To not want to help out my great aunt

Extended families doesnt necessarily mean we all live locally. It means that we are in regular contact and in a mutually supportive network. It means we do feel some obligation to be there for relatives in need.

We have strong roots and close ties.

How come I know you're from a culture that expects WOMEN to do the unpaid caring work? And this is not someone OP loves- she hardly knows the woman. I hope you plan for your future because I'm not sure your dc will be your slaves when you're old.

I don't tolerate unkindness or cruelty. I don't tolerate a society where we treat our old as burdensome. I can't stand the hypocrisy of complaining that you don't have support and then refusing to be supportive. I can see the generational differences in this current group of children who are slowly being removed from the care and guidance of their grandparents generation. They are worse people as a result.

You are free to tolerate those things.

we live in extended families

Right. So actually a completely different situation to this woman who lives an hour away and suddenly seems interested in the idea of family helping out now, when she needs it.

No no - she deffo would - right after she’s got home from her fictional job after a commute, and before she’s collected the kids from various schools & nurseries, helped all three children with their homework and cooked and fed the entire family. I mean, she’s pregnant at the moment apparently, so once she’s had the baby she’ll have even more time on her hands for this thrice-weekly 2hour round trip to shower a relative stranger. Definitely.

You are being selfish and need to help your aunt. She is vulnerable and in need of help.

And if your culture is about helping people solely on the basis of inheritance I’d suggest you are one in need of prayer and getting down off your high horse @TheHateUGive.

Seeing family values as financial transactions is pretty scummy, as is thinking you have any moral high ground.

You'd make a 2 hour round trip every other day, plus the time spent there, to help out a distant relative you'd not seen in almost a decade? Not as a one off, but as ongoing arrangement that could last years? I bet you wouldn't 😂

What does it tell you? Do you want to guess my ethnic and religious background based on your assumptions of other groups of people?

Yes. Of course I have a job. I have 3 kids and 1 on the way. We all help each other. Nothing is left all to me and I help others with their load.

You don't. Your non-answer says everything we need to know.

@TheHateUGive

Some people will share your viewpoint on that, certainly.

However, it could also be suggested that you (not your culture, but you personally) are perhaps lagging behind when it comes to being tolerant of the norms/customs of a culture that isn't your own?

The irony of certain username😂

Do you work in paid employment and have kids, whilst you’re doing all this helping out of random neighbours with shopping and personal care for 2 hours 3 times a week? If so, I take my hat off to you - deffo going to Heaven.

Yeah it is becoming problem in places where women didn't work really until recently. Now they have to because life is expensive so there is coming up an issue of elderly care.
All our nieces work now, while their mothers predominantly didn't. In about 10 years it will start being real problem because how do you support elderly with higher cares like before if there is no time. Younger ones are also moving away from multi gen living to an extent.

not my circus, not my monkeys

If your mum wants to get involved by organising carers etc that is her business - but make it clear that you are not getting involved and will not be told to do this or anything else by her.

Perfectly practical in my world. My husband and other relatives would step up and make sure she was supported to. Either by doing some themselves or taking care of my load so I can.

I think instead of pushing back and arguing on this. Maybe wonder how you can bring back some of this kind of caring ethos in your own culture.

I see you didn't answer the question. Come on, which culture?

You're hardly virtuous, you suggested she provide support as she might inherit.

Definitely too much to ask of you. Even if you were close, with distances involved, cost of fuel and time and the fact that you have a busy life it wouldn't fly. As you are not close then it's a no but maybe you and your mum could arrange a cleaner for her etc. Must be hard to be eighty and alone.

I'd offer to help her get set up with external agencies and that's it. Her health will deteriorate and then the expectation would by for you to provide personal care.

It's better your GA gets comfortable with external people being in now.

If great aunt lived around the corner then maybe the request could be considered, It is not practical for a woman with children in primary and secondary and with a job to take several hours out of their day multiply times a week to clean for a distant relative who could just hire a cleaner. If family was so important to the GA she should have been taking lots of interest in her great niece when she was young and having a relationship with her. It is far far more practical for the GA to hire a cleaner and maybe take more time to build a relationship with her family rather than using them.