Elderly parent - more work than children!

[Isitsummeralready]

Regular poster but have Name changed for this.

In my 50s and for the last decade or so I have been helping to care for both my parents. My son also helps as I'm an only child.

My father passed away a few years ago after battling cancer and my mother's own health is now declining. She is incredibly proud and although she cannot do much for herself, she won't admit that she is dependent on us (apparently no-one does her washing as the machine does this and no-one does the cooking as the cooker does this etc). I do all of her food shopping and she rarely pays for this although she is very well off and much more so than me (I think she thinks it's still 1950 where you can get a week's shopping for £10!) She has no dementia or any memory issues.

She has been having some reoccurring dental issues and it is always me or my son who takes her to her appointments - it can, in traffic take an hour to get there. She has refused to change to a dentist closer to home even though there are spaces. She says other relatives tell her she can go where she likes (these relatives never offer to take her) and she tells me when I explain that I have to take days off work - 'can I not have what I want at my age, I should be able to go where I want to'.

She is lovely to strangers and people like the hairdresser and window cleaner etc but I feel she treats me like a maid and is quite manipulative. I have taken the day off today and arranged an appointment for her with her dentist and she didn't even thank me when I called to tell her - again if this was a stranger she would be falling over herself to thank them. She says her relatives who don't visit/contact her mean nothing to her as they don't do anything for her which makes me feel her love is conditional.

AIBU to think caring for a demanding parent can be harder work than raising kids? Sorry if there's a better thread for this but I thought I'd get more traffic on here from other's going through similar situations.

Honestly, you need to stop this now. She can afford help, so she needs to start paying for it . As others have said, you can set up online food orders using her card not yours. She can call a taxi for her appointments and pay in cash. I wouldn't do her washing either, she can do it herself or pay someone to come in. If she was grateful, that would be something else, but she's treating you like a doormat. Don't do it.

My mother is nearly 90 and I live 3 hours away,she has a careline alarm and keysafe.I have POA and arrange Ocado deliveries ,milk papers and medication are also delivered.She has a cleaner and gardener and she pays for a full tank of petrol each month and occasional lunches when I visit.She is comfortable financially which is used to make life easier for both of us.This situation may continue for a few years so its wise to set boundaries now.

Yep! Stop paying for her stuff. Get her to pay for a gardener etc and maybe carers to come in and make food. This can go on for many years more (much longer than childhood as you say) so you need some boundaries. She should give you POA then you can get a bank card of her account and use that for her stuff.
😱😱😱😱😱

I feel for you OP. I cared for my DM until she passed away, she was appreciative although did have a grumpy jag every so often.

She loved Cook meals so as said upthread give them a go.

My DM used a local voluntary service for lifts to the doctor, dentist, etc. These are all over the UK, friendly neighbour schemes or similar name. Well worth looking into. They often do a weekly bus trip to a supermarket too which combined with online could do the trick for your Mum. Is not just old people who use the service if she moans about it. Can be people of any age unable to drive for whatever reason.

I used to cut my DM a lot of slack if she did seem grumpy. It must be very frustrating getting older, not being able to drive any more and maybe not be able to walk far. Treating you like a cook or washerwoman is not on though.

This is why I am moving abroad as I know full well this is exactly what I will have to deal with and not prepared to be walked over by a manipulative mothet who only thinks of herself

daisy "She is comfortable financially which is used to make life easier for both of us"

so does mine. It used to make me feel guilty but now I see the sense to it. She takes us out for lunch once a fortnight. If we are in the shops together, she gets agitated if I don't put some stuff for myself in the trolley!! If I say I don't need anything, she just says "well buy something you'd like to have then". She would have a fit at the idea of your mother letting you pay for her shopping OP, never mind the rest of it.

It's tough and there are no winners in these situations.
My mum is 72 with middling dementia. Living at home alone with carer support, we're not sure for how much longer.
I live 300miles away but she phones me 7-8 times a day starting from 6.30am - not too bad as my toddler is currently waking at 5.30am
I have POA for her finances so deal with all of her bills (which would be easier if big companies actually knew what that meant and weren't twats about it) and organise her carers, social worker stuff and medical appointments, cleaner and weekly activities.
I visit when I can but with distance, kids, job and my own disability that's hard.
I have siblings and we share some of the burden but it's hard and we have very different views on life and our mother.
I have learnt to say I can't cope or even I don't want to (I didn't have the best relationship with mum, before dementia she could be nasty, I don't feel beholden to her but I do feel sorry for her)
Share the burden (both physically and mentally) with other family members, her friends, your friends and paid help. Otherwise you will go mad.
Learn to say no sometimes.
Also try to do the odd nice thing that you don't have to - go on a trip somewhere nice together, go for afternoon tea just because you can - otherwise everything becomes drudgery that you will understandably resent.

Food:
set up online delivery with Waitrose or similar and give her the receipt then ASK for the money.
Slight amendment - use her card details when placing the food order. Same as with taxi service. That way you don't have to ask her to reimburse you after the event - which may end up being a sticking point.

Washing: shove it in, hang it out but DO NOT IRON.
If she's desperate to get things ironed set up an account (using her card details) for an ironing service which will collect and deliver.

Order ready meals or food shop on line. If she has money then organise a taxi to take her to and from the dentist and she pays

Gosh, people, this is the OP’s elderly mum, can you not call her a cow and horrid? Love to see what you’ll all be like when your time comes.

OP, it sounds like it could be worth getting a financial (and health, but financial is the relevant one here) power of attourney sorted out so you’re not paying for stuff you can’t afford. I’d tou get that arranged then you could look into things like a gardener once a month or a minicab account, that kind of thing.

Re cooking, might it be worth making extra of what you’re doing for yourself and taking it to hers to reheat or freeze? Portions of spag Bol sauce or casserole or something.

I think you are right in that is can be thankless like looking after a child. But, that is what family is about. The important thing is to get the support you need, both practically and emotionally, so you are not women down by it.

Worn down! Though woman down is probably accurate enough.

By all means get the POAs sorted but be aware that if she has capacity to make them, you won’t be able to use them without her permission unless she loses that capacity.

It’s very hard indeed! We moved MIL close to us and she’s infuriating. I started off doing loads for her but had to stop as she was getting grumpy with me while being so lazy (she’s a lot more physically capable than your Mum, by the sounds of it, though has some mental health issues she won’t address). I had to accept for my own sanity that I couldn’t change her and she must live with the consequences of her actions. We bumble along now - it’s better. But I had to work out where my boundaries were first.

She had a spell in hospital recently and needed a lot doing in her house before she came home but she was horrid about everything I did. I had a rant to a relative, who spoke to her about being ungrateful and it improved. Are there any relatives who could point out just how much you can do?

She sounds rude and contrary to me. I wouldn't indulge her so much and make clear that she needs to pay for stuff. Taking days off work for dentists appointments is excessive and unnecessary. She can pay for her transport to a far off dentist if that's what she wants to do and for the food she eats. Again l can see parallels between the child and parent relationship, where the child is given too much and doesn't appreciate what they have

Firm boundaries are required. My mother recently has started trying to offload various tasks on to me. I've made clear this isn't going to happen. She is 67, retired with no physical or mental health issues. In contrast l work a fair amount, trying to refurbish a property and my health hasn't been great lately. She's capable but is idle at times and loves to delegate tasks she doesn't like 🙄

Also as soon as the POA is set up the OP can take it into her mother’s bank and register it, which means she, as well as her mother, can use the account.

@Wasywasydoodah
I hope your DH/DP is going his bit to help with your MIL?

@WeepingWillowWeepingWino

Gosh, people, this is the OP’s elderly mum, can you not call her a cow and horrid? Love to see what you’ll all be like when your time comes.

I hate to pop your little fluffy unicorn shaped bubble, but not ALL mums - including elderly mums are lovely, sweet adorable Angels. Some ARE horrid and spiteful and mean and critical and thoughtless and selfish. Some of them think they are 'owed' by their children for raising them. When I say children, I mean daughters. Coz let's face it, it's not the SONS who are expected to wait on the elderly mother (and/or father,) hand and foot is it? It's (almost) always the daughters.

I mean, as if the (usually 35 to 55 y.o.) daughters haven't got enough on their plate, with their own family, home, bills and mortgage, job, career, and children still at home to look after. They are bombarded with demands from their parents too.

The 'sandwich generation' they are called. The people (as I said usually WOMEN,) who are holding down a job, looking after their own home and children, and also having to tend to the needs of demanding ageing parents.

I know half a dozen women right now, who are aged between 40 and 55, who work, who have kids still living at home, (aged between 5 and 17,) and who have parents over the age of 65, who they run around after like the Tasmanian devil! Hospital appointments, dental appointments, doctors appointments, hairdressers, opticians, etc etc. Also, shopping, and cleaning for them, sometimes cooking for them, and doing the garden. They are run ragged

I also know four different women whose parents both died when they were 25-35 y.o... With 2 of them, the husband's parents died also (before he hit 40.) It was a hard road to travel, not having the parental support that their peers had; knowing they had nowhere to turn when they needed help. (Financially or emotionally.) It was very hard to be without both parents when you were so young.

But they have the better deal now. Kids left home at 18 to 20-ish, and they have no elderly parents to look after, and wait on hand and foot. They may have had a tough time when the kids were younger, but now they have NO commitments or ties, or anyone to look after, and they are only middle aged.

Their peers who had parental help and support, when their kids were younger, are now the ones who are servants to their (now elderly) parents... and are constantly chasing their tail.

I guess that's what you call the universal balance being restored.........

My understanding of LPA is correct. It requires the donor's permission to be registered unless they lack capacity.

www.gov.uk/power-of-attorney

From this moment on your help is conditional. Perhaps not conditional on her being polite and grateful because that sounds like a bridge too far for your mum and you'd probably be wracked with guilt, so for your own sanity I would put up with a bit of rudeness on the basis that it will be easier for you than feeling guilty - that's obviously your call though, you certainly aren't obligated to put up with rudeness when helping her.

The condition of your help needs to be that it's on your terms - if she wants you to take her to the dentist, fine. But that means her appt needs to fit in around your own diary and it needs to be somewhere that's convenient for you to get to. If those conditions aren't met then you can't take her, simple. Employ this reasoning with all of your help. Tell her you are there for her and will help with some things but only if it's possible for you to do so and she meets you half way. Stop taking so much time off work, stop driving her much farther than you need to for appts that could happen close to home, stop mowing her lawn when you clearly don't have time and she could easily pay someone else to do it etc.

Has she always been a bit rude?
Even if she isnt diagnosed with dementia, it can start affecting ur personality 10 years before diagnosis. It sounds like how my DM was before we realised she had Alzheimer's. Difficult, unable to see how much hard work she was, ungrateful, and sometimes nasty, and really scared of losing her independence.

weepingwillow and Also are talking of registering POAs with different meanings hence the confusion. The PoA form has to be signed by the donor (the elderly parent), and before it can be used, has to be registered and stamped by the Office of Public Guardian. This needs donor permission. This is what also is talking about.

Once you've done this, the PoA document can sit quietly in a drawer until such time you need to actually use it. At that time, you have to register it with every financial institution that you have dealings with (it's not all-or-nothing - you can agree that you'll manage your elderly parent's savings account while they control their everyday spending one, for example), This is what weeping is talking about.

My dSIL does this for her mum. Travels probably 200 miles every couple of weeks to take dm to hospital appointments, shop and cook. Probably for very little thanks. Poor dSIL is wearing herself out.

My mum would be exactly the same if o let her op. She has narsacistic tendencies. You need to tell her you can no longer do this. Initially there will be a lot of wailing and gnashing of teeth but she is making your life miserable.

Arrange a taxi to the dentist. Online food shop. Speak to the local authorities to see what help she can have. Get a cleaner for her.

Then when you see her you can have quality time together.

My DM ended up on antidepressants and BP medication running round after my GM. Isn't what you 'work all your life' for and 'save for a rainy day' to be spent on buying services to ensure you are safe and comfortable in your old age? What else is it for?
Her wants do not trump yours. After my GM finally died aged 89 my DM was then killed in a car accident six months later aged 69 so maybe I'm bitter.
Although difficult, you need to now be making some difficult choices, and they are choices, that will preserve your health and sanity in the long run. If your DM refuses to co-operate, that's the choice she makes and she lives with the consequences.

Has she always been like this, or is is a recent thing?
Only this is how my Nan started to act when she had the beginnings of dementia. Complete personality change, and as you say, pleasant to strangers and family friends, but vile to close family.