Am I the evil villain in the woolly family play?

[woolythoughts]

Apologies that this is more epic saga than short story - trying to make sure everything is Included with no drip feed.

The cast:

Me - only child who works freelance in IT. Lives several hundred miles away from family but recently staying with DM a lot as DM about to have surgeries and DM lives close to current client.

DM - 74 and widowed for 12 years and disable but manages mostly non her own. Didn’t know anything about computers or tech until dad died and had to learn.

Aunt - 80 year old aunt who is bullied by her husband. Has children of her own one of whom is a very senior fd.

Uncle - 85 year old husband to aunt. Insists on his food being cut up for him and will not engage with technology. Thinks everything should be done manually.

MrD - actually 74 year old other uncle but walking disaster and breaks everything he touches. The only man I know to break 8 printers in five years.

The scene: since dad dies I have no issues with helped my my mother out. I do get increasingly annoyed at being volunteered to be the woolly family technical support line.

The plot: MrD breaks everything. He borrows hoovers and sucks up stuff that shouldn’t be sucked up so breaks them. He is just a disaster. He crashed an iPad so it had to be rebuilt. We keep telling mother that she is not to let him near anything. Nothing.

Four weeks ago he broke another printer so came flying down to mothers to use hers. And broke hers - print head problems. As she is disabled she wasn’t with him so. Any vouch for what he did and he claims he used it properly. I do not believe him. I replaced mothers printer and said that if he ever was let Newark anything ever again I was not getting involved.

Roll on to this weekend. DM, aunt, uncle and mr D regularly go out for meals which they book using groupon etc. Turns are taken to pay except when it’s aunt and uncles turn to pay. Uncle will not allow aunt to buy anything online and normally what happpens is dm or mr d book and they give him the money. This time mr d insisted aunt book it so used my dms iPad to book it using aunts account.

I have no idea what he did or how but somehow he’s managed to lock aunt out of her email account and she hasn’t got he password (because uncle won’t let her use passwords) nor has she acces to the recovery email account. In other words she stuffed.

The problem: Sunday night I’m watching a movie st home when I get a call from DM. Could I help aunt out trying to get into her email. I said no, I was watching a movie.

Queue the emotional blackmail “could you just give her a little tinkle on the phone as it would help calm her nerves as uncle is kicking off.

So I did. An hour an a half later I got off the phone after trying g to explain in 19 different ways she could. It recover her email without either he password or the recovery email account.

I was livid. Told dm that I wasn’t technical support and I’d already said I wasn’t fixing any of MrD?s messes and it was their own fault. Asked why couldn’t aunt get her son to help her, why is it always me that has to be volunteered to help. Got told that he has five kids and is manic getting them ready for school week - implication being because I don’t have kids my time isn’t important. She denies she meant that but that is how it reads to me.

Yesterday was on way to mothers when I eat told MrD needs help with his sky - he can find the programs he wants on demand coils I call him when I get there to help him. I said I wasn’t sky support and maybe he should call them.

DH speaks to DM in be mean time and reiterates my point I am not tech support and am getting sick of it.

I got told my dad would be rolling in his grave as he would do anything to help anyone.

My point is, I will and I have but if they keep letting MrD break things I do t have to keep fixing it.

And if you’ve got to the end of all that- am I being unreasonable for finally reaching breaking point?

"Not only do I get told to shut up I get “your the youngest in the family”"

Oh really? What about those 5 kids you hear so much about?

Oh, that reminds me of something else I have said in the past -

I don’t know, that is new to me. Best ask a thirteen year old about that one.

MereDint personally i'm full of sympathy (only just got to grips with an i phone for the first time myself. Been happy with an old Nokia till it died) but having sympathy doesn't negate the day to day basic issues.

I think all posters here will do what they can when called upon but it's not always stuff we know how to do and it's not realistic to be expected to be on 24 hour call out for things like restoring the bookmark bar (again) or scrolling down to the 'no thanks' box on a website to get rid of a pop up.

It's a unique social problem as i see it. Can't think of an equivalent in recent history at all. In the past older people have always been the ones to pass down knowledge TO the young. They've known how to do life because they've been doing it longer. Before recently (last 20 years?) anything so alien to us that we still knew bugger all about it by the time we were adults was probably safely cast aside, but that's getting less and less doable nowadays. We just can't avoid tech anymore. I wonder if it's something which will continue or if kids nowadays will continue to cope with the new tech that comes along as they get old because they'll be more used to having to keep up with change?

ACtually this is an argument I have with my mother when she says "you'll be like this one day".

I might be BUT from when I was in single digits technology that I've used has been ever changing - constantly.

For my mother, she was nearly 50 before she really had the concept of a computer and was 63 before she had to really use one when Dad died.

I do think the younger generations are used to throw away knowledge that we know moves on. But also probably less scared about pressing a button or icon and seing what it does.

Yes to less scared about button pushing. Just press it and see what happens !

My mum has always carefully kept manuals for everything. Even the little round £2 tesco analogue alarm clock by the bed with one battery and one button which is both on or off for the alarm.

I can understand how she really struggles with not knowing what every button on her computer keyboard does and not being able to just look it up in a little manual. I think subconsciously she feels it actually has a self destruct button disguised as something innocuous like + or = ... It sounds like i'm mocking but i'm not. When the screen 'goes all black' on her sometimes because she's pressed the wrong thing it does look pretty final. However she wont fart about with it for a bit to see if she can fix it. She'll carefully close the lid and ring me wander off.

We have a family tech person and I also support family it issues. Part of being family. Annoying repeating stuff but they did the same for us when we were young and taught us how to use a spoon...
However, Mr D needs to join the U3A in his area and learn how to do stuff properly through their classes.

OP, tell your M you don’t have the necessary skills to help. You dont. You can’t get through to them. She can’t volunteer you for something you can’t do.

ACtually this is an argument I have with my mother when she says "you'll be like this one day".

Well, not about tech maybe, but you probably will need help with some things at some point in the distant future - but not every day and not at the drop of a hat, and not in an entitled sort of way.

Not only do I get told to shut up I get “your the youngest in the family”

Have you tried saying that the next time you get told to shut up, you will therefore put down the phone? There is no way I would tolerate that, not in a jokey voice, no way, don't care how it's said. Your uncle's son can deal, 5 kids or not.

I think subconsciously she feels it actually has a self destruct button disguised as something innocuous like + or = I can understand this! When I started using computers, you couldn't just go back and change things you'd written, you had to use a "text editor". Of the two computer systems I used, the text editor on one used the command "D400" to move down 400 lines ... on the other, "D400" meant "delete 400 lines" - and there was no "undo" button!

It's a unique social problem as i see it. Can't think of an equivalent in recent history at all. In the past older people have always been the ones to pass down knowledge TO the young. Yes. Older people are increasingly being seen as merely a burden. They no longer have knowledge that is valued by younger people, or which can't be obtained from elsewhere. The only thing that is valued is the ability to give free child care - yet physical health, energy levels and stamina are declining in ways that younger people seem to find it hard to appreciate.

I would simply say that you don't know how. There's often a small pc repair place in a local shopping mall, direct them there.