Elderly needy parents + young needy kids - arghhh!!

[PlumPudd]

What do we owe to our parents / what responsibility do we have to them and what do they in return owe / have a responsibility towards us and our little kids?

I expect this is a common issue in my age group (mid 30’s). I’ve got little kids, who I love more than life itself, but who need most of my and my partners time / care / worry and attention. I also have a job, a partner, a mortgage, health worries, friends who I’d sometimes like to see, the need to occasionally have five minutes to myself to read a book etc.

However at the same time I’m raising my tiny kids my parents have been switching from relatively independent adults, to querulous, feeble (their words) old folks who want me to show them how to use the internet and book appointment for them, spend endless hours listening to their fears and grumbles about each other, their health, politics, media bias, how awful young people are today, how expensive their heating bill is (not as bloody expensive as mine) etc. and seem to feel that their time to look after has ended and their time to be looked after has begun and that it’s my responsibility to do this.

All this at a time when I’d really value still getting a bit of support and a listening ear from them as I look after a baby and a toddler, struggle to afford life, balance work, manage my own health etc. I know they got this support from their (admittedly slightly younger) parents, my grandparents, and that in theory they’d like to give it to me, but they seem unable / unwilling to.

In principle I agree that your parents should look after you and you should in turn look after your parents when they get old. But what are we all supposed to do when (because everyone is having kids later and living longer) our parents get old, grumpy and in need at the same time that we ourselves need their support in the difficult years with very young kids, or don’t have the time and energy to look after them and our kids together?!?!?

Not really looking for an answer to this (hypothetical) question, just offloading…

My mum had when she was 43! I'm a 37 year old young woman with an elderly needy mum. I also have very young children.

My mum can be so unbelievably rude and entitled. We aren't close at all (she put work before me!).. Yet she's so unbelievably demanding. If I ask her to wait, hold on, let me think about it - I get told I'm a disappointment.

Anyway, I don't know what the answer is! But my god, I am actually developing anxiety over it. I'm always tense and overwhelmed by it all.

Yep, the bricklayers and carers are famed for their keyboard skills round here.

Elderly mother and two sn teens is a nightmare. It was really hard when she was calling all the time. One evening she called 30 times in an hour! My eldest sabotages my phone calls anyway, drove me nuts.

Slightly better now my mum is in a care home but I still take her out every week and we still have to sell her home which falls on us adult kids as she hasn't got capacity.

Meanwhile my eldest age 16 is not safe to be left at home without me for more than a couple of hours. Younger one 14 can manage longer maybe half a day.

Its tough and it goes through stages and each stage you think it so
Much harder than the last one. And then something new crops up.

You have to think about how much you can really do.

Have they got LPA's in place as that is really important to do while they still are relatively ok. They cant make them if their cognitive ability declines.

It's called the 'sandwich generation'. Sandwiched between kids & parents needing care.

I find it difficult because FIL refused to learn to do anything for himself. DH has to do it all - even take him to appointments, although that's stopping as he can't take more time off work. It's draining for me as I'm stuck with 95% of life admin & kids & my own parents, who look after themselves but are constantly asking for tech help. I've a recently widowed uncle looking for help now, too.

It's made more difficult by having friends with parents who do lots of childcare & financial gifts. It's hard.

What an odd thing to say 😂 my mum had me when she was 43. (And parents are continuing to get older!!)

Apart from my career driven mum. Everyone else I know between 70-80 retired in their 30s on long term sick or were paid to care for someone else. Very few people I know in this generation actually worked with computers....

But that's probably the area I'm in tbh. A little backwards!!

I don’t have health. I also don’t have parents or in laws that will look after my children on a regular basis. I had to do nearly all of it whilst they were young and now (my husband is amazing!!!!) I even home educate ate them too now so never get a rest.

life is what you make it and whilst it’s nice to have all of that my mum owes me nothing now. I feel it’s 50:50. She brought me up alone with not much help and she can’t help me that much either. She helps me mentally a huge amount and of course I’m incredibly blessed to have her still here

i would probably like her to babysit a bit more but in reality she’s done her bit.

So many unkind posts. You do realise that your parents loved and cared for you as you are now doing for your children. Your focus and love and prioritisation above all of your children is what THEY did for YOU yet you seem to be resentful of the fact they need some support.

You do realise that your parents loved and cared for you that's not true for everyone though.

The OP hasn't indicated that her parents did not love and care for her has she?

I am a single parent to a 13 year old with autism. My mum helped me a lot when my daughter was younger.
After my Dad died mum developed rapid Alzheimers and now lives with me, daughter and dogs. I gave up my job to be her carer.
It's not easy at all but I have peace knowing I'm looking after her.

Gosh you're unfriendly 😂

You do realise that your parents loved and cared for you as you are now doing for your children.
@jenandberrys ⏫ This is a massive assumption. Many parents were cold dismissive, emotionally absent, neglectful or down right abusive. Then they get even trickier with age..... Sometimes people don't unquestionably love their parents and it's a bit more complex...

No shit! But that is not what the OP has posted at all. There is no indication that she had an unpleasant or abusive childhood, so I am not sure what your point is.

But how old do they actually have to be not to have had the opportunity at least to make themselves aware of technology? If they’ve chosen not too then that’s their own fault and not discriminatory in the slightest! My parents are in their mid/late 70s and are completely tech independent. We had a home computers from the mid eighties, they had mobiles from the mid nineties and they organise their life online. Even my grandmother, who died in 2006 in her late 80s, had an email address and was happy communicating using it, albeit from a PC that she might have struggled with if it went wrong, as iPads hadn’t been invented then… And she’d be 99 if she was still alive!

My dads always been like that even in his 30’s when I was a child 😳 incapable of doing anything for himself always relying on my mother when they were married. Any issues he has now he rings me letters, banking, paying things, moaning he’s only 60 and active and healthy. It fills me with dread for the future. My sons 8 and has autism and varius other health issues..he never visits and keeps out of the way, only hints at coming down when my son is at school or MIL on a Saturday. It’ll make me resentful caring for someone who has not been there for me.

So he's trying to have a conversation with you about what he's read, thinking and stuff and your not interested so are shutting him down....he's not moaning talking about the news he's trying to talk about stuff like normal people do. Who does he get to talk to?

@Tryingtokeepgoing this was my earlier point - money, social class and technology all intertwined. Working class old people less likely to be tech savvy. They're not being difficult- it's just a fact

I feel like if we owe our parents everything. Both my parents were ill, my mum died unexpectedly 6 weeks ago and now my dad is all alone.

If it wasn't for my parents, I'd not have the life I do. They looked after my daughter so I could work, have a bit of a social life and when my son came along, as bad as their health was getting, they looked after him too so my partner and me could continue to work full time, demanding jobs. Since my mam died, my dad has broke his back and is no longer able to look after my little guy. As a result, I've had to take a career break as we have no nursery spaces full time and no other family to help. I didn't know how much I needed/relied on them until my mam was gone.

Some days, I just want to stay home and curl in a ball, I haven't grieved my mam cause I'm trying to stay strong for my dad. Dealing with everything so he doesn't have to. I'm a firm believer in they looked after us when we needed them, it's only right to return the favour.

There are too many generalisations here.

If parent(s) have been great, supportive, giving parents up until a certain point, and now have health problems, I feel they deserve alot more sympathy and support than neglectful/ abusive parents.

But you can only give what you can and each of us have to decide what that os and stick to it. Young children come first.

I feel for anyone with ailing parents while they have babies/ young children.

I dreaded this happening when mine were tiny. They're pre teens now, and my mum needs alot more help.

I have far more to five now than I would've done a few years ago. Loving parents who have done the early years would surely understand this...

It's not just children who suffered through Covid many older people did and for a lot longer due to illness etc. It was widely reported that care homes saw rapid mental decline due to isolation etc. Older people in their homes were no different why are people being so mean and unkind to their own families?

Not everyone on mumsnet feels like this. I'm really sorry you're stuck in this situation. We're so programmed to look after parents however horrible they've been! And people who've had lovely parents just don't even get what it's like not to have had them. Literally the only people I know who've empathised with my experience have been people who've experienced it themselves.

I did help my parents out but only as much as I could spare the emotional energy and I didn't pander to them. I also pushed back if they were rude to me when I was trying to help.

I'm not a perfect parent but I think I've been a pretty good mum and I do my absolute best not to put any pressure onto my young adult children for anything. I plan to continue with this.

did they at the same time have needy parents vying for their attention?
Your first duty is to your own wellbeing and then to that of your children. The parents should have planned better for their later years

So selfish

I agree, they are very selfish!

It took me 45 minutes on the phone while bouncing a baby to sleep to explain to her how to log out of her account for something and log into mine. And the 45 minutes included her narrating entire pages of the internet to me despite me repeatedly reminding her that I couldn’t see the page she was on so her telling me the names of random icons would not help,

Remote access tools can make this much easier. There are many out there, Google's is free.

https://remotedesktop.google.com/?pli=1