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?

Yanbu to want them to move closer.

YABU to keep taking about it. They are grown ups who can make their own choices. Back off.

@Dacadactyl

not everyone would. Some people would prefer a stranger attending to them than their own family. Dignity and all that.

A nice 2 bed flat with a small garden walking distance from our houses. But yeah absolutely i get they are attached to their house as i am to mine. But i worry that attachment is clouding their judgement and they will end up having a fall and getting shipped into nursing homes and they’ll lose the house and their autonomy entirely.

@Whatsinaname1234

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

this OP! This is what you need to keep in mind

Maybe this is your dad's way of saying "I won't have the girls caring for us" - by purposefully staying too far away.

They can buy in care.

Fair enough, we are all different. I personally would prefer my family attending to my personal care, rather than a stranger. And would find it more dignified too. But I understand not everyone would feel the same.

Are there honestly whole industries that do not exist outside of London? Only one I can think of is working for the Royal household

At some point OP you just do a big sigh and let it play out to their own tune.

It's really bloody hard as I was in your shoes last year and ultimately my mum died. Possibly highly preventable and before her time. But ultimately she didn't want to listen. I guess really she got her choice abd died at home. The guilt that I should have done more or tried harder to make her see sence. But it was her choice as an adult to make.

Do you expect this from your grown children?

No, I don't expect it. However, if my grown children were asking me to move, precisely because they WANTED to be more involved in helping me, I would jump at the chance.

I certainly wouldn't stay hundreds of miles from them, when the writing was on the wall and I could see I was already struggling, when they were asking me to move nearer so they could help!

100% this.

Wow.

would you also agree then, that as they are choosing not to move, they have chosen not to see much of their adult children and their grandchildren in their final years?

and that they should own the consequences of that choice, with not guilt tripping and pressure to move ‘home’ (which I put in quotes because it isn’t the adult kids home any more).

ive though about this a lot as DH isn’t British. His only sibling has also made his home in the U.K. they’ve been here nearly 30 years now.

DH didn’t move here for me, he’d been settled here for years before we met.

his parents still act and say that we are ‘home’ the couple of weeks a year we visit there.

PIL have had an active and well funded retirement travelling the world. They have very noticeably not learned English nor thought about ways they could spend more time here with their adult kids and grandchildren.

that works out well for me as I find them controlling and difficult.

but it also means a care home and occasional visits is the only outlook for their final years.

ive thought about this a lot and if my kids settle ‘away’ for the long term I will invest my time and energies getting to know it with a view to moving there when the time comes.

i want my kids to be free to follow their dreams. I also love them deeply and will follow them once they are settled, if theyll have me.

they are and always will mean more to me than any house or hometown

It's not a given that in a crisis they will go into a shitty care home. My dad was an emergency admission, the home us admittedly not the mist luxurious, but the manager is excellent, the staff are caring, there’s little turnover in staff, and he is happy. Now he is in his final years he’s much better off with them than he would be with me

Thanks and that’s important to know. I left it to the end because it’s not the most important part of how i think about my parents. I think about how kind my dad is, how bright my mum is etc. I guess I have always thought of the hoarding as just an inconvenience rather than something bigger?

I’m my experience there will be a number of crisis’ before they go into a care home.

Why would it be a shitty one, my DM’s is so nice.

But i worry that attachment is clouding their judgement and they will end up having a fall and getting shipped into nursing homes and they’ll lose the house and their autonomy entirely

This isn’t how it works. They can have a thousand falls, but if they still have mental capacity and want to go home, then they will go home. No hospital can force them into a nursing home while they are still cognitively able to make their own decisions.

You’d be better supporting them in their decision to stay at home while things are just about working…whilst simultaneously trying to hammer out what they would want to happen if the wheels well and truly did fall off. Eg if your dad died or became physically unable to care for your mother, what would happen then? If your dad developed dementia, what would happen then? Do they have POAs for health and/or wealth? That would be a good place to start.

that’s helpful to hear that you had a good outcome. Because I have a fear the home scenario would be awful, they’d be miserable and my sister and I would be devastated we’d want to care for them ourselves

You moved away.
Their life is up north. Along with familiarity, and probably friendships, social connections and local knowledge. They want to stay where they know!
By all means try and facilitate an easier life where they are, but don't try and force a move to your prefered environment.

Super helpful pragmatic advice thank you x

@Fernsfernsferns
if my children move miles away from me, I will not expect them to look after me when I’m old. I will of course do whatever possible to facilitate good family relationships. My husband and myself purposefully chose jobs which geographically placed us between our two sets of parents( at negative costs to our careers) so that we could be there for them when they need us as they age. At no point would we expect our parents to drop everything for us. If anything I feel that we are where we are because of our parents and we will be there for them.

OP there is a long journey ahead from where they are now to a care home. A care home doesn’t happen easily if they have capacity.

My DM has Alzheimer’s and it still took a good few years with involvement from all the emergency services numerous times before she moved to a nursing home.

You need to work out what you are willing to do and put boundaries in place.

Very interesting exchange of messages actually.

because i never thought of it this way.

i would NOT want my kids caring for me. Nk way jose. I would much prefer a nurse. But I have been very stuck in my idea that i want to be the one to care for my parents, i guess i assumed that’s what they would want?

genuinely hadn’t thought this before, thanks folks x

I empathise OP. Luckily for me my mum is rational and practical, and moved down from the Midlands to the town next door to us in the home counties. She's in a 2 bed flat which is a converted house so she even has a nice garden. It is so manageable for her, and she's still young enough to make new friends and get involved in the community. She has done exactly what you want your parents to do.
I would also say that it never would have happened had my dad still been alive as he was Midlands born and bred, and also a serious hoarder. Moving my mum out was mostly getting rid of his stuff. All the best whatever happens.

investment banking

Are you sure you wouldn't be able to find a job outside of London? I find that strange. If you are determined to be close to them it might be the only option. Otherwise I think you need to allow them to make their own choices, I wouldn't want dd having to care for me as I want her to live her own life.