Hi All... having a moral dilemma here and I feel awful but at the same time all I can think is 'why should I?'
Some background in to what's gone on;
My dad is currently in hospital with Paraneoplastic Cerebral Degeneration as a result of T Cell Lymphoma. He's extremely unwell and is incapable of performing basic human functions, such as speaking, eating, seeing, etc. He's currently having chemotherapy to try and reduce the severity of the cancer, which we've been told is untreatable. He's been this way for over 2 months now and, due to the rarity of the disease, we've no idea how things are going to turn out. Initially I took three weeks sick off work to help my mum at home and make sure I was at the hospital every day to help care for him. Once the three weeks were up, financially I had to return to work but managed to get them to agree to home working so I could continue to support my parents. I'm one of three children, my brother is disabled and my sister is married with two kids. I'm childless through no decision of my own, but I live with my partner and have two house cats (who are very dependent on me). This pretty much leaves only my sister and myself who can help my mum out (small family). I am based in Manchester, my sister in Leeds, my mum in Doncaster and my dad is currently in Sheffield. My sister is constantly using the fact she has two children as an excuse to not help, despite living with her husband who is the father of said kids, and my mum is happy to allow these excuses.
Me and my partner had our first round of fertility treatment this last month and through the 'important' week where we needed to be together, I still made sure I was there for my parents every day and drove from mine, to my mums, to my dad (6hr round trip) every single day. Of course, this led to stress and exhaustion which resulted in a failed fertility attempt. As horrible as it was after TTC for 6 years, I put this to the back of my mind and refuse to grieve over it until my dad is OK (or, y'know). My partner and I have made the decision to put any further treatment on hold until the situation changes. Heartbreaking, but I've put my family first. I told my mum about the failed treatment and her response was 'Okay'. My sister responded 'We didn't think it would work first round anyway'. But whatever.
My dad's business is closer to my sister than my parents house so it's been agreed that during the latter half of the week (Wed-Sat), when she's working there, that she will stay with my sister and I will go and live at my mums to look after her dogs, my brother, the house and my dad. All the while carrying out my own job and putting extra stress on my partner as he's now having to maintain our home and pets on his own. We're happy to do it though as it helps my parents and that's my main priority.
A Sunday is pretty much the only day I have to 'get things sorted' at the moment. Things like needing clean clothes, a shower (because even that's hard to find time for now!), and making sure my partner is OK because this is putting a lot of pressure on us and we want to make sure we're able to support each other too. We'd agreed that Sunday (12/12) would be our day to get our Christmas tree, put our decorations up and go shopping as it's the only day we had before Christmas. I have my Covid booster the weekend after so there's no saying if I'll be well enough and I don't see the point of putting Christmas dec's up on the weekend before Christmas. My mum asked, after we'd made the plans, if I could go to the hospital on the Sunday to look after my dad. Now, here's my moral dilemma. I wanted to say 'of course' and drop everything for my parents but then I remembered everything I've done so far and that I need a break too. I asked why she wasn't going and her reason was because she was going to a pantomime. She'd arranged well in advance to go out with my brother, sister and her kids but hadn't actually bothered asking me and my partner, I assume, because she'd already decided we were cancelling our plans to look after my dad. So... not an emergency. OK, so my mum and sister are as entitled to a break as I am but that shouldn't mean making each other cancel plans last minute, especially considering they'd just had 4 days of break. As I said, Sunday is my only day. I told them no, I can't do it. They've asked countless times before for me to go when they couldn't and I've done it without question.
Just a little context on this situation as it happens quite a lot where I'm expected to drop everything for my family:
August 2021: My sister got married. I had been asked to be her maid of honour, same as she was for mine. I'd started planning her hen do and all those other little bits that were my responsibility. I then got informed that I was no longer invited to my sisters wedding as she'd decided she only wanted her friend there (no parents) and was going down to Bournemouth. OK, fair enough. I was annoyed but it's her choice at the end of the day. I then get invited to go shopping with my mum and my sister for what I thought was an 'all of us' shopping day. How wrong was I. My mum was frantically searching for a dress and when I asked 'Why?' she responded 'for your sister's wedding.' Bam. Kick to the teeth. What a nice way to find out that they'd lied to me. I confronted them about why I was uninvited in that case if parents were now coming and it was 'close family'. The reason is: If you and your brother come then that means that sister's husband-to-be's grandma will want to come and they don't want loads of people there so it's parents only to stop arguments. Hmm... okay. I'll respect that; that's their decision. So instead of going to my sister's wedding I'm asked to leave my family for 3 days to go and look after my brother and parents' house & dogs. Couple of months later and I'm visiting my sister's house and there's her wedding photos on the wall... complete with a group photo of around 30 people including husband's Grandma, friends & their families and some people I've never seen in my life. So to me it seems like they lied to me to get me to drop everything to go and look after their dogs.
OK, back to my point.
Whilst I understand everyone responds differently to stress, it seems as though my sister is starting to play everyone off each other and blaming/guilt tripping everyone else for days when they can't be with my dad. She goes one day a week. She's already made my mum cry but gets handed a green card because she has children. On the Saturday before that dreaded Sunday, I was waiting around at my mum's house for her to get home from work so I could drive her to the hospital to visit my dad. Whilst waiting, I get some pretty horrific texts from my sister saying that my mum's crying and I shouldn't have to be guilt tripped in to going to look after my dad and essentially making out that I don't do anything for them. She then told me that I 'may as well just go home'. Of course I took her up on that, grabbed my shit and walked out that door.
After everything I've done for them, after everything I've given up, because one day out of 2.5 months I've asked for one day for myself I'm suddenly the worst daughter in the world and I haven't done anything for them. Like I'd said, if it was an emergency and their car had broken down then of course I would've dropped everything to go to dad. Not for a bloody pantomime. Not when my dad is lying extremely vulnerable in a hospital bed, undergoing chemotherapy which has completely destroyed his immune system. We were told that even if he has an underlying infection, as soon as he has his chemo then it will kill him. I wouldn't consider a pantomime, a room full of people during a pandemic, would be the best place to go and whether I went on Sunday or not I'm absolutely furious that they would even consider putting my dad's life at risk like that.
Now my family aren't talking to me as I need to 'grow up' and 'put my ego aside' - all of this because I said no. My mum's sticking up for my sister because 'She's stressed because she's working and she has children', but does that mean that because I don't have children my life is less meaningful and I don't have a right to be stressed? I don't know how many of you have been through infertility and fertilty clinics but it's not a nice place to be and it's certainly not stress free.
I'm heartbroken and I want to cut my family off because I can't take any more of the abuse (it's been like this all my life) but am I just going to be seen by everyone else as being the asshole and I don't want to leave my dad during what could be his final days.
Am I an asshole? :(