Aibu to resent my Dad's neediness

[pupchewsleg]

My Dad moved 150 miles to live near us 5 years ago. I wish he hadn't every single day.
He constantly wants me to do things for him. I feel he moved near us because he felt we would be more useful to him. It is not because of a close relationship as I have never been close to him. I feel bad for resenting his demands on me and my time.
Every interaction is about him. Typical conversation.
Me: DS1 has got a cold.
Dad: Oh, I still can't get rid of my cold...blah blahblah.
Most of the time I don't like him very much. Sometimes I feel sorry for him as he is lonely if we go away, but won't join groups, go to church ( he says he is a Christian) etc.
My Mum died 6 years ago and that is very sad for all of us. She put up with him for 40 years, but I don't want to. My heart sinks every time I see his no. on my phone.
He constantly wants help with stuff: changing his bed (can't do it apparently), visiting large shopping Centre (can't navigate on his own he says), looking at a spot on his back (I looked twice it's fine). I resent it all.
He is a healthy, relatively fit adult and I just wish he would have his own life.
He is a self obsessed, hypochondriac who isn't interested in having friends (I have never known him to have a friend). I don't like him very much, but feel bad about it. He hasn't any idea, but I do make excuses (children, work)to not see him too often.
Am I unreasonable to resent him? I can't see a way out, and he is only going to need me more and I don't want to.

Parents are annoying but just do it for the fact that he put up with you for how ever many years it was. Have some respect for that and get on with it. Mayb he feels like your the easiest to talk to of the bunch.

What absolute rubbish.

So children (daughters), have to shoulder the burden of parents so they, like it or not? Regardless of not having a good relationship?

Unless you're a GP or a dermatologist, why is he getting you to look at a spot on his back?? I wouldn't have a clue myself. If he's worried and has symptoms, he could see his GP. If he has no symptoms, why worry.

I would agree with those who say set boundaries you can bear - weekly visit plus maybe one other call sounds a lot very reasonable. and organise a cleaner (preferably a highly social one) to do some of the work. I've been on MN long enough to know that some people have very close relationships with their dads. Those of us with dads who are simply incapable of having relationships that aren't about themselves and who spent our childhoods absorbing family resources while giving back very little should just be happy for them and get on with doing the best we can bear.

The OP has not said that her dad was abusive, yet some posters seem to have added this in. She had a happy childhood.
OP, I don't get why you feel so irritated by your own dad wanting to talk to you or 'look at a spot on his back'. It's like the guy can't do anything without annoying you.
As pp have suggested, why not set a few boundaries so that he accepts he needs to be independent and maybe even say to him how you can't always be there for him as you have dcs, work etc to tend to but that you will see him, help when you can (or is that still too much?)
I have a widowed mother and recent widowed fil. Fil has moved 250m to be round the corner from us and I couldn't be happier (he is 89 though). Both parents wind me up from time to time but it's family. I'm not perfect either so who am I to judge them? Life is very precious.

I feel so sorry for your dad. He is lonely and sad. Could you set aside an afternoon a week to spend time taking him out and also arrange for a cleaner/helper who could actually be company which is more important than getting rid of the dust. He may be more inclined to accept having a cleaner rather than a carer, but he/she may be happy to take him shopping.

You don’t say how old he is, which makes a big difference to things. However in terms of needing lifts/bed making etc he could employ someone for a few hours a week (presuming he can afford it?).

I adore my Dad & would do anything for him - but he has always been an incredible, supportive parent who would go up the ends of the earth for me. What goes around comes around & if yours was a bit shit then fair enough that you feel that way - start saying no.

twocats at 21:37 she in response to someone saying he looked after her growing up the OP posted "But he didn't really.... My Mum looked after us, knew us, cared about us, kept in touch when I moved out. Dad complained a lot. He can't remember anything about our childhood (when I ask him) as he wasn't really interested. I had a good childhood, but that was down to my Mum. I would love for my Mum to have lived nearby. They were very different people."

I'm not sure anyone has said he was abusive? The OP has said he wasn't really there for her growing up, he just complained a lot. Yep now he expects her to be there to the extent of changing his bed for him even though he's fit and healthy.

It sounds very much as if his wife did everything for him and their children, and now she's died he thinks his daughter should do everything for him.

I'm assuming he is not elderly. He sounds as though he is a fit and healthy man in his 60s from the OP's posts.

If he is in his 80s or 90s then that does change things, most certainly! Though it doesn't mean the OP is nasty not to want to be the emotional crutch, social network and housekeeper for someone who never showed much indication of caring about her as a child. It means organising a cleaner or carer for him might be more appropriate. If he's in his 60s and fit and healthy he doesn't need a carer - he could be a carer! He can organise his own cleaner!

Sounds like a lot of older men I have come across, DH has an interest which results in contact with many sad, lonely, self -pitying old men. Until I had to deal with my rellies ageing and passing away I was very sympathetic. But not now. As people age they seem to lose awareness of normal boundaries. Eg they are lonely/bored so why shouldn't your Dsibling, DD, Dfriend pop in for an hour or two on a daily basis?!?. Completely oblivious of the fact that they have their own life, and completely oblivious of the fact that they themselves never ever took on a huge long term responsibility for a friend, relative or DC themselves, they lived their own selfish life.
I would be honest with your siblings and see if they will step up a bit.
I would tell him he must get help in eg a cleaner/cook/bed changer/shopper weekly because you aren't doing it. You have your own house to keep. Having someone in regularly whom he can chat to could make a difference to his life.
Approach the befriender service see if they can help.
Is there a mans shed in the area, men get together to work on hobbies/projects.
Walking group? That's something sociable which he might consider.
You need to have a conversation with him. Very hard but this can only get worse if he isn't making changes himself.

This is just what some parents do, particularly the male ones and particularly to their daughters. When his needs increased, my FIL told SIL 'I suppose you'll be moving closer to us now, that's what daughters do'. She was well over 60 by this time and enjoying acting as a child minder for her daughters' kids, as well as having a pretty well established life of her own, but never mind that, he still tried the old guilt trip. Not on my DH of course, he's a boy...

SIL resisted and has provided genuine loving care for her parents, in co-operation with DH and the rest of the family. All the people saying it's horrible not to pander to this self-centred man are falling for the programme. OP isn't saying she wants to abandon her parent, just resisting the obligation to do everything for him in the exact way he wants. It's not selfish to set your own boundaries.

YANBU. Could he get a regular cleaner who could make the bed and he could also talk at for a bit while she/he cleaned, so he didn’t feel the need to go on at you as much? He sounds awful.

This is so very much like how I feel about my own father. He drove my mum mad for the 50 years they were married and was not a particularly nice father to me. In fact often times he was nasty and aggressive to me.

My mum died 3 years ago. My dad has a diagnosis of early onset vascular dementia. This just adds to the guilt of looking after him. I nursed my son through his illness and death with nothing but love. I nursed my mum through her illness and death with nothing but love. But my dad? Looking after him is with the FOG - Fear, Obligation, Guilt. I hate to say that I don't particularly like him, he has very few friends as he has fallen out with most of them over time, and now I have to look after him. And I do resent it. Partly I'm tired from my son dying and then my mum. But it is extremely hard looking after someone who you should love, I mean he is my father, but who has never been that nice to you.

I have a sibling who does a bit, when I ask, and is getting better. But for the most part I do it on my own. I would feel the same about with with or without his diagnosis.

He drains me. I hate the way I sound about him as many/most people love their fathers, have had a lovely relationship with them growing up, but that was not my experience. I beat myself up daily and am trying to find a balance of looking after him, whilst protecting myself, so that I can live without these feelings of guilt and resentment. I'm sure others looking in would say I'm hard but they didn't have him as a father.

Can offer you no advice but just that you are not alone in these feelings.

Imagine this. You wake up at home to total silence. You have no-one to speak to whilst you eat breakfast. The morning is ahead of you, no-one to speak to or ask after you. The afternoon is the same, the silence is heavy in the air. It gets dark and you have still not seen a single person. Tomorrow is the same,as is the next day. Sounds dramatic perhaps but that is reality for a lot of people. Your father is lonely and is using you as his entertainment to break that loneliness. That in itself is not wrong,but your saying it's not convenient. You also mention he wasn't a good parent. I think that perhaps this is clouding your judgment on him a little . Have you ever sat him down and had a conversation telling him you are happy to see him x times or x day but your life is hectic . Do a bit of research and find out what's on in your area and take him/ drop him off to it.

Namethecat. It's never as easy as that. For my part I have looked into everything for my dad since my mum died. Encouraged him to do practically anything and everything. He has lost most of his friends through his temper. He will not join any social group. Now it's too late really with his Vas Dem diagnosis. I cannot live his life for him. I cannot put my own life on hold for him. He wants me to replace my mother and I cannot and will not do it. It's too much.

And yet the guilt is always there.

Namethecat you are asking people with young families and work (the OP mentions she has both) to imagine waking up to total silence and have the whole day stretch before them to do entirely as they wish, without a single interruption... The luxury of having that as a fit and healthy adult (which the OP's father is, she says) is quite something...

Reap what you sow Op, reap what you sow.

In 30 years that'll be your kids talking about you

NewYear is it not the dad reaping what he sewed? The OP has said

"My Mum looked after us, knew us, cared about us, kept in touch when I moved out. Dad complained a lot... I would love for my Mum to have lived nearby. They were very different people."

I loved my dad, but as he got older he was much harder to be around and during the last 2 years of his life, when he was ill, he was a horrible person. I know it wasn't his fault, but it made doing things for him a real chore and there were times that I really resented him. I hate that I felt that way, but its true. I got no thanks for getting up again in the middle of the night to scrape him off the floor after he had fallen once more. His neighbour was his contact (just to rile me) and she always rang me straight away anyway. I then used to get bullshit about how come I knew the paramedics - because they were there so often we became quite friendly! It was intensely wearing. DF was also socially inept and fell out with every single friend he ever had, usually for some trivial reason. Everything I did for him was wrong and I got no sympathy or support from him when my marriage broke down.

So I know where you are coming from, OP, but I have no suggestions. I never managed to find a happy medium of helping and seeing him and having my own space.

OP You sounds like a completely normal, nice person. You have absolutely nothing to feel guilty about. Nothing.
Unless you have had the misfortune to have had a parent like this then you just can't understand how difficult it is trying to conjur up feelings for this man when you don't have any. Don't feel guilty about not feeling obligated to make his life pleasanter now he has absolutely no-one in the world except you. As you have stated many times, he was emotionally absent, disinterested, selfish and basically might aswell not have been there. He was pandered to and his selfish nature tolerated by your mum. He has had a lifetime of being allowed to be as selfish and uncaring as he pleases and you are still expected to put up with it. You sound as if you have tried to put helpful strategies in place. What more can you do? You sound as if you have tolerated a lifetime of his cold, hard nature. You are normal and decent. As you have said, if it had been your Mum it would have been a different story.
Stay strong and don't let your father take advantage of you.

Honestly, when as women are we going to give ourselves a break from the expectation that we must always put ourselves last?

This. How often do you see men feeling awful because they don't love playing taxi to their unpleasant parent and being bollocked for not being better?

So children (daughters), have to shoulder the burden of parents so they, like it or not?

Quite. This is all steeped in sexism, I doubt many sons get called to change bedding

Your might think your father didn't do much for you, but I'm sure he worked hard and provided a family income that helped you in lots of ways. Some of us, don't know our fathers, you are very fortunate.

Oh fuck off. So having a shit abusive father is better than no father at all? And we have to be indebted to horrible parents because they didn't plunge us into destitution as children? Seriously give your head a wobble. As a PP said you reap what you sow - be a good parent to your kids and then they may just be happy to take care of you in your old age

Elderly people are not entitled to help and companionship from their children (daughter's) just because they're old. You can't be as nasty and useless as you like to people your whole life then expect a round the clock servant from those same people just because you turn a certain age.

Tip to everyone here - work at your relationships, be a good parent, be kind and someone who's pleasant to spend time with, and maybe you won't have breakfast alone every day in 40 years time

catinapoolofsunshine
I am fully aware the odd day of a whole day of peace and quiet could be thought of as a treat. But most of us have someone to speak to / interact with in our own homes on a daily basis. I was saying the loneliness of people who do not have that in theirs so seek out other people to curb that situation / feeling.

CherryChasing - totally agree.

The OPs dad isn't even really old. It's his life; he needs to get out there and make friends, find himself a cleaner etc. Or the OP could have 20-30 years of this ahead of her. It isn't fair to presume your children will be your everything as you age.

Yes OP, you sound so mean and nasty not wanting to change the bedsheets of a grown man who's perfectly capable of doing it himself, just got used to having a woman do it for him instead.

I feel so sorry for your dad.
Can you just be a bit kinder ? My dad died last year. He often annoyed me (and me him I’m sure) but I’d give anything to have him back.

Can't you pay someone to drop in on him, take him shopping, make his bed etc? It would be money well spent if it saves your sanity.