Cockroach Cafe - newly refurbished for the summer

I'm taking DM to see a couple of sheltered flats later today. Even if she thinks they are OK, she won't necessarily get one this time (it's a very popular place, lots of applicants) but it's a start.

And (waves to all the other house clearers) we have started talking about all the stuff in the house. For many years she and my late DF were fans of antique shops, auctions, car boot sales etc and they never threw anything away, so the house is rammed with interesting and potentially valuable objects, as well as a huge amount of junk, so it is not going to be an easy task separating it all out. But the prospect of this task has been hanging over me for years, so I will be glad to actually get on with it, in a way.

Thanks for the welcome back! Sorry lots of other people are going through the house sorting trauma. My mum has so much stuff I’m going to put quite a lot in storage and sort it later.

Oh, I could cry! We’re trying to move mum to a different care home. Where she is now is really difficult to get to, which cuts down on the visitors she can have. There is another care home in the chain which has a vacancy and could meet her needs, which is in the same town where her brother lives. If she were there I could also probably rally some of her old friends from church to visit.

But she consistently says she doesn’t want to move “because it’s an old people’s home”. The social worker went to see her last week to discuss the move, and is now having to speak to her manager because mum (predictably) told her she didn’t want to go. All she wants to do is “go home”, which is just not an option.

I don’t want to force her, but she complains no one visits. Her only regular visitor is her brother, but he’s in his 80s so won’t be able to drive to see her forever.

Apparently she’s going to get a named social worker so I’ll discuss with them. But aaaagh the guilt!

Just to say Meredint that my cousin is managing his aunt's affairs and has said he aims to continue her established 'patterns of giving' as she had several causes close to her heart. So if there's no detriment to his care, I think there would be every reason to continue the DDs.

Dint I am not giving the lack of signature a moment's thought. She's done the best she can, the finance PoA is going back in the same envelope and I'm sure they have something in place for people who can't sign. The ball will be in their court. I would have thought that you are fine continuing charitable donations where he had a history of making them when he had capacity, providing that the amount is reasonable (the guidance goes on about reasonableness). It doesn't have to be for his benefit, you are doing what he would be doing if he was able to do so.

I have today cut my grass, mum's lawn, filled her bin with stuff she would never miss (including the boxes of things she hasn't owned in years) and started cutting back brambles. They went straight through my leather gardening gloves, I was bleeding and unimpressed. I am now done with daughtering for today and it is still such a relief to be able to say that.

The frustrating thing is that we've got both of them at the same time

TBH I'm not sure that it's not best to get it all over in one hit. It's hugely stressful dealing with it all, I'm not sure it's better for it to drag on.

Sympathise very much with your DH and BIL, we are in that position with MIL who absolutely refuses to acknowledge she needs help.

May I join? I've been lurking on these threads for a while, as my mother and MIL both got older and frailer, but now things are coming to a crunch with both of them. DM (physically not in a great state, has a stairlift at home, walks with a stick) has just been diagnosed as being in the early stages of dementia. We signed off the lasting power of attorney this weekend, thankfully. MIL has vascular dementia, diagnosed a couple of years ago. MIL now really needs full-time care, but still has capacity and is refusing to consider either a live-in carer or a care home. I'm staying out of the discussions, but BIL and DH are tearing their hair.

The frustrating thing is that we've got both of them at the same time. MIL is 20 years older than DM, we ought at least to have had this in sequence rather than simultaneously and 400 miles apart. But DH's family is long-lived and mine is not.

Meanwhile, I have a full-time job, and DD started secondary school this autumn so needs quite a lot from me. But this thread is a reminder that things could be worse; at least neither of them (yet) thinks we mean them any harm, and all of us - DH, BIL, me and DSis - are in agreement about what ideally ought to happen.

Oh Sinister that sounds just like how I've felt for the last couple of years...I'm so sorry.

I put up with a lot more shit than I might otherwise have done because of Dad, so now he's no longer with us I don't have that factor to consider so much.

How old is your mum? Mine is 82 and definitely prefers men to women. She lost her dad, whom she idolised, at the age of 13 and I think she's spent her entire life hoping to find someone to fill his shoes, and being constantly embittered and disappointed that it hasn't happened.

SinisterBumFacedCat maybe it's time to be as unavailable as your uncles. It's not as if you are the only person in her life, if you shuffle backwards then someone else will be brought into the drama. It won't go on forever, there is going to be a MH crisis somewhere down the line that will mean professionals are drawn in and then Something Will Be Done.

Malbec MIL told everyone that she knew that I wheeled her out of the supermarket in a shopping trolley. No, she spent nearly an hour wandering round the aisles, announced "my legs have gone funny again" and I managed to get a chair under her before she fell. As I took her back to the car in the store wheelchair (not a trolley) she then thought to mention that the exact same thing had happened when her brother brought her the week before.

No idea what the green face was about

Step away @SinisterBumFacedCat Protect yourself

I feel like we get told to stand up for ourselves and be strong in any other situation, be it school bullying, horrible bosses and toxic relationships. But when it comes to an elderly parent we just have to roll over and accept it all with a beautific smile on our faces, no matter how much the insults and accusations hurt. Because it’s “the dementia talking and not them”. So it doesn’t matter, I don’t matter. My life is being ruined by my mother and she will continue to do this forever.

On the subject of cleaning and clearing a house - we've just been through this. It's made me take a good hard look at the stuff I've kept here and I'm starting to bin it now.

Sorry to hear of the struggles. We were lucky with MiL in that although she was suspicious of lots of people for utterly random reasons, she was ok with us, especially our DDs. The thing that drove DH mad was her insistence to occupational therapists that he did everything for her, including all shopping and food prep, which was a complete lie. He shopped and would put a meal together when he was there but he worked an hour away on a secure site where no mobile phones were allowed. Our DDs were late primary school/early secondary age and she was moaning about not seeing him enough. When DH was away for a few weeks with work, I took over. I persuaded MiL to go to the local supermarket in the wheelchair with me. She insisted on going up & down every aisle "in case we missed something". No MiL, you really didn't need to go down the baby or pet aisle, having neither. We got back and she beamed at me, telling me what a lovely morning she had had and how we should definitely do it again. The following week, I went to collect her and she accused me of tipping her out of the wheelchair onto the busy carpark and leaving her there. Yes of course I'd do that to a vulnerable old lady with osteoporosis NOT.

I just went out for a walk with DF down by the beach. It was lovely then, although it's now raining. He will be fine reading his paper & watching TV for the rest of the day - I have a rehearsal that I can't skip - and bought a nice meal for this evening. Then I'm working all day tomorrow and the weather forecast is dire so he will no doubt be frustrated and fed up when I do get home. Oh well...

I'm sorry everyone is going through it. It's easy to say detach and think of yourself as a professional carer, but it's harder to put into practice isn't it. My mum doesnt recognise me as me. She says I look a bit like her daughter but I'm not her daughter. This I can cope with in the main. It means she is mainly polite to me, asks me lots of questions like 'do you have any family?' and tells me lots and lots about her daughter (me) and her (my) life and family. It gets tricky when she's asking me where her daughter is who apparently lives with her (I don't). She can get quite upset about that.

Dint it turns out that mum can't sign either, she couldn't press on hard enough to make much of a mark with the pen and the faint thing she did write bore no relation to her signature. I am also struggling with throwing out mum's things, they are hers even through she's never coming back to that house. It feels so wrong. That's why I'm starting with things that she would never miss, dried up paint, saucepans and elderly cake tins and things that should have been thrown decades ago. I'm hoping to work up to the important things eventually.

I am in the fortunate position that she doesn't need the capital tied up in the house, should she need nursing care I'd have to look at it again but at the moment there is no push to clear it (other than nudges from the neighbours who are circling and leaving their phone numbers)

I've reached the point tbh when I'm slightly detaching from thinking of her as my mum. She not emotionally able to parent and I suspect things will only get worse. It's very sad but actually makes it easier to manage in some ways.

This is exactly where DH is. His DM has been replaced by this raving stranger who says the most vicious things to us and is totally convinced we want to harm her.

She has been calling people on Facebook messenger over and over again they started off being sympathetic but now I think most of them have either blocked her or just turned off notifications. This included people she hardly knew, some young guy who did some gardening work for her and FIL years ago, DH's old friends from university. I had to block her number on my DF's phone as she was calling him all the time.

We are getting almost daily calls accusing us of theft money from her purse, all her food (apparently this why I am so fat ). If we offer to get food or money for her she just rants. DH has developed the technique of asking if she needs him to do anything to help and if not he just hangs up.

Sinister I'm so sorry you are dealing with a difficult mum too, although it's strangely reassuring to know it's not only us. It is incredibly stressful, one of the most stressful times we have had I think and we are not exactly in the first flush ourselves. Other posters here have young children to deal with too, our DS gets lots of pass/agg messages from his GM but he's 22 and copes quite well with it.

Meredint my maternity care post birth was careless to the point of negligence, and the care my father received when he was admitted for abdominal pains still gives me the rage if I think about it. These, and many other stories from friends mean I am not a fan of our local hospital I'm afraid.

I am going to withdraw, again. I have had this before and she rings me later pretending nothing has happened but still alluding to my “sensitiveness and becoming upset”. I have sent an email to the wonderful males in her life who she endlessly gushes about listing all the various problems she has pushed on me over the last few weeks that need sorting, but I haven’t been able to sort because she likes to find ways of tying my hands behind my back when I am mid sort. The things I did manage to sort she will not acknowledge or leave me out of pocket. The men, like my uncle, are so wonderful that they ignore phone calls over weeks, whereas I had 11 calls on Friday and answered 10 of them. She will be much much happier without me in her life, the last time I walked away from her she didn’t even acknowledge my absence to anyone else. She will just have to start using other people who will expect things in return whereas I haven’t.

Oh God tech is scary. Maybe deinstall messenger?? But tbh him blocking her sounds sensible.

My mum went to hospital in an ambulance at 5am as she fell twice and was speaking gibberish. Can't get an answer from A&E and it's worrying. When I'm on that ward I do feel like I'm the only person who picks up the phone... going to try after ward round.

I will be honest and say it's actually a relief that because of Covid I can't go to hospital with her- a relief to be able to come home and have a shower and wait for them to call me (and to find my son has a girl staying over for I think the first time...)

I'm sorry to see everyone is still having to cope with yet more of the same.

Sasparilla that's awful. I hope things improved and that maybe you've got her home by now. I know there's an infection risk with catheters but it still absolutely baffles me just how reluctant medical professionals are to use them in even the most extreme circumstances.

Sinister that sounds terrifying. I agree with Mere about withdrawing a bit, and at a minimum (I know thus sounds dramatic but thinking of the safeguarding training I've done over several years) make sure none of you are ever alone with her.

My mum has had another meltdown over the bloody carer...messages to me at gone midnight, 4am and 5am Fri night in state, talking about driving over to his house or killing herself.

He's accused her of nuisance calling him via FB messenger and said if it continues he'll have to block her. Now, she has been calling him in that she's been hitting the call button and hanging off but it's genuinely been accidental.

Her ability with tech is dramatically diminishing, she has diabetic neuropathy in her hands and feet and her tablet is hyper sensitive (I was trying to look into what was happening yesterday and managed to call him by accident myself ).

So I need to see if there's a way to disable the call function in messenger. I have told her it would be better if they blocked and deleted one another anyway and she would still have his work mobile number, but she 'can't bear' to do that .

I've reached the point tbh when I'm slightly detaching from thinking of her as my mum. She not emotionally able to parent and I suspect things will only get worse. It's very sad but actually makes it easier to manage in some ways.