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AIBU?

Share your dilemmas and get honest opinions from other Mumsnetters.

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Original poster

To think my sister is really mean?

66 replies

ilovesooty · 10/12/2011 01:29

My mother is in a residential home. Now that she seems to have come to terms with the fact she's staying there I suggested she had a landline put in her room so that we can communicate. She is now keen. My sister thinks it is a waste of money as she has a mobile (which I bought) that she never answers. Also my sister is very aware that my mother's money will run out in he next two years then her house will have to be sold to pay the care home fees. I think we should make my mother happy while we can with what aftyer all is her money. I would call her at least once a week. My sister said she won't. AMIBU?

OP posts:

squeakytoy · 10/12/2011 01:31

YANBU to want to put the phone in. Lots of elderly people still get confused with mobiles and dont like using them

YABU for only ringing once a week though... more often would be nicer.:)

demetersdaughter · 10/12/2011 01:31

No you are not being unreasonable.
Your mother is your main priority and you're obviously thinking of her.
Didn't the law change about having to sell a home to fund care home fees?

WorraLiberty · 10/12/2011 01:32

YANBU at all but why only once a week?

1Catherine1 · 10/12/2011 01:33

Get the landline in. I have a mobile but still have a landline. When I'm home I prefer it.

YANBU.

BalloonTwister · 10/12/2011 01:35

YANBU about the phone, but YABU to only call her once a week!

AgentZigzag · 10/12/2011 01:38

What does your Mum want to do?

Original poster

ilovesooty · 10/12/2011 02:05

I'd probably call more than once a week actually. My sister said "Well whose she going to call and how often would she be in her room anyway?" I don't mind at all talking to her regularly: my sister finds it hard...she did even before my mum was in the home.

What gets me is that my sister basically seems to resent our "inheritance" going away.

OP posts:

demetersdaughter · 10/12/2011 02:10

How will your sisters inheritance go away by just the cost of a landline?

Original poster

ilovesooty · 10/12/2011 02:20

She tinks that any money e spend from my mother's account now (we have POA) is one step nearer to having to sell the house. She and I weren't close, and we got closer, but over the past year while we've been clearing the house for tenants we've got sick of the sight of each other.

I'm annoyed that apparently according to the home (I went last week) my mum needs some new skirts as she's put on weight. I'd have just bought them. My sister says we can buy them for her birthday in January to save taking from the bank account. That seems mean to me too.

OP posts:

Original poster

ilovesooty · 10/12/2011 02:25

Sorry: typos. I have to say as well that my sister is about three quarters of an hour's drive away.My BIL usually drives her. I'm about two hours drive away and when I go to see her I go down and back in the same day.

OP posts:

Original poster

ilovesooty · 10/12/2011 02:28

I usually spend a good two hours there when I go. We've always been quite close. To be fair the relationship between my mother and my sister has always been rather difficult.

OP posts:

goodasgold · 10/12/2011 02:32

I think that you are right and that any money in your mother's account should be used to making her life as good as possible, and if there wasn't any money in your mother's account that you would be spending your own money to do the same. Heck we all need a bit of extra money, but not by stealing from your own mother.

Original poster

ilovesooty · 10/12/2011 02:43

Thank yiu, goodasgold

I haven't much of my own money to spend, but I feel that my mother should have as good a life as she can while she's there. To be honest I feel if she wants the landline I wouldn't mind paying from my own money if my sister won't release the funds but I know that would cause trouble.

My sister says that given that my nother keeps forgetting what she's said we ought to wait to see if she mentions it again.

OP posts:

MabelLucyAttwell · 10/12/2011 07:14

Which is your PoA? Can you or your sister do something alone on your mother's behalf or do you have to do things together on her behalf?

TroublesomeEx · 10/12/2011 07:21

I agree with goodasgold.

We are having huge problems with my brother at the moment who feels a huge sense of entitlement to his 'inheritance' and by that I mean "money other family members have in their bank accounts".

The new one is that he and his wife will never have children because they can't afford IVF (they've only been TTC since August), only they would have done if my grandma had considered that IVF might have been necessary for them at some point considering their ages (both early 30s) and had given them/saved the money for that instead of having a new kitchen which was more suited to her needs and buying a mobility scooter 6 months before she died.

Nip your sisters attitude in the bud and do what is right for your mum.

TroublesomeEx · 10/12/2011 07:24

Can I just say, my brother wanted my mum to go for POA too to "take control of that woman's money".

POA means that you can act in the best interests of your mum, not that your sister can treat it as her own.

Pocket1 · 10/12/2011 07:27

Put your mum first and do whatever you can to make her happy and comfortable. I hate to say it but your sister is the unreasonable one.

Sixyearoldwoes · 10/12/2011 07:28

Go steady with the ivf talk-I know I'm being over sensitive but my father funded ours and it wasn't giving us luxury-just taking us back to most people's position of being able to conceive. That said, we didn't feel entitled and we wouldn't have left dad short to get his help.

Sixyearoldwoes · 10/12/2011 07:29

Sorry folk girl-knee jerked there a bit. We're not like your brother and he sounds very grasping and entitled.

Angelswings · 10/12/2011 07:31

It's still her money to be spent on her and I think you have the right attitude your sister is wrong.

IF we get anything from our parents when they die we should be thankful, not ask for more or try to make sure we get more IMO

Sixyearoldwoes · 10/12/2011 07:39

I would feel that if we didn't see our parents comfortable if they could afford it, then any inheritance would be fairly hollow really. You are absolutely right to make your mum comfortable. The landline is hugely important, the calling her is the main thing once she has it. Your sister would have a point if you were buying her loads of clothes that she neither needed nor wanted, but well fitting clothes are hardly a luxury. I think my friend over compensates for her guilt (completely unjustified) at finding a home for her by buying her loads of stuff that actually she doesn't want. She'd rather have visits and calls.

lisianthus · 10/12/2011 07:42

OP thank goodness your mother has you to look out for her interests. It is not nice being old and vulnerable and to know that even being able to spend your own money on comfortable clothes that fit you properly is dependent on the goodwill of a child who is looking out for her inheritance and may not permit the money to be spent. How horrible!

TroublesomeEx · 10/12/2011 07:44

sixyearoldwoes Oh no that's a TOTALLY different situation. If my grandma had funded it then that would have been her entirely up to her. And if it had given my brother and SIL a child, me a niece/nephew, my children a cousin I'd have been supportive of it all the way!

But she died in January. During the previous year she had a new kitchen, because her failing health meant that she needed some adaptations, and a mobility scooter so that she was no longer housebound.

My brother married in the summer, they started TTC in August and in October he made the announcement that 12 months earlier my grandma was selfish for the new kitchen and scooter on the grounds that after 2 months of TTC they might need IVF and the money she wasted on that (given she died 6 months later) would have been better spent on their IVF.

The most part of it is that my dad and his wife used some of their savings for assisted conception and my brother's livid about that too! (for similar spending his inheritance reasons!!)

TroublesomeEx · 10/12/2011 07:45

I would say that this is a hypothetical IVF, they've not seen the dr about it or anything.

TroublesomeEx · 10/12/2011 07:47

Anyway, OP, maybe your sister doesn't realise how important something as simple as a landline is when you're seeing life as you knew it becoming a distant memory.

For your mum a landline would be a lifeline.

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