To want my parents to move closer to me

[Whatsinaname1234]

The AIBU here is about how I deal with my parents who are ageing and I would really be interested to hear others’ experiences of the same thing as this must be something so many people deal with.

My parents are in their mid 70s. My mum has very bad health problems and my father is effectively her full time carer. They live in a big house in a smallish town in the North, my sister and I both live in London. We both have jobs which don’t exist out of london, young kids and zillions of other commitments.

Our parents are on their own with no family network (they were born abroad). Their house is big, over 3 floors with VERY steep stairs and a big garden.

The house is falling apart around them and they will not accept offers to help. They have money and savings, ok pensions etc so it’s not money. I think they just feel overwhelmed by my mother’s perpetual ill health and can’t lift their heads above the parapet to think how they can stay on top of maintenance of the house. It’s not just cosmetic, there are parts of the property with subsidence, cracks, kitchen doors hanging off, microwave that sparks.

I have tried offering to organise quotes and builders, my dad just turns it down. He doesn’t want to be patronised by his daughter thank you very much.

The bigger problem is I think they should just sell up and move to london. Weirdly my dad’s brother lives here too, so do me and my sister and our kids. They could swap their big falling apart house for a manageable flat, we could pop in and visit and help.

Recently a family friend of their age had a fall and was assessed as being unsafe to return home fir various reasons. She was put in a home and her house forcibly sold to pay the fees. I just feel if my parents do a move on their own terms they can avoid this, and if i was close, they may never need to go to a home as i could help them out.

Tried raising this with my dad and it was a blanket, flat, no. I think he’s hoping if he holds out we might move ‘back home’ to be closer? But i’ve explained it can’t happen. Both of us work in whole industries that literally don’t exist where they live. We have kids and lives and they should be the ones to move as they have fewer ties to their area than we have to ours.

Another issue is that he is quite a severe hoarder and moving would require him to deal with having to dispose of things when he has a big house packed to the rafters with at least 30 years worth of just… stuff. So much stuff.

AIBU to want them to be closer in their twilight years?

Has anyone else experienced this and talked their parents round?

I think you need to remember that they are living their lives as they wish and not for your convenience.

Maybe they like their big tatty house and their wild garden. Maybe they have friends there or an emotional attachment to their home. And it is their HOME. Maybe they don't like cities.

I know I'd rather poke sticks in my eyes than live in London. And I work there regularly. Horrible, crowded, dirty, noisy, crime-ridden, unfriendly dump. And the only time I've lived in a flat I ended up on antidepressants. Different people have different needs.

Your dps don't seem to have asked you to do anything for them, so perhaps you should just keep out of their business.

My dm refused my offer to help her move closer to any of her dcs. She wanted to stay in her house, with her garden and her memories and her friends. She didn't want a clear out. All that 'stuff' was precious to her . So with a few minor adjustments, she lived independently until about 10 days before her death.

I was in a similar position (only my dad though as mum had died some years previously), we did move closer to him (still a couple of hours drive) and saw him when we could. He died during Covid (heart attack) which meant it was difficult to do much quickly. It took 21 months to clear the house (there is still a lot there) and we now need to spend about £300k to make it safe and watertight.

My advice is let them live the way they want, enjoy the time you have with them, it is their decision. However, have a very clear plan in place for after they pass away (clear with all your family), because that is the bit where you have to be on the same page about decisions.

You left an important part to the end of your post - if one or both of your patents are hoarders it’s very unlikely they’ll ever move, even if it seems sensible on all other counts.

So your choice is really only to accept that, and then figure out how you will cope with the realities of their decision to remain there.

I think the fact that your dad is a hoarder is a huge obstacle. He will be very emotionally attached to his stuff. Hoarding is a very tricky mental health condition.

Your mum may move without your dad. Do they ever visit?

I can't think of much worse than moving to London at 40 years old let alone into my old age.

You've expressed your concern and also your solution but it's up to them. You say they have no savings or money. So after buying a flat in London - what money will they have for the higher cost of living down there?

Is there anyone they would trust to take advice on the maintenance issues?Family friends up there etc? Although tbh I suspect the issue is once again the hoarding not the ‘not wanting daughter to interfere’. People who suffer from hoarding tendencies often find it impossible to let outsiders in, even for essential maintenance.

Totally understand your frustrations OP. I moved 200 miles away and my father started to struggle with dementia and falls. Unfortunately his sister and my step siblings didn't want him moving up north with me and nor did they want to help or house him... its like a catch 22.

It makes sense for them to move nearer to you/ his brother and other family but all you can do is keep your offer open.

Its a really challenging situation and you are now being pulled by duty vs time/ convenience.

I have been in a similar but slightly less fraught situation, having been living 5 mins from my parents and them moving to over an hour away. I have a sister who lives 40 mins from them. They had been in reasonable health and managing OK - one worse than the other but chronic rather than emergency.

In context, when my parents were younger they had moved away from THEIR parents by about an hour. So when my grandparents started to have health issues it became unsustainable to manage and they were told to move closer or not have any support. Both sets of grandparents moved into the town where my parents still live and had support in older years.

So fast forward to last year and one of my parents has had a very serious illness. My sister and I put the emergency help in, back and forward for weeks and then, once over the worst we sat down and basically laid down the options ... move and have help, don't move, manage alone with a monthly or fortnightly visit. Work and costs prevents move.

They are moving.

Hubby's mum is 300 miles away but has other family close otherwise we would have moved her too.

Good luck!

I had a similar dialogue around 20 years ago with my parents. They were around 100 miles away and at the time my Dad was in mid 70s and Mum mid 60s with a blood cancer. My Dad would not move - roll forward just a few years and the house became totally unsuitable as he had mobility issues. It took my Dad's death for my Mum to agree to move. It will be an event or emergency that will force a rethink eventually.

Lots of smaller towns just outside of London that would be both cheaper and easier for the op and family to get to.

The parents may not want to move but it's a given that they will not want paid help in the future

OP you say at the end that your Dad is quite a severe hoarder..........

It's not going to change. He won't sell up and move. He won't let go of the Stuff.

Sorry, but it's never going to happen while he's alive.

What I would say though is that it is THEIR choice. Do not move your life for them.

They are adults and can do what they want. If needed they can buy in support and care but it won't be great in an emergency. I hope they realise what a difficulty this is.

The reality is that in a crisis they will go into a shitty care home whereas if they were close you could help them maintain some independence.

This. And they will regret it probably but there's nothing you can do except lay out the facts and let them decide.

I get where you're coming from and I would be frustrated, but I would advise ending all unsolicited advice or opinions. I have concerns about my own mother living 100s of miles away and not taking care of herself / addressing house issues. But sharing concerns with her just leads to frustration on my part as she's dismissive. I think that often adult parents don't take kindly to their adult children telling them what to do even if it's done with the best of intentions. By the way you will get a lot of people saying YABU but I think you are NBU because older parents need to realise that their actions in this regard can lead to a lot of worry and sadness from their adult kids. I don't think it's fair of them. I'd suggest putting good boundaries in place with them to save yourself from getting hurt.

I'd rather die than live in London, perhaps they feel the same?

If your dad is a hoarder you will struggle to get him to move let alone halfway across the country.

I do think it makes sense either to move closer to family or downsize to a more manageable home but how you persuade them I don't know especially if your dad is refusing your help. Keep trying but ultimately it is up to them. Unfortunately it will probably mean they won't accept help until they have to.

I have been through this. My parents moved 360 miles away to retire to the location where one of them grew up as a child. As they became frail and elderly my siblings and I asked them to move back. They would not consider it.
Things were tough for about 8 years, managing care at home, selling the house and arranging a care home, all a combination of remote and long drives to be there in person. Covid was awful.
The only positives were the community where they lived and standard of care. Much better than London.
They have both passed away now but it was very challenging for us, the adult children trying to manage everything.

I couldn't think of anything worse than living in London - or anywhere close to it, to be brutally honest. I'm in the North, in the countryside and every time we've been further south than, say, Peterborough the traffic and the general busyness is horrendous. I like how peaceful and remote it is round here. I've got a big house - probably worth about £280,000

What do you think I could afford in London for that? And will it come with a large garden?

Fair, and that’s their point. But what happens when, not if, one has a fall? We have young kids, we can’t relocate to care for them through recovery.

So we just let them rot in hospital? Or be moved to a home? We love them! We want to be with them and help them. But we can’t physically be with them other than on weekends.

I just feel it will be me who deals with it though? As i won’t leave them to rot of course. The infuriating thing is my dad’s own parents were just the same so most of my childhood i didn’t know my dad as he’d work in the week and travel to support his parents at the weekend. It wrecked his mental health and then when finally my gran moved to near us in the last few years of her life she said her biggest regret was not doing it years before

I don’t think they will ever move even though that would be the sensible thing to do.
I feel for you OP and fear you are going to have a lot of back and forth trips to see them.

The garden’s not a good thing. They are never out there are it’s just filled with weeds, they can’t manage it anymore. It used to be beautiful with fruit trees and so on but they’ve chopped them down over the years as they couldn’t handle the pruning.

I guess my parents feel the same about london as you do. But we live in a leafy suburb very comparable to where they live now. A nice community where people know each other’s names (it does exist in london, promise). I’m not asking them to move to oxford street.

And also yes they’d need to downsize but they can’t manage their massive house, they only use 2 rooms in it the rest are shut off and gathering moss, why not switch to a smaller space they can maintain?

@Whatsinaname1234 What can they afford in your 'leafy suburb'? If it's a nice area I imagine that is reflected in the house prices. And if they've been in their current home for 30 years I imagine it has sentimental attachment for them. I love my home. I don't want to move somewhere else ever.

Yep there’s money. But i’d rather care for them myself or at least pop in a few times a day and make sure all is fine than have to trust stangers remotely.

Because they don't want to.

You don't want to move north (for perfectly valid reasons.) They don't want to move and once you start to decline cognitively, it's too overwhelming.