting a train thing does sound a bit manipulative.
What about you look for a place that has perhaps a granny flat type thing or an annex on the property ao she could move with you and have her own space? Or just look for somewhere that has property nearby and run the idea past of her moving with you? Depending on her answer you'd then know if that makes her feel better of if she digs her heels in and just doesn't want to move.

Your updates of her going on cruises and such seems at odds with your original post

I thought so too ..

Am I being unreasonable and mean?

A bit. Four hours is a long way for you to move from your old widowed mum.

Isn't there somewhere rural closer by?

It sounds as if she has lost a bit of confidence - re driving and public transport etc.

The idea of moving near to where you are planning is a good one. Look into a bungalow, one level, usually have decent gardens. Show her some details. Look up some local groups/activities she could join. Sell it as a fresh start somewhere new. She doesn't have to be fully reliant on you just yet.

Your updates of her going on cruises and such seems at odds with your original post.

This is nothing about your Mum but relocating generally, did your DH grow up rurally? I did and it’s a very different life especially when older. Consider a move to the edge of a town. If you ever lose the capacity to drive and live rurally it’s truly awful. Plus if this is a holiday place that is special to you, well it’s different if you live there. I live on the edge of a town, 15 mins walk is open fields and 15 minutes the other way is every single thing you need, superstore, Doctors and the local high street.

You are not old at all but if you live very rurally you may need to relocate again in 20 years. Maybe when you say rural you will be a 15 minute taxi ride to the edge of town. Really consider how it would be without the use of a car. My friends DH is only early sixties but is now forbidden to drive due to a medical condition.

It's what we save for all our lives? Well that would have been lovely if we could, but we were too busy working our socks off to pay for school fees, uni fees, weddings, house deposits and ongoing financial emergencies. And now one DC is moving near to us so we can help with childcare. I'd be righteously pissed off if in the future, when WE might need support, they decide to bugger off and leave us to fend for ourselves when we're old and vulnerable.

Then their mindset is wrong. It isn't evaporating. It's paying for heating, lighting, food, insurance, gardeners, building maintenance, staff wages, taxes etc etc etc. The cost of being alive and kept safe.
We all know the rules. If you want to pass on money then drip feed it away over the lifetime. Handing over large chunks of money on death and receiving free care from others isn't sustainable anymore If we all want to live to 102 and continue to take the pills to do so, even with a diagnosis.

Good grief, of course you should go op. And she should be ashamed of herself for guilt tripping! Unless you are actually planning to be a hands on carer? If not, you need to put your DH, you, and your relationship first. Something your mother should be encouraging!

Can she move to the same area as well?

Do you want to provide care to her in old age? I'm watching my poor step mum be run ragged caring for both her mother and grandmother. I wouldn't want my children spending years of their life not being able to go on holiday becuase they're committed to providing my care.
I won't be providing care to my parents.

Also, do you have a plan for your own aging? Is the place you want to buy a long term option or will you need to move back when you're old? Presumably you're not expecting any children of yours to provide care?

It doesn’t sound, from what you’ve written, as if your mum is putting much effort into ensuring her declining years are as healthy and comfortable as possible. If this is the case, then I really don’t think you need to feel guilty about not prioritising this either.

My dad had COPD and in his last few years as it progressed he would not have been able to live independently without family support nearby, he needed someone physically present to advocate for him, especially for emergencies and as the disease progressed there were many of them.

It isn't about martyring yourself, it is about loving your nearest and dearest in their time of need more than a rural fantasy. it is about being able to find pleasure in life as well as support others - they are not mutually exclusive.

Although he never asked for support, I personally would not have left him to go through it alone, it was a privilege to be able to support him and when he died I had no regrets. I guess it comes down to the type of relationship you have with your parent and your own personality.

Go! You have to put yourself and your husband first. It's not your job to look after your mother, so don't give in to emotional blackmail.

Does DH have family @youvegotit?

This is an odd one for me.

because at 42 with 2 kids (1 adult age and 1 teenager) I would be telling them to go and live their lives as they want.

But I don’t know how I would feel if they left me when I was starting to get old and sick. I would love to say I would be fine. But who knows. I am not that age and (thankfully) not sick.

I absolutely couldn’t leave my dad though. I say dad because my mum is dead. Not just for his sake but for mine. If he gets sick and is in and out of hospital, I couldn’t keep going back and forth with that sort of drive. So what happens? Dad is hospital, alone? I couldn’t do it. So I would be killing myself going back and forth.

a good friend of mine has just been through 6 months of her dad in and out of hospital, falling at home, injuring himself etc. in the space of 6 months he deteriorated completely. The stress of finding a home and so on has been a lot. And she lived round the corner and shared responsibility with her brother. No one could I do it 4 hours away. And no way would I just leave him to it.

It just wouldn’t work. Dp knows that and wouldn’t want to move away from Dad either.

I think I'd be trying to persuade her to move to a small town near to the rural area you have your eyes on. It would be difficult if she had a social network where she was.

It's what we save for all our lives, to buy in help and care as needed and leave our busy adult DC with jobs and families of their own free of the burden. It's what you save for all your life. My father's generation, not used to long lingering dementia, expecting to be carried off fairly quickly with heart disease or cancer, saved to be able to pass on a good sum to children or grandchildren. And squandering it on their own care seems to them very wrong. Though phrasing it as you do, "leaving adult DC free of the burden" makes it slightly less unpalatable to watch one or two hundred thousand pounds just evaporate.

What has your relationship with your mum been like?

Because if it hasn’t been bad, I think you are being ice cold OP.

Reading between the line it sounds like she is a difficult person who has fallen out with the rest of her family, refuses to take steps to try to socialise a bit more and put a lot of guilt on your shoulders...

'Very thin skin' also sounds like she is used to using emotional blackmail and play the victim to get what she wants.

I wonder if there is a back story as well as to why you felt you had to stay so closed to your parents (again were you made to feel like they should always be your priority in life even when you were younger?) and always prevented from making your own decisions?

I had a mother like yours and I literally moved to a different country when I was 20 to escape her constant control and lies and manipulation. Every attempt from me to become independent had been met with threats, fake tears and hysteria.

Would I care for her in her old age? not a chance.

Plan your retirement and move with your husband and make it clear that she needs to start making plan for her own old age and not except you to become her main carer. Being a martyr won't make you or your husband happy...