To think that they are taking advantage of my mum?

[jellycake]

My mum is 65, fit and healthy been retired a year. This is quite complicated but I'll try to keep it simple!
Her exdp's best friend lives in Australia but has an elderly mum (90 but lives alone) who lives in the same village as my mum. My mum and the exdp have helped this lady and done some chores etc for her. He used to do this before he and my mum got together. The lady has 3 children, 2 who live in Australia and 1 who lives nearby (about 15 minutes away).
Since my grandmother died, my mum has done more for this lady, visits her regularly and sometimes invites her to dinner on a Sunday.
The son in Australia comes home about once a year, throws some money at the situation and goes again. The daughter never comes home and the other daughter sees her mum about once a week.
About two months ago, the home daughter told her mother that she was going to Australia for 6 months and went. There were no facilities put in place to help look after this lady who has suffered a series of mini-strokes and who had the most recent one at Christmas.
This lady's health has deteriorated quite a lot over the past year and a lot of responsibility has fallen on my mum, her exdp and this lady's ndn. All of these people are in their 60s and 70s.
My mum has just phoned me as she went to visit the lady last night and she was quite poorly, they had to phone the out of hours gp. The lady was supposed to go into a nursing home for a week as her son had arranged to have her bathroom re-done to make it more manageable for her (at my mother's suggestion as the lady had got stuck in the bath). The lady was so scared at being left alone in a nursing home that she is now staying with my mum for the week.
AIBU thinking that these people are taking the piss? If it wasn't for my mum and her friends this lady would have ended up in social services care! Should I be phoning my mum's exdp and telling him to get on the phone to his friend and telling him to get his arse back to this country pronto and to stop taking the piss? (My mum would not thank me for this!) By the way, money is no issue for the Aussie son. What do you think?

It's hard but I'm sorry but it's really up to your mum
She should have let her go into a home for a week
If she didn't want to have her she should have said no
Is your Mum actually complaining or is it just you ?

No I don't think so. The son arranged something. Your mum had chosen to have her at home. It's the, but your mum is choosing to do this. Fwiw (not really relevant) the kids sound awful, but can't really judge as she may not have been the best mother.

It's shit. Not it's the. Phone auto corrects.

Might it be that the lady is taking a bit of advantage?

My Nana was like that. Made her kids and us, her grandkids, look and sound as though we had abandoned her. The reality was that if we mentioned something she would set her face against it. If we suggested something we were trying to make out she was incompetent so we could put her away.

When she was hospitalised we would be lucky to hear about it (she didn't tell us grandad was dying in hospital - he went in and died 12 hours later - and told neighbours we had all let him die alone). When she was finally hospitalised we found out she had been abusing her meds and had fallen on the stairs, breaking a hip. She sat, leaning against the phone table, refusing to call because, she said, if we had loved her we would have called and found out she needed us. She even stayed silent when the postman came.

My point is, for decades her neighbours thought she was a lovely lady with a horrible family. They must have hated us and thought we were such hypocrites at her funeral. The truth was she manipulated everyone around her, even though it meant she was the one who lost by it!

I'd say Yes they are taking advantage. But your mum has the option of saying No, either to them or to the lady herself, and/or to talk to her about how she can sort out her own arrangements with social services.

If she chooses to be a mug, well I'm sorry for her but she doesn't have to.

Your mum sounds like a very caring, empathetic person who this lady is lucky to know. Yes the son and daughters might be a bit cheeky knowing they have your mum to lean on and so aren't as careful as they would be if your mum wasn't around, but ultimately this is your mum's decision. By all means talk about it with your mum and find out if she's happy with the situation, but don't take it into your on hands.

Maybe if your mum wants to be helpful, she could act more as an 'advocate' for this lady with her GP, social services etc, helping her to source proper kinds of assistance in living at home rather than actually providing them herself.

Assuming the lady still has her mental faculties, she doesn't have to be at the mercy of her children's decisions about what she needs.

Ok I am glad that I asked, it is just me that is feeling outraged about this and I will have a talk to my mum about what feels that she should do when the lady has gone home.

Your Mum doesn't have to do this - she chooses to.
I am personally grateful that my Mum's neighbours are as kind as your DM and keep an eye on her, run errands and are available in an emergency. My DM was left alone following the sudden death of my DF, who was her carer. Although there are 3 of us, none of us live near our mother and we all have our own commitments which make it difficult for us to care for our DM (although we spend 6 hrs there yesterday doing jobs and go as often as we can ). We could not just change our lives because of the situation our DM found herself in - and my parents chose not to move either into a more suitable property in their home town, or to be nearer to me where I would have happily popped in on them on a regular basis and ferried them to appointments. We have involved Social Services, but the assistance they offer is worse than useless even though my Mum is self-funding and they know she has no family close by. We also had to arrange for alterations to her bathroom, although she managed to stay in the property whilst the work was done.
Old people (including my DM) do not always want to go and stay in 'strange' places and be looked after by 'strangers'. This lady obviously feels that your DM is her friend and would feel comfortable about staying with her - whereas she wouldn't feel happy in a nursing home surrounded by people she doesn't know. If she is anything like my DM she will also be stressed out about the work taking place in her house.
And don't be too hard on her relatives - I assume the daughter had good reason to take off to Australia for 6 mths and you cannot criticise the other 2 for being so far away, if they have made their lives there some time ago.