It’s my ILs…. Again. Serious advice needed

[Lillonely]

So you may remember me from my previous threads and my almost farcical situation with my IL. Feel free to search my UN to pull them up, can’t work out how to link them…

but we’ve got another one now…

brief overview DH is British Pakistani, I’m the ‘wrong kind’ of Asian. 3 kids. FIL has 2 ‘wives’ islamically, in legal terms one wife (mil) and one mistress/ side chick or whatever SMIL. Long and short is, never wanted to marry MIL, married her, knocked her up, and dumped her here. Paid her pitance to live on, and made DH when he was 16 financially provide for her and the household. She speaks no English and has made no effort to. There’s a lot of backstory but she’s not as innocent as my synopsis makes her seem and has been very very cruel to me for years. FIL has now refused to pay for MIL, DH can’t as it’s an extra £700 pcm. She now signs on, that in itself was a battle. She has all her faculties. The house was bought cheap at auction (15k in the 90s) is in quite a bad state of repair but is habitable, (for now) I’m sorry there’s probably more detail but it’s in the other threads.

so the issue now is, dh goes around, we had covid so he’s not visited for 2 weeks and she’s just let the house go in to a state of ruin apparently. Bathroom full of black mould. I pressed dh on this as all that can’t happen in 2 weeks from what he’d said he’d not used the loo there for a while, probably months. Christ knows what happened. He said he could smell damp, and went in the front room and the plaster is crumbling away from the wall by the window, damp and he said the floor boards under foot were very creaky, I’m worried that they’ve rotted due to damp. The damp in the front room has been an issue for a while, dh managed to get FIL to send builders around to fix it and she sent them away as she didn’t want FIL to spend on it but wanted DH too, he couldn’t afford it.

but now FIL is saying he can’t afford to keep her anymore, hence the signing on, there’s no chance he’ll pay for any of the work and we can’t afford to, realistically 10k minimum probably more.

ive looked at the La to see if they have grants for this and they do for insulation but not for damp repair.

we can’t afford to keep her, for my mental health I can’t have her move in here, we also don’t have the space and she’s deeply traumatised one of my children in a past incident.

how on earth can we get around this? As mean as she is at points, and as abusive as she’s been to myself and DH, it’s no way to live.

Does anyone have any suggestions?

He doesn’t know, just let the house and her continue as is? But then what when it all crumbles down, no clue which is why he’s incredibly stressed, can’t see a way out

This is a community that has condoned his mother being uneducated, isolated, abandoned by her husband, and financially abused by said husband. Why on earth does he care about their approval? The rational response would be to pull up stakes, move to a new city, and completely remove this toxicity from his life.

Oh gosh, not if it involves associating with white folks (she’s not the biggest fan) it’s not anything she’s interested in, she doesn’t really have any interests except for religion, gossiping and TV shows

there’s absolutely no way FIL would pay now, not a chance, unfortunately that ship has sailed

i completely agree, the shame is on them rather than him. I think In many ways he’s still stuck in the FOG of it all, plus the community are his wider family really, so there’s that emotional pull. They also have a bit of a mob mentality and would likely hound him, like in sofa gate

This...

The local authority has a legal duty to assess.

I wonder? Are there any LD with MIL? I'm wondering if aversion to any modern life is covering up her lack of ability (I don't mean just reading and writing.... People can have nornal range intelligence levels and not be able to read and write.)

Like a PP, I also do not understand people who move countries (I grew up in 3 different ones) but don't want to integrate, learn the language, go to school, make friends, work, take an active interest in local and wider community.....

I think it's a psychological thing, deep social anxiety, no confidence etc.

Yet their demands and inability to work on themselves have everyone else spinning on their axis catering to them...

Infuriating and so sorry you and your husband are going through that OP.

Stick to your guns! She has no right to sabotage your life. So don't let her.

So she basically does literally nothing, no work, housework, repair? What's wrong with sone people!
If she moves back to Pakistan at least she'd have more of a life!

if DH signed the house over to her and then contacted social services to say they didn’t think she was coping wouldn’t they have to get involved? She could end up being rehomed somewhere lovely and being taken care of properly?

If your husband won’t consider it because of cultural reasons then I’m afraid he is going to have to start rolling up his sleeves and start maintaining his property himself, he can clean the mould and ensure proper ventilation. Perhaps if his mother sees that he is having to do it himself she will start to have a bit of pride and make an effort herself? He could channel his angst into doing something productive and hopefully move you out of this stalemate?

please do not allow this lady to move in with you, she will make your life a misery.

What does she actually want?

She doesn't want to move in with you as it's too far from the community.

She doesn't want to visit Pakistan.
She doesn't want to integrate, have a job or do anything.

What is all this passive aggressive, house destroying nonsense about then?

Dear OP, you are in an absolutely horrible and complex situation.

I have mixed South Asian/White British heritage and one resonance I have is with the feeling of angst about how two of my relatives are living. They have made choices which, from my perspective, make their lives drastically less healthy and happy. I think ‘if only they would do X, Y and Z they could have a much better quality of life’. But it is their choice, I can’t force change, they aren’t really interested in my opinions. There’s also a certain amount of difficult behaviour directed at me.

Honestly, my situation is a piece of cake compared to yours but I have a glimmer of the psychological strain you are under.

You have strengths, play to your strengths. You have loads of useful knowledge, you can get advice and support. I imagine your guiding light is to create and protect the best life possible for your DC. You can do it despite this very tough situation.

There have been some potentially useful practical suggestions on this thread. You need some allies and proper advice about what is possible in legal, practical and social work terms.

My family discovered there are some special rules to do with housing and supporting a vulnerable relative. As your MIL is unable to function in certain ways it may be that she has a diagnosable condition (apologies if you have said in a previous thread that she has been diagnosed with a condition).

You will know best here but, for example, you might be able to find an excellent Psychiatrist who speaks her language and could give a private assessment. I’ll explain my reasoning:

Many years ago a young adult relative, newly married, was having a lot of difficulty. For family reasons I and another relative suspected a particular condition and after doing some research found a private psychiatrist had a one off appointment. I drove her to the appointment, it was a long journey (London-Bristol) it was not cheap, I paid up front.

(As a side note this particular psychiatrist did speak several languages including Urdu). I was really moved by the kindness and concern, really gentle and supportive but thorough assessment. The diagnosis was life changing. My young relative was able to get a lot of support and help, understand her difficulties better, qualify for DLA (now PIP).

Why would your MIL agree to such an assessment? Because it’s part of getting the ‘sick notes’ she needs to avoid signing on.

Why would you go to the trouble and expense? Because if she does have a diagnosable condition (given her life path and current engagement with society outside her immediate community why would it have been picked up before?) and she, for example, genuinely qualifies for PIP, a lot of help and support for you all could potentially be unlocked.

The problems (financial, care, housing, behaviour) wouldn’t get easier but managing them would be.

If this is unhelpful please ignore the suggestion. If you would like a chat I’m happy to help do a bit of research for you - feel free to PM me.

To give concrete examples consanguinity is associated with higher risk of schizophrenia and also of autism (www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC3721918/ pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/31933025/ links to show I’m not making this up) could either of these or another condition be a factor?

Good luck and a hug🫂

If it’s a water leak then can a claim be made on insurance?

Sorry for being a bit off topic but what does "the wrong kind of Pakistani" mean? Is it to do with different religions? Or different social classes?

I recall your other threads. It sounds like she basically just wants to be a kept women. No working, no cleaning, no responsibility nothing.

New sofa someone else pay, room dirty someone else clean.

Nothing will actually fix her she just wants to be looked after hand and foot. You can fix the house but unless dh keeps cleaning it etc it will go to ruin again. She just doesn’t want to.

time to drop the rope and walk away. Get dh in counselling if you can for the fog.

There is no easy options, but these are the ones I can see:

1. You and DH mentally write off the value of DH share in the building - you can sign it over to her or not, but either way just treat it as worthless. Then totally ignore her, even change phone numbers and not give her any way of contacting you. I doubt DH will go for this, so it is really not an option.
2. You accept that he will continue to pay for her - repairing her house for a start. As a family you financially take the hit, for the sake of keeping your marriage. When she dies, you and DH will at least inherit a house that has been kept in good order - make sure she has a will leaving it to DH and not your FIL. I believe if she has no will then FIL will inherit her share.
3. You move her in with you, then sell her house for whatever it is worth, then use the proceeds to move your family to somewhere she can live in an annexe or have separate rooms, including her own kitchenette and bathroom.
4. You leave DH and divorce him

I suspect you will go for option 2, by default if no choice is made.

Your children will have a childhood with less money, but the value of the house will mean you can give them deposits for their own houses in a few decades time.
That is assuming it doesn't all go on her care home fees.

@Beancounter1
But repairing the house could open up a whole hugely expensive can of words. Theres a chance all the wood is rotting away. The bathroom has crumpled into a state of severe mould in just a matter of weeks apparently with all the plaster crumbling in the bathroom. How did this happen? I would be very worried and wary of the underlying state of this house. I reckon they should sell it now and get rid of it before they find themselves dragged into a hugely expensive project.

And then as you say, what happens when she gets old and the house has to be sold to pay for her care, taking all the OPs investment with it?
Nightmare

It’s just not financially viable to support another household for us, cost of living and extra increases have meant our bills have gone up £600 a month, a need our savings for our remortgage and it’s that simple. If it came to that, I’d have to divorce him

V unlikely to be different religions more likely caste, region or family

Your dh is putting too much weight on the community, I doubt mil ever has anyone around to her if the house is in a state.
How will anybody even know she's filed for divorce if she's never socialising?
Get your oh to sort the paperwork, she can't read, get her to sign the documents and any settlement she gets use it on the house.
At some point he's going to have to stop worrying about what the community think of him, if they're all so great why is nobody stepping in to help your mil?!
FIL and mil don't live together, unless she goes around telling everyone nobody is going to be any wiser.

So DH won't go for option 1, and option 2 is just not financially possible, which only leaves options 3 or 4.
You either move her in with you, or divorce DH.

Or a variant of option 1 happens by default - the house becomes almost worthless, you and DH can't do anything about it and continue to live in great stress and guilt, but you don't cut her off. Then eventually social services and/or environmental health get involved, she is moved into social housing or a care home and you sell the wreck to a developer.

I'm so sorry, this is not easy, but I always think it is better to bite the bullet and make tough choices, rather than putting one's head in the sand and being swept along by events.

Can you pre-empt the variant of option 1 above by getting the ball rolling on moving her into social or sheltered housing? Call environmental health or social services and get someone out to see the house and condemn it? Get her a mental health assessment if she is under retirement age.

Or if you haven't got the time and energy just do nothing, leave it to DH.

Wouldn't "the community" look down on her being moved into social housing/care too? How is that any "morally" different?

OP I am terribly sorry for the situation you are in. You must have immense love and a deep bond with your husband to tolerate this level of abuse and stress. It appears a lot of the suggestions lead to dead ends because of various (not discounting their legitimacy) reasons. I find myself asking you a simple question. What do you want? I assume to live your life in peace but right now that isn't going to magically happen. What can you realistically see being your future. Worst case and best case. How would either be achieved? You could also discuss this with your DH. What do you as a family want that can actually be achieved.

I would also say that your DH should ask himself would he rather lose his family (a family which truly love him) or a "community" whose opinion should matter zero. I suspect financially this isn't possible but maybe counselling could help him work through the toxic culture he has been brain washed to follow. Or is there possibly support groups ran by other people who have "broken away " from the community. I can't imagine he is the first to be in this situation.