Son won't help me post surgery

[Silentlysinging]

I've been waiting for quite some time to have a hysterectomy. I am in desperate need and have purposely avoided it for years, due to having a DD at home (now aged 10). I cannot put it off any longer and have finally been given a date. I obviously will be off my feet for a couple of weeks and so my concern is getting my DD back and forth to school.

Unfortunately for us, I don't have a support network in place to help, hence why I've put this off for so long. I don't have siblings, my parents are not nice people and so we have no contact, my friends have their own children to care for and jobs to get to, my neighbours aren't the sort to help out and my ex husband works abroad most of the year.

My son (aged 21) lives around an hour and 20 minutes away from home. He's away at uni at the moment and is a fully dedicated student. He's only in uni 2 days a week and currently hasn't got a job. He enjoys spending a lot of time in libraries and coffee shops, much more grand and elaborate than the ones we have at home. He loves his life away from home and I'm so very happy for him, as well as immensely proud of the life he's created for himself.

The thing that has hurt me the most throughout this entire process is, my son is aware I have no support network at home. He has seen me suffer for years, despite me trying my best not to make a big deal out of things, to avoid upsetting my children. I have dragged myself to be a mother and work full time to provide while I've literally been wearing double pads and underwear. He obviously doesn't know the full ins and outs, but is aware I've had issues that affect my daily life. He's aware I'm going for my op and will have no one to help and hasn't at all offended to come home for a week to help his DS.

Believe me when I say I am more than ok to try myself and may even have to just keep her off a week and home educate her, but am I being unreasonable to be hurt that he won't even offer to help me after quite a big op? I was in hospital for a week two years ago and he came to visit me once, while hungover and slept in the chair. I just feel perhaps I've given my all to the extent I've belittled my own worth and worthiness of being cared for, by someone I've moved heaven and earth to support. Perhaps I'm just a bit sensitive and nervous.

With regards your son, he's a young lad who's a full-time student who lives 90 minutes from home. It's not easy to pop back and forth regularly, so I don't think it's necessarily fair to expect him to.

But have you tried asking the school? I know ours have been helpful in getting students to/from school when necessary.

Or even another school mum? I'm sure if you put it in the chat that you're going to be off your feet for a bit, someone who lives near would be happy to help.

I hope the op helps.

Yabu not to ask him. He’s not a mind reader. Also Yabu to delay for years, there are several long breaks in the school year so you could have tried for an appointment in the summer holidays or arranged your child’s other parent to return to the uk for the scheduled op. You also might be eligible for support (my friend who had an c section recently got funded taxis for her child to be taken to school while she recovered). I dp find people with no support network are often in that situation because of the way they interact with others. Not saying that is your situatio but from this post alone you do seem to have a victim mentality when there are simple steps you could take such as actually asking someone for help.

@Silentlysinging

Have you looked on your local council website for school transport? The local councils all have a service you can apply for temporary transport for parents who are temporarily incapacitated i.e. post surgery. If you're willing to name your council, or PM me Im happy to help you find the application form.

OP I think you should ask the school for help. Maybe get a babysitter/temporary nanny to do school runs. Or just keep your dd home till you can walk it. Contact your local authority and ask if they have a community childminding network- I used to do a lot of short term work for families who needed support this way, often a parent was sick it does tend to be support for younger children but I’ve done school runs for a family once when the mum was hospitalised so it may be your LA can point you to help.

im sorry you have had some harsh responses. I don’t think it’s unreasonable to ask a 21 year old for help. The fact you have pushed through so long so as not to impact him may be a contributing factor. I know he’s your son but I’d not forget this in years to come when you become helpful to him for childcare etc.

I missed some uni days to help with my father after he had an operation. It was expected of me and never expected of my brother. Not one person has ever said to me I should not have been asked because I was the child and a full time student. Perhaps times have changed or perhaps this is because the young adult in question is male.

it absolutely is unreasonable to expect a child to become a full time carer or long term carer for their parent. We don’t have kids just so there is someone to care for us in our dotage. But this isn’t long term it’s short term!!

im fairly certain they won’t let you be the only adult home for 24 hours after a general anesthetic too. You may want to check that. If the hospital keep you in because of that or if you have complications and need to stay in what will your son do then?

My niece works in a school and said you should highlight the issue as there will be staff willing to help.
I would if you lived nearby sending you ❤️❤️

I agree.
I live in an area where a lot of families have moved a long way to be and thus have no family support network. We help each other out
A. because it is nice and a good thing to do for your friends
B. Because it is banking favours for the future when i could be stuck due to no family support

One of my friends, lives rurally, nearest family are 300 miles away and her DP family are in Aus, broke her leg, her kids made it to and from school everyday and her DP didn't miss work, because many of us stepped up, i even used to swing by and pick my friend up to join after-school socials in the summer as she was missing out and getting cabin fever.

It's about karma, or whatever you want to call it, and requires long term investment.

I feel that OP my have allowed herself to become over reliant on her DS.

I hope the OP goes well OP and I'm v glad you're having it.

When you are out and recovered I think you should consider some therapy and counselling - you seem to really struggle to assert yourself, and (while I can see things are tough) you do come across as a prone to martyrdom in some of your posts (eg suggestion you may put the op off again). A lack of assertiveness and being unable to ask clearly for what you want isn't helpful in life. Things will be better - and you will be a better role model for your DD - if you change that.

Re your son - it's good he's doing the basic minimum. 21 year olds are selfish, and usually have no health issues, so need. things. spelt. out. You may not get everything you want this way, but it will improve.

You need to explain to your Son that you need his help for the week after your op & that you have no one else you can rely on. If he can't or won't come home contact the School & let them know your situation. They may suggest someone who could maybe help get your Daughter to/from school. Does your Daughter have any friends that live local who she could ask to go with them?

A 21 year old isn’t going to offer to help. Just ask him!

Just read your replies and I can see you have asked him so please ignore my previous post!

It does sound like you have an issue with asking for help though. It seems like you talk yourself out of asking by thinking of reasons why others can’t help without actually asking them. I totally get why you do this and I used to do it too - you don’t want to be a burden and you don’t want people to feel like they have to help when they don’t want to/it’s inconvenient for them. The thing is though, lots of people do actually want to help others out and if someone does agree to help when they really want to say no then that’s their issue not yours. They can always say no!

Her son lives 90 minutes away and has lectures and classes that he is paying an extortionate amount for. He is therefore clearly not available to help for the whole week. It’s not his fault that his mother has failed to establish any friendships she can lean on for support.

Sorry, parentifying an adult child because OP needs short term help?

This thread is blowing my mind.

quite- my favorite is the poster accusing the op of parentifying her adult child. It’s adultifying and if your adult child needs adultifying, otherwise known as they need to grow up, then you didn’t parent them well enough. Adults contribute.

Contribute yes, but OP wants him to do 100% because she won't ask anyone else to chip in. She could ask school, DDs friends, DDs other parent, neighbours, work colleagues all to do a bit but she won't. That's a choice she's making. Loads of posters have said they'd help out another school parent in the circumstances even if they didn't know them. It's not her son's fault she's either not made relationships with anyone or is too proud to ask them to help out a bit.

I wonder if OP was guilted into doing things for others or taught that you only ask close family for anything? She's several times said he should do it , why should she have to ask strangers. And said DS said he knew this was coming ,suggesting he knew she'd expect him to do everything. If she'd make connections with people in the many years she's needed this surgery they wouldn't be strangers. Her son should help as much as he can, but OPs pride isn't his fault and shouldn't be his problem.

Agree with @Namechangetry. An adult to adult conversation would have been the OP working out what other options were available as soon as she got the date and then coming to the DS with specific requirements for say 1-2 nights support. Instead of expecting her DS to volunteer to do it all and then having an extreme emotional response when he doesn’t, it doesn’t feel like a proper adult to adult engagement.

I know it’s not exactly the same, but it doesn’t feel dissimilar from my experiences with elderly DPs. Happy to provide what support I reasonably can in conjunction with a professional care package, but not happy or prepared to abandon my own life when other less preferred options exist as it’s faaammmily.

Adultfying would mean respecting his prior arranged commitments and accepting no for an answer. It would also mean prioritising his final year university education over a 10yo primary school education.

At the moment she accepts he will only do an afternoon and won’t stay the night, and she needs to explain to him he might have to. That is so laughably far from ‘100%’ of her care needs that your statement won’t wash. Yes she should have asked for more help from the community and will have to, but her son is also very self-centred and anything but parentified , more toddlerifiied in his self-centredness.

In a year or twos time when he is working and she says "you HAVE to stay the night" and he says no, then what is her plan? He is an adult he is occupied (by a very expensive university degree), he can't just drop things, these things need to be planned for my OP.

Let's fervently hope that, in the future when he asks her to help out with his kids, she will find herself far too important to be available.

Let's fervently hope that, in the future when he asks her to help out with his kids, she will find herself far too important to be available.

He doesn't know! He won't think about the after care.

He does need to be in uni on his days, he really does, but the other days he could be with you to help , but you need to ask him . Personally, I would ask your daughter's school friends if they could help you fir the first two weeks in getting her to school, they are going anyway

If he has kids anytime in the next 8 years she will presumably prioritise her DD over him, as she is doing now by prioritising her primary school education over his final year at uni.

Well if he didn’t directly ask for help but instead muttered about needing childcare, didn’t investigate any paid for solutions and instead expected OP to do all of it, then yes I hope she would say no. If however it was a polite request for say one day a week as part of a wider childcare package, then it’s a different scenario from what is being asked for here.

Why don't you read the full posts of OP, and a lot of the supportive ones from people who have read them properly before you say anything. Her son, yes son, needs to start repaying his Mum for all the time and care she has given him over the years and give her the time she needs to have the much needed operation and recovery time.