Anyone actually waiting to care for parent?

[LindaLa]

Just wondering if people do this.

I don't have parents to worry about but I do have an illness that will degenerate over time and result in me needing care.
I do not want my adult children to provide that care.

They both have careers and eventually their own families.

People are shocked when I say this but I've seen too many parent/child relationships disintegrate due to providing care.

I'd much rather have them pop in for a cuppa (or help me go to Switzerland ) at whatever home I'm in than provide care.

Do people really have children to care for them in old age?

I agree. I don't want mine doing the care. Luckily I've got a dp. We'll have to care for each other.

Same here. I have MS and although it's ok now. It might not be in the future. I'm
Single and people keep telling me to adopt or use a sperm donor. But I don't want them to have to care for me. On the flip side, I also will not become a carer for my (lovely) parents. No way would I give up my job to do that. Fortunately they've always been clear that they wouldn't want us to care for them.

Not waiting to, but I can see it being on the cards eventually. It's beginning to start now; dm is having a cataract done; both db and I are abroad, but it will be me who goes back for a week to look after her.

From October this year when we move back to UK and db is still abroad, I will have the weight as it were. Dm seems to think that dh and I are going to be her bitches; dh is going to charge her the rate at which he is currently paid. I don't think she can afford him.

We don't mind helping, but it will be wanting me to drive her old cooking oil to the tip as she doesn't want it in her car; changing a light bulb; resetting and sorting her TV and PVR. All doable, except she doesn't like waiting once she has decided something needs doing, and it is a half hour round trip each time.

Watched my mum and her siblings fall apart looking after my granddad, I would like to say I would care for my parents but if they have the money or me and my siblings earn enough we’ll certainly be getting private care without a doubt.

No both my parents died but my mam cared for her brother and dad.Theres no way i could do that.And i dont want my kids looking after me,its just not fair on them.

It's utterly ridiculous.

Who would want to be scarys mum!

I don't want too be old and vulnerable relying on other people.
We must sort out euthanasia and make choosing when too end ones own life easier and more acceptable.

Glad to see I'm not the only one who feels this way.

It's a very difficult area and I do understand people feel they have to care for the people who raised them but I see it as I raised my children to fly.

@scaryteacher have you and your parents spoken about it?
Do you wonder about the effects it could have on your own life?
Your husbands life or your kids?

Snow Considering that I schlep from Brussels to the Devon/Cornwall borders to pick her up and return her for Christmas and in the summer, picking up all travel costs. meals and hotel bills, and she never has to put her hand in her pocket whilst she's here - I wouldn't feel too sorry for my Mum! She does very well out of dh and I.

Mum's friend, whose husband does many of the odd jobs for Mum, says it is a PITA when she rings and demands that things are done immediately.

I am not joking about the cooking oil. We were getting set to drive back to Brussels, when she insisted I take her cooking oil to the tip as she didn't want it in her car, and it took ds and I 30 minutes as there was a massive queue for the tip. Had we gone back with the oil, there would have been sulks and snide comments all the way to Brussels and for the whole time she was staying.

Linda My Mum has made her expectations very clear, but we are trying to dig our heels in and make it equally clear that we aren't there to be unpaid handymen/taxi drivers/ general skivvies.

My ds is 23, and is not averse to telling m,y Mum where to get off if he deems it necessary, and my dh won't take any crap either. It will have a negative effect on my life as I will have to try to keep the peace and make sure that things are done; but maybe not to her timetable.

@scaryteacher

I feel for you but would you have got away with being so selfish at any point in your life?
Have you had an earnest conversation about it?

Or.., Make her go through your ds and they can deem if it's important enough

Linda I've seen this before with my Dad's Mum. It is a product of living on your own for almost 25 years in Mum's case, and only having to consider one's own needs and wishes.

I got a slight sob about me not being back in the UK for Mothering Sunday, and when I jokingly said I could cook next year, as I'll be back for good, the menu was arranged, her veggie friend invited and that she would be staying the night after all the wine she'd be drinking. She was not kidding!

It is hard to have a conversation like that with her. The last time ds called her out, I had to endure a day and a half of sulks and silence as I was driving her home. She then didn't talk to me for three weeks, and she normally phones at least twice a day. This is the woman who announces that she likes to stay with her children but expects them to fetch her (hence the toing and froing from the continent); and once, when we were about to come back, she announced that she considered it the height of bad manners to have the radio on in the car, when one had a passenger. Instead of listening to, and singing along to, the Classic FM carols, we sat in stony silence all the way to Dover.

@scaryteacher

Wow! I really feel for you.

At least you won't do it to your ds!

Sending you and an alibi

Scary, I know it is hard but: it is YOUR car, YOUR money. I think you need to talk that through with a third party!

Persona The sulks are just not worth it. We can more than afford this at present, but dh retires in December, so we will have to start to watch the pennies far more than we do now.

It is the denial that she has said these things (about needing to be collected) etc that really pisses me off; or the 'Oh, I didn't mean it' throwaway tinkly laugh afterwards.