Supporting elderly parents who were insistent on 'enjoying retirement'

[Keeg]

NC in case I get slaughtered...

When my kids were young we could have really done with GP help, but there were very much (as is most of mumsnet!) of the school off thinking ‘we’re done raising kids’. I coped, I raised children and I knew it was my responsibility... but I’ll admit I had some
Unvoiced resentment. DH and I had similar jobs to them, but a higher level, but we never had been able to access the housing etc they had due to the much higher childcare and housing costs. They’ve lived nearby in great affluence whilst their grandchildren were wearing second hand, a bit overcrowded etc. Obviously not their problem, but on the flip side they had great capacity to help and didn’t chose to exercise it. They probably spent 6k-12k on holidays a year, whereas 1k for us would have meant for example being able to run a car.

They didn’t offer childcare bar very very occasional inconvenient seeings, for example 1-2pm on Saturday, wanting them dropped off and at a time of day with heavy traffic (turning an 8min drive into a 40min) and meaning there was no time to do anything else. I remember an occasion my son had a last minute amazing opportunity and they couldn’t help by watching his sister (I later found out it was because she wanted to go and see a film at the cinema, 15 min walk away and on for months multiple times a day). They retired pre 60 with big lump sums and pensions, very active and able. No issue with health.

I left them to it, never commented, it’s their life. But I’ll admit I was underneath jealous of every friend who seemed to have GP helping. BUT they are now older, they are needing support and I’m not feeling at all warm in rearranging my life to give it. For example dad can’t drive right now, temporary due to an OP, and he wants hospital lifts. I feel like saying ‘get a cab’ because of all the times I wished for help. It’s hugely local, and I being petty? Or have others felt like this. In the long run, although I get on with them, I don’t feel like every offering to let them move in. They didn’t help their parents (who did offer childcare). I guess I feel a bit heartless but a bit ‘you made your bed, now lie in it’. Being nice I think, we’ll they obviously raised me as a child, but then on the other hand I think their expectations were that links stopped at 18. I don’t dislike them, but I don’t feel hugely bonded to them either and more like people not related that get on

Nope you're not being unreasonable! Let them get taxis. As a PP said "You reap what you sow"

No slaughter from me OP. We are in a similar situation while parents provide lots of help to siblings who live close by. Our parents are well at the minute but when the time comes I will be assuming that my siblings will repay the favours. We get maybe 5 visits a year for a few hours. Maybe I'll double it to ten visits if we feel generous.

Just for the record, I've helped both my children out with house deposits and one wedding, cutting any capital I had by almost two thirds. I need to keep the rest.
I don't expect them to look after me when I start to need help, and I intend to help out with GCs if I ever get any. I would draw the line at regular childcare while they went out to work though. I just don't want to do that. I haven't the energy or the patience to do it week in week out so they can stuff that for a game of soldiers.

However, some of the attitudes here, to the elderly and baby boomers in particular, stink of entitlement.

Surely when GPs provide childcare they are also forging a relationship with said GC? We do one day a week just from 9am until 3pm looking after our GDs while my daughter works part time. We love having our GDs and it is lovely getting to know them and see them growing up. It will only be until they start school but those early years are so important it is nice to be part of their world. I don't think just seeing them for a few hours every now and again would be as rewarding. They also go to nursery and if we go on holiday or have other commitments our DD or her husband take time off to cover the one day a week we normally do. I find it very sad that some GPS don't want that and consider they have done their bit and would rather go on holiday. Don't be surprised if you don't get visitors in your old age as you usually get back what you put in.

I think there is a happy medium between helping out adult kids and fhen GC where needed, doing nothing, and bankrolling adult kids/doing a bundle of free childcare.

My parents are great and I think have got the balance right and I greatly appreciate what they do for us and I hope to do the same with my own boys.

The parents haven’t actually asked for anything bar a few lifts to the hospital due to a short term condition that bars him from driving.

They have not asked to move into the ops house, any personal care needs, taking shopping, doing housework etc. Just a couple of lifts.

If you can’t or won’t give a lift just tell them. I am sure they know how to book a cab.
As to not giving you any money. Why should they when they know at some stage they will need to pay for their care needs.
The fact they are having holidays is nothing to do with you. They have put their time in working and bringing up their children so why shouldn’t they enjoy some nice holidays together before they get to old to travel.

Can I ask were they good parents whilst you were a child? Did they give ensure you had what you needed within any financial constraints they had. Was there food, clothing, days out or holidays. Did they ensure you went to school, give you what you needed to study. Did they care for you when you were ill, put up with any teenage drama, facilate your friendships by allowing your friends around, money so you could go out to the pictures, ice skating , bowling or what ever you enjoyed with them?
if you can answer yes to most off the above then your parents have given a decent start in life and the rest is up to you.

As someone who supports their parents a lot, YANBU.

I do for them because they do for me and I do for them and so on......

Its give and take, and it seems that they are very much takers.

Age has nothing to do with it. They clearly treated their parents as they are treating you by taking and never giving, its how they are. Well now its time to put a stop to it. "No I can't" is a perfectly ok answer to requests for lifts etc.

I think you are a bit late to the telling them "remember who will choose your care home" party 🙈
But I bet you feel like saying it. No advice to give im afraid from a practical point of view, just wanted to say I think you're justified in how you feel, but it's you who will have to live with your actions, so think hard when you make your choices. They'll be gone long before you & regret is not something nice to live with. You are however well within your rights to suggest a care home / retirement facility with no regrets. See it's what is ok with you, only you know how you feel & have felt & will be ok to feel.

dontsweatthelittlestuff the OP has already explained what kind of parents they were. Not the caring kind you describe. More the minimal child rearing kind.

The parents haven't asked too much bar a few lifts to the hospital ... well that is a few lifts more than the OP would have been given (read her posts) and is clearly an indication of what they expect from her in the future.

Now is the time for her to say "no I can't do lifts but can help you downlowd uber or set up an account with a taxi firm"

I would have done a lot for my parents (not everything and not to the detriment of my own kids) but even I think it is a bit much to live your life on the basis of "I do what I want and am not responsible for anyone else after I reared my children to 18" but then expect those children to run around after you when you get older.

It isn't a tit for tat. it is that some people understand the concept of family and caring and some don't. You can't run with the hare and hunt with the hound - you are either "we're all on our own" or "we're all in this together" Expecting your children to accept "you are on your own" when they need you while giving "we're all in this together" when you need them is utterly utterly selfish and likely to end in disaster.

If you don't give into relationships when they demand something of you you can't be surprised when those relationships aren't there when you want something of them

No slaughtering from me. I think continuing the status quo of friendly and slightly distant is probably the way to go. Neither of you are wrong.

This.

Grand parents and parents are unique as a snow flake ...my grandma once told me as she was holding her very own great grandchild
Parents love their children dearly you give them everything you have and later when the child grows up you get in return what amounts
to half an inch...well children have to survive and celebrate they are released from their own childhood playpen.
Things young adults need things and theywant prevent a generous return financially to their parents and probably less time than ever to enjoy themselves.....
Less time to visit the grandparents with chores to do on the day off let alone the struggle with spending an hour in church once a week
Thank you for bringing up the grandp grandma holiday self indulgences....
The past is never as expensive as the future....

That is completely unintelligible to me, 5747snookie, sorry.

I hardly have anything new to contribute, but FWIW, I agree with most posters here. Your parents have kept you at arm's length for so long that they would be unreasonable to expect more than what you offer them already: polite interest. You have no obligation to undermine your own emotional health by giving any support which would compromise the time and attention you have for your own created family.

With USA healthcare insurance premiums being so unaffordable they are at $200.00 per person (in my case $450.00 a person)
How can a man and a woman sustain a family ?

Is this a forced financial population control by some one who is pro abortion anti life anti woman anti motherhood anti fatherhood
Very subtle way to tell people dont have children each one will cost you $200.00 or more per month for 25 years or so
Once woman give up a woman's chore to have children and nuture their children to go out into the world to do a man's job take on men's chores
Who will have the babies? Men just can't take on a woman's chore...Sadly women who have guilt for abortion want company, if abortionists are in charge
With authority in Government and other forceful institutions will they hesitate to impose their lifestyle of poor choices on you?
Does misery like company if other woman commit abortions then I am not alone I must have been right
A dictator should never be allowed to interfere with our God given right to choose our own pursuit of happiness and not subtly punish us by making it financially impossible to have a baby

This post has raised a lot of serious emotions here!

To the OP: if you can help and it's not inconvenient to you - however you define that - then help. If it's too much trouble then don't. Help your father download Uber and give him the numbers of taxi services. Say you're busy with your own family so that time or day doesn't work, sorry.

If they start to complain or pressure you into helping them, then you can say that you have to focus on your own children now and that over the years we've been functioning as our own individual family units so that's what you're used to.

@5747snookie it might be better to start your own thread about whatever it is that you're saying.

I have a friend Jane and her mother is the most selfish person I know.
In Jane case her mother promised her a job and money in the past and then conviently forgot about these when the time came. Jane is now on a social security payment but meanwhile her siblings have all houses, jobs and money due to getting their inheritance early. Jane told me recently I would not have gotten more than £6000 off my parents in the past 12 years. Jane said I have to listen to my mother complain about her non existent heath issues for someone of her age. Then she has to tell me about every bill she has to pay and how she has to do X or y. This is despite having a decent pension and a lump sum of money in the bank.
Jane said I know my siblings and my mother will expect me to mind her in time. My mother has made no long term plans for what will happen to her if she can't drive despite living a few miles from the closet town. I can't drive so I can't bring her to doctors/hospital appointments. Due to being on benefits she can't move in with me as I will lose my main source of income. I also plan to get some pt work so I just won't be available at a moment's notice.
I have seen people putting elderly parents first despite the same parents do as little as possible to help out their children once they were adults. Even minding a baby for a few hours to give a mother a brake was asking to much but then when they get older they expect to be waited on.

Personally I would think carefully about how your children see you manage your elderly parents. I have much to be grateful for and will do everything I can for my mum. But I also do it because I want my children to see me treat her with respect, to see me support her, visit her, help her when she needs it, include her in activities, holidays and outings because I very much take the view that they learn by example.

My parents are quite self absorbed and retired early and have had loads of expensive holidays in the last 25 years. I haven't had any financial or emotional support from them (pretty much ever) and no childcare, although we do live too far apart for that to be practical. My mum once said that she had thought about care in her old age and she had decided that she would rotate around each of me and my siblings spending 3 months a year with each. I said nice plan, but my offer is double the support you gave to your own parents and in laws (ie zero). She didn't like that!

Good answer torches

My mum once said that she had thought about care in her old age and she had decided that she would rotate around each of me and my siblings spending 3 months a year with each

I'd get her to read "King Lear", who proposed much the same arrangement with his three daughters. It ended badly.:o

@canileavenowplease

Your post is very sanctimonious. If you hadn’t so much “to be thankful for” re your parents and in-laws, then you may feel differently.

I think if you’ve made efforts to include your parents and in-laws, up until they’re in what? their mid eighties and they have shown zero interest, then they all of a sudden want to see you daily, because they want you to give them the support they point blank refused to give you when you really needed it, that is actually a fine example I would want to set my children. And anyway, it is not a history that will ever repeat itself as I do not plan to just check out of my children’s lives as soon as (if) they have their own children. Unless for some reason they tell me to!

You realise we are not talking about YOUR parents? We are talking about some rather selfish individuals, who for whatever reason decided they didn’t have to worry about their children as soon as they were adults.

So frankly, you can put your “be careful” nonsense in your pipe and smoke it.

Sorry, but your seriously, holier than thou post, when you state yourself that you are one of the lucky ones who has had support from gps really grinds my gears.

that is actually a fine example I would want to set my children

Should have said “and you do NOT decide to rearrange your entire life so that you can provide their care, that is actually a fine example...”.

Children do learn by example, so they also understand the idea of love and reciprocity. My adult children help with supporting their fragile, fairly dependent grandparents because they have strong memories of the love and care they received from them.
You are under no obligation to personally maintain people who have done little but take, just because society expects you to, because that is the traditional role of daughters.
Respect and politeness, yes. Locating places and services they can ask for help. But personal care and support? The relationship needs to be there, secure and mutual before that.

Personally I would think carefully about how your children see you manage your elderly parents... I very much take the view that they learn by example. The GPs have no interest in my dcs - don't do gifts - occasionally do money - never bother with a card, never talk to them never mind play with them, mind you they weren't interested in us when we were growing up, so I didn't really expect them to be interested in my kids, who I doubt will see my lack of care for my parents as unexpected. Besides this we do not expect our kids to be burdened with our care in out old age, we didn't have kids to be our carers - we don't believe they will be living close enough to us anyway.
The way our kids treat us is directly related to the way they treat us - but I would not expect them to be my carer that's a step too far and I know too many people who's lives are destroyed by the burden of their parents, even when they do get on well it's still a massive burden- not something I'd ever want for my kids.