Elderly relative won't wear hearing aids. Stopping visits until he does?

[TheTreeLightsAreFuckingMeOffNow]

Morning all,

This might sound harsh but it's driving me up the bloody bend.
My grandad is elderly, 82. He's frail now and has just given up his license. Between me and my mum we have a rota for all lifts needed, I have him round for dinner once a week and so does she. The load is shared between me, my mum and aunt. My nanny sadly passed away a few years back so we try and keep grandad busy as he can get lonely. He lives 5 doors up from my mum and I know she carries a huge load of this and she struggles so I really try and help out as much as I can between having young DC, working full time as a single parent etc. grandad grates on mum sometimes as he won't even bother opening his mail he will just trundle round to mums while she's WFH and give her the envelopes. She's on a bit of a journey with asserting boundaries with this, as he's quite bone idle as it is and my nanny did everything for him so there's aspects that probably won't change now.

Anyway more to the point, he is profoundly deaf. But he never wears his bloody hearing aids! His excuse is 'his ears are blocked so what's the point' and 'he can hear perfectly well without them..' well the only reason he can hear is because we are shouting at him. The TV is on 3/4s of the max volume. It's bloody exhausting. I'm autistic and struggle with loud noises at the best of times. He doesn't know I'm autistic as he doesn't believe in any of that and said 'it's no different to when I take DD to soft play with loud noises'.

Anyway, I personally think it's rude and so antisocial to go to peoples houses, be fed and looked after and expect everyone to shout at him. Just put the bloody hearing aids in!

I've now said to grandad that he cannot come round or ask for help unless he's wearing his hearing aids. This hasn't gone down well with him, of course. I'm conscious with mum now getting even more of the load as I've put that boundary in place. I have suggested that she also has the same boundary she maybe it'll make him realise. She is thinking about doing the same thing.

AIBU? I think it's rude to come into someone else's home and expect everyone to shout when there's an easy fix. Shouting at someone and having to repeat yourself for 2-3 hours I find utterly exhausting, I come away feeling really overwhelmed and honestly can't wait to drop him back. I know that's probably due to my ND but I just can't do it anymore.

He won't wear them because he 'doesn't need them.' We've asked if they hurt or are too loud and he said they're fine.

AIBU? What else can we do? Thank you!

I used to work in a nursing home and once had to attend a hospital clinic with a resident to get hearing aids fitted. The audiologist explained that it doesn't just amplify the sounds you want to hear, it amplifies all of them and after years of deafness, there is a huge sensory overload when you put them in. When I tried wearing one, I lasted about 30 seconds as it was unbearable!

He needs to wear them little and often so he gets used to them. Gentle encouraging should help and I would also look at getting his ears syringed.

I can tell you that you're wrong. The problem is that hearing aids don't give you back perfect hearing, you still can't follow group conversations or hear what people are saying if there's no background noise. You still have to lipread a lot. And the biggest bugger of all, you have to learn to use them and it takes time and concentration. What's more, with presbyacusis (age-related hearing loss) the first thing that goes is the high frequencies so it DOES sound as though people are mumbling.

Try to be a little more sympathetic. Everyone who lives long enough is likely to experience some degree of hearing loss. I've been deaf since my teens and I am now seeing my peers start to suffer from hearing loss. For once I'm a bit ahead of the game because it's not new to me as it is to them. I still try to be sympathetic though. People take good hearing for granted and it's difficult when it's taken away from you.

@madaboutpurple · Today 11:27

The problem is some people seem ashamed to use a hearing aid. I think you are being harsh on your Grandad to be truthful.

@Havalona · Today 13:05

Have to jump in here without reading any further! I am in my 60s now, and have gradually lost most of my hearing over the years due to meningitis and now older age lol. I absolutely love my hearing aids and wear them with pride. I wear my hair up and they are fully visible and I don't give a shit. My life has been transformed since needing to use them about 6 or so years ago.

How supremely unhelpful. 🙄 Bully for you if you absolutely LOVE wearing your hearing aids, and 'wear them with pride', shoving your hair out of the way so everyone can see them!

What a ridiculous comment really!

People are different, and some people feel embarrassed to wear them, and some people struggle to wear them for physical reasons. They find them uncomfortable and itchy and unpleasant, and struggle with the levels of noise and sounds. And as has been said by a few posters, they actually hurt some peoples ears! They are a wonderful creation, but they don't work for everyone!

OP I think you are getting lot of stick from posters who have no idea what it is like to have responsibility for a selfish, lazy elderly person.

I got to the point that you are at with my parent; no conversation due to not wearing hearing aids, and people thinking they had dementia as they pretended to hear and understand things that they hadn't.

My parent won't do anything for themselves and is incredibly self centred and self absorbed. They actually liked the idea of carers as it was people to wash the pots and make tea. I had to arrange every single aspect of that.

All my love and respect has disappeared, it is now a chore dealing with them. Instead of lovely memories and being happy to help them in their old age, I'm left with resentment and frustration. The difference between can't and won't with an elderly person really affects your relationship with them.

Yes we need to stand up to the system!

My mum had a fall and went into a nursing home for respite. At the time i lived three hours away from her. I travelled to see her about five times.

My brother lived thirty minutes away from her.

My aunty rang me and shouted at me that I wasn't doing enough for my mother. She made me feel so awful. Like I was a piece of sh#t

She would never even think of ringing my brother and telling him to do anything. Because he's a precious man and I'm a lowly woman.

I did strongly stand up to my aunt on that occasion as I could envision my mum getting older and my aunt constantly shouting at me for years that I'm not doing enough for her. I strongly stood up to my aunt so I don't think she'll do it again.

I said to my aunt "I'm working full time, I don't live near my mother, I can't magically be with her in her house when she comes out of the nursing home, she needs to get a carer".

That's a bit harsh. I don't use earbuds or such, because they just hurt my ears.
With his ears blocked, presumably they're very uncomfortable for him.

Turn the tv down when you go, and tell him you can't stand the noise so he can bear the inconvenience while you visit.

Ashamed of myself?

Are you alright??

I had a friend who’d refuse to wear hearing aids. She told me they’d make her deafness worse , then that her hearing was fine and she didn’t need hearing aids.
it got to the stage where I’d have to write things down when I visited.
And then she couldn’t hear the phone or doorbell if I rang or went round, so I was unable to talk to her. She wouldn’t give me a door key.
I tried notes through the door, but I’ve now decided to step back.
I did get social services involved because I was worried she was so vulnerable, but she won’t give them a key..

Please elaborate.

You have nothing to be ashamed of @TheTreeLightsAreFuckingMeOffNow You're just frustrated and tired and angry and weary. And it's not surprising. Hope it all works out.

Oh this made me cry. Thank you. Yes the burnout warnings are flashing red beacons.

I'm trying to take as much pressure off mum as she has been my rock through my cancer and treatment. She made sure I had a clean bed to go home to, that my DDs routine wasn't changed at all, she did so incredibly much and I sort of feel like me taking the reigns is a little bit of a debt to her I can pay back if that makes sense. I don't think anyone could ever prepare her for nearly losing me (I was in a coma for 15 days after cancer surgery) and she never left my side.
She's now run ragged with grandad and I just feel I have to keep helping her.

My lovely mum is amazing but I have realised from this thread that we both desperately need a break.

I'm going to book us a spa weekend for Christmas and come up with a good plan with her at the Spa I think. It's time to get outside care in, for sure. And I won't be told on this thread that I'm awful or I should be ashamed of myself for asking for a pair of fucking hearing aids be worn.

Thank you for your post it really means a lot.

If you wear them with pride you are supremely unhelpful and ridiculous.
If you refuse to wear them you are stubborn.

No win for those who don't fit into the full hearing category! And I can hear the derisory tone on the page even though I'm bloody deaf!

Aids can be adjusted, the dome can often be too big (the bit that goes in the ear canal). The mike can be too heavy (back of the ear). The feedback might need to be adjusted (the whistling sound).

Most of them can be fixed to suit. Provided you go back to audiology of course.

I don't know the dementia risk. My mum probably does though but I'll definitely bring that up to grandad for sure. Thank you!

It's exhausting straining to hear as well. I'm 74, suddenly went deaf with COVID September 2023, went to my GP,was told 3 months wait for audiology appointment. I bought amplifiers online, about as big as my little finger nail. I can just about manage an hour,they really hurt. If you touch your hair,they go up a level, loudness doesn't always work it's pitch. Then I got wireless headphones for the TV, you have to get up the app on the TV,then I have to wait for dialogue, because the title music of say a film is really loud. Then the volume has to be adjusted on the TV. I have to wear glasses for distance,so have to wear them for TV, with the headphones over top,it hurts.I use subtitles if available,they aren't foolproof either. Guess what, I had my audiology 3 months appointment last week, over a year, now I have to wait for the tinnitus clinic appointment, and then for hearing aids. My family get annoyed with me. My late father would be in his 90s now, and he never made so much as a cup of tea in his life. That was normal in the 30s and 40s. Men didn't set foot in the kitchen. I sympathise in some ways, when my DM died,df remarried, she died,I remarried,had a baby at 41, worked ft nights nursing ironically, only child, ended up looking after him terminally ill, after working a 12.5 night shift, and he lived 40 miles away.

You need to speak normally, if not a little quieter than normal. Have the television on at normal volume. Stop making concessions for him and he will realise he needs to wear his hearing aid.

Hearing aids are uncomfortable, and even the best ones don't provide the kind of clarity natural hearing does. After a certain age, they can become rpetty ineffective in my experience. I agree he should wear them. It's importnat for keeping his brain active that he ehars properly. But he's 80. Be a bit patient.

He's frail, he's 82, and you're refusing to let him come round or ask for help? You do realise that it isn't going to be a problem for much longer, don't you?

Accept him for the way he is now. Don't leave yourself in the position where three or four years down the line you're thinking, 'I wish I hadn't said that to my grandfather,' but are not able to change it.

I don't think they have really put enough research into hearing aids.

A lot of them don't seem to work.

Hello OP - your grandad sounds very like my late dad, who was in his 80s when he died earlier this year. Lived alone, wouldn't help himself, pretty much stone deaf, wouldn't wear his hearing aids, TV on full blast etc.

I appreciate how frustrating it is, especially when the solution is right sodding there!

An earlier poster suggested this and you weren't keen but tbh, the only that worked for me (me? Him?) was writing things down for him on a pad or small whiteboard. He would answer quite happily.

If that's going to drive you up the wall, maybe you could consider a voice-to-text app on your phone? I.e. you speak into the phone and then the screen displays a block of large-print to east under his nose.

For my dad, this final part of his life was lonely and miserable. Being further cut off, by not being able to hear the world around him or communicate properly, only served to increase his isolation.

Nothing to stop you banning your grandad from your house if you honestly can't bear it - your house, your rules - but I know that if I'd done this, I'd be consumed with guilt and regret now. As infuriating as my dad was, I loved him very much and I miss him terribly. Not trying to make you feel bad - just being truthful.

Sadly I think this is happening. Thank you for voicing that and I'm so sorry you've gone through this too. As PP said, it's always women.
Then we're labelled as disablist, ageist, should be ashamed of yourself, harsh, and whatever else I've been called on this thread.

I really hope you're okay and I'm with you in solidarity ❤️

You did ask if you were being harsh in your OP!

You asked if it was rude for him to come round and to be catered for with his disability and his problems with his HAs in your OP.

He might think you’re the rude one, always shouting and berating him for not wearing his aids, but not realising communication is two-way and you need to reframe how you communicate with him.

I’m perfectly fine thanks. I gave you the benefit of my own lived experience and that of my Dad and countless other deaf people of all ages and backgrounds and states of hearing and communication styles that I’ve known all my life.

I also know that sometimes disabilities conflict - in my life I’ve met many people of different disabilities and there are some who are absolutely allies to each other because their individual struggles have taught them empathy and a willingness to accommodate each other.

There are others who can’t do this and are only concerned with their own disability and can’t accommodate others but want their own needs recognised. I find them hypocritical.

With your emphasis on your own needs you seem unwilling to accommodate your granddad. But actually if you do accommodate him, as I’ve suggested the sound level will go down, communication will be easier and your needs will be met. It will be less exhausting for you both.

His ears aren't blocked.

OP, when you are caring for someone, as you and your mum both are, the first and most important rule is to look after yourself. You sound like you are at breaking point and it's no good risking your own health - including your mental health, especially when you are a single parent with your own child to take care of. Working out a plan with your mum for you all to step back a bit sounds ideal. Don't be afraid to involve social services as a PP suggested. My MiL didn't want to accept carers, but she would accept a cleaner, and eventually a 'home help' who would do whatever jobs were needed on the day she visited. Definitely look into attendance allowance if you aren't already getting it as it could pay for this help. Being a carer is exhausting and I wish you the best.

Don't let anybody put the guilt trips on you. They can piss right off. Your life. Your choices.

Making a plan is a good idea. You might also get some tips from Age UK about handling a stubborn old git who is refusing help unless it's from a female relative (because that's their duty, right?).

What happens when (if?) you and your mum go on a fortnight holiday? That's an interesting scenario to consider and might help put things into place while you're making your plan.

Yes I agree it is very hard for people with disabilities, and it's very scary to lose your hearing, but the thing you're forgetting is that it's not the granddaughters responsibility to look after her grandad. She has a child to look after.

And also do you see where she wrote in her opening post, that he has never done a thing for himself, that he got her granny to do everything for him. So he was a selfish man already.

@RoseAylingEllisFanClub -
I haven't berated him once. I treat him with the utmost respect and love.
And from the majority of posters being on my side, no, I don't think I'm being too harsh at all, nor do I think I'm being unreasonable. That's what posting in AIBU is about, to figure out if you're being unreasonable.

I've come to the conclusion I am not. My grandad is being lazy and bone idle. Elderly aren't exempt from that whatsoever.