Juggling older parents and family life

[LusaCole]

My PILs live about 2 hours' drive away, so not a massive trek, but too far to go just for the day. DH has one brother who lives abroad.

We usually see the PILs for a weekend once every few weeks. We have three DC, aged between 8 and 12. When the DCs were little, we would sometimes go to the PILs and they would sometimes come to us. These days the DCs have sports commitments at the weekends that they prefer not to miss, so the PILs usually come to us (except in the school holidays).

Recently, my PILs considered moving much closer to us. They even looked at a couple of properties about 10-15 mins from us, but in the end decided they didn't want to move. Of course that is absolutely their decision, but I think they need to accept that this means they will see less of us than if they moved, yes?

FIL is 79 and his health has deteriorated over the last couple of years (before then he was very fit and healthy for his age). They have now said that they can't come and visit us any more as 2 hours in the car is too much for him. They would like us to go and visit them instead.

What is a good compromise here? I don't think it's fair to expect the DC to miss their sports matches - and it's letting the rest of the team down as well. But obviously we can't ask FIL to make the trip if it is very uncomfortable for him.

Any suggestions? At the moment I can't think how to approach this!

I understand what people are saying about moving and uprooting their lives. I suppose in our case it wouldn't be so bad as the in laws live about 15 minutes drive away, so they would still be able to see their friends etc. If there was sheltered housing in their town that they liked, we'd be happy with that but there isn't.
We'd be happy if there was a warden there to be the first line of call when they fail over, as when it happens it's not like we can drop everything and go over straight away, much as we try. Also, when things do happen, quite often they don't tell us as they don't want to worry us! If they lived in our town, we could pop in more often ( and find out what they've been up to and didn't want to tell us!) I'll never forget the day someone found dad up a ladder cutting the hedges, just what you want with an elderly relative who falls over quite a lot and forgets what he's doing frequently. Mum was holding the ladder, and she's not too steady on her pins either. It's a constant worry. I know they want to be independent and not a bother, but it's more of a bother when we have frantic phone calls, ambulance visits and have to sort out care and time off work to look after one or other of them. I love my in laws and do a lot for them but it would be much harder if they lived a long way away.

I think that four hour round trip to see GPs is entirely fair (but then we never stayed with mine growing up and it was a five hour return journey, and I never stay with my parents which is a similar journey, so it’s my normal).

I’d add to the caution about uprooting elderly parents to live near you - both sets of GPs have mentioned this in the past few years. I think @maxelly’s points are well worth thinking about. In addition, the thought that we could never move again if an opportunity arose scares me.

DontCallMe - nope, the sports matches are on Sun am too!

My DPs re 2 hours away and expect me to run errands for them as though I lived 10 mins away. I ended up backing off and now see them once every two weeks, but always a day trip, never an overnight. And DC only come too if it's the holidays. DH has completely given up on visiting them with me.

Maxelly, mike and Jeni, good points about the difficulties of uprooting the PILs and expecting them to settle in somewhere new.

I'm in a similar situation op. Mine are a title bit closer - only 1.5 hours which means that I can get down and back inside a school day. Which is a mixed blessing really as I have a 2 year old with me and a 3 hour round trip gives me one hour with each parent as my mum doesn't visit the care home if I am going.
It is exhausting and not quality time but at least I see my dear old dad and it lessens the guilt a bit. We don't do full weekends as we have a regular thing on a Sunday morning that we don't really want to miss. The children are also very disrupted by too many sleeps elsewhere and very tiny at school so it is just too much.

My parents and sisters think I should do more but they don't live my life so I leave them too it. (my sisters go less often but stay over when they Go)

Just struggling with this myself. My mum is starting to need a bit more help, nog very

Oops... not too much yet but she would definitely benefit from more visits, but she's 2.5 hours away and i can only occasionally face the trip on one day. Im not prepared to drag ds down there to stay often. Trying to get mum to move but it's torture. There isn't really an answer imo. I go on my own mostly.

@MinaPaws this is the problem I have too! I’m 2 hours away (on a good day) and I have kept a flat in my hometown which I stay at maybe 1or 2 nights a week. I work part time due to being diagnosed with MS so get very tired very quickly, my DM expects me to visit her once a week regardless. This means driving up after lunch after being at work all morning, getting up early the following morning to walk my dog then take my DM shopping. I then return to my flat collect the dog, tidy up and then do the drive back home within enough time to avoid rush hour.

I have had comments made to me that DM would be upset/angry if I stayed at my flat and didn’t visit her! I didn’t visit her last week and on the back of that my daughter was phoned and questioned as to why I hadn’t been round. Luckily DD knows the score and said I was not coming up.

When I do visit I’m expected to fit in with DM schedule for shopping etc and then sit and have a coffee while she moans at me about everything and everyone. Needless to say I don’t enjoy my visits.

I would love to be able to see my friends when I’m “home” but get such limited time I struggle as DM seems to think that I have lots of spare time as I “only” work part time.

For comparison my DB lives 5 miles away from DM and DF but rarely visits and never helps out with shopping etc as he’s far too busy apparently (DM words)

We see PILs for an afternoon every few months (same distance away). They just can't cope with2 young boys in their space (show home) and they're too frail to run around after them. We meet halfway for a picnic at a nice NationalTrust place.