Called mil selfish, not proud of myself

[Knitjob]

Mil and fil both late 80s, both mentally all there, fil fine but slow and frail, mil really poor mobility, struggles to get out a chair, can't reach down to get socks and shoes on, can't really twist round to fasten her bra or get a jumper on, falls a lot and needs nurses with inflatable cushions to get her up.
She's in hospital after falling twice in one day. Hospital are reluctant to let her home without a care package. She has always been determined not to need care and elderly fil is basically her carer which is exhausting for him and just not sustainable.

She's come up with this great plan where dh, sil and I will take turns to stay overnight with them, get her up and dressed then go to work, get her ready for bed in the evening. They live in a different town 45 minutes from us with good traffic and maybe 30 minutes from sil. She has even devised a timetable of who will stay when. This is to go on until she's better. Unfortunately she's never going to get better. Her bones and joints are damaged beyond repair.

Dh and sil are seriously considering this plan. I think it's total madness, unsustainable and really unfair. We all have young families. They won't consider moving closer to us.
I said I was not willing to do it. Too much, 3 young kids, work, school, it's just not going to work. She said I was condemning her to a life in hospital apart from her husband. I said she was selfish for not considering carers and she was basically expecting me to live separately from my husband 4 or 5 nights a week. I am not proud of myself for it, I have apologised. But it is selfish.

Hospital have asked dh and his sister to think about whether they are really actually prepared to share living with their parents. They have referred to social services for care assessment but pil won't engage. I am sat quietly in the corner feeling like the bad guy.

But this is not a sensible plan, is it? If it was for a few weeks to recover that would be different but this is an open-ended thing. She's not going to get better and once this madcap plan is in place it will be really hard to stop. And apart from her mobility she is in good health. Her own parents and her brother lived well into their 90s so this could go on for a long long time.

Rant rant rant. Sorry. Thanks for reading

MIL,88 insists she will staying in her house for as long as possible. I see this scenario unfolding for us but we are 64 and 65. BIL is 67 although his DW is younger.
She has no downstairs bathroom and a tortuous narrow staircase.
She does say that she will go to live with BIL when she is not coping. I am not sure that he understands the implications of having her living there permanently in a state of ill health. I also have no idea what his DW thinks as we have little contact. He is also not averse to borrowing large sums of money from her.
My DH reluctantly accepts that the situation will deteriorate although in the past he accused me of being unkind for saying I would not look after her.
Thank heavens I have Mumsnet to stiffen my resolve!!

Also going back to your OP, she said you were condemning her to be in hospital unless you agreed. You need to be really really clear with this - if she gets stuck in hospital it will because SHE will not agree to having outside carers. Not because of you. Shut that talk right down.

I agree with everyone else, she is being ridiculous, you can't do this with your own family and work etc, you'll be dead before her!! Can I ask are your parents still alive? Will your DH do the same for them? Good luck stick to your guns xxx

She is selfish. If she refuses carers she's condemning herself to hospital not you.

Stand firm and don't give in. If my dh agreed to such madness I'd be furious.

So they expect you to only get 4 nights a fortnight in the same house?

Fuck that.

I think you are right, they should get carer’s help.

My MIL was discharged from hospital with terminal cancer. We knew it would be a limited amount of time, maybe 3 months if we were lucky.

We had carers in 3 times a day, and pretty much moved in with them for the duration.

In that 3 months, whilst I don't resent or regret being there when she needed us the pressure was intense, despite having carers in so often.

You're not being selfish at all, it's not a practical plan.

I really don’t think you mil, sil or dh realise what this crazy plan means.

Yanbu and good for you for saying no.

As a pp said, she is restricting herself to staying in hospital. Not you.

every elderly person I have known has fought against having carers. I think many old people with failing health lose all sense of anything and fight like cornered rats. They all labour under the misapprehension - like the OP’s mil - that they are going to “get better”. I suppose people simply can’t face that it’s the final stretch.

Gm, dm, mil and then fil in turn all refused care packages. What happened is that they all had to go into care homes. Even the most devoted child cannot cope with night waking, double incontinence and heavy lifting.

I agree with advice of iamawoman upthread who suggested respite care for mil. A nice convalescent home would offer respite for the fil and a chance to sample care for the mil (although nice homes cost £££££).

Furthermore OP’s dm will not be able to stay in hospital indefinitely. Mil was in hospital for some weeks and refused a home care package. Fil was unable to cope. The hospital sent a letter threatening to sue unless mil was moved to a care home.

OP’s mil I mean.

She is being selfish and unrealistic, she should realise that your dh priority is you and children, she will cause terrible strain on family relationships. I'd offer to do practical stuff like housework once a week, online shopping, bit of gardening but no way would I stay 10 nights a fortnight, even full time carers get more time off than that, does dh really want to wash her, deal with continence, falls, feeding, getting her dressed, what's he going to do is she wets herself in the middle of the night or falls and he's got to go to work the next day. He will make himself ill.

Similar to @Rachie1973 my dad came home from hospital with a very few months to live. My mum was (and still is) very fit, she had carers in several times a day, then latterly, Marie Curie nurses in every night overnight. She still insisted she needed one of her daughters there every day/night.

Frankly, it about bloody killed us, and we weren't doing the lifting/toileting etc. You have to be trained to do that stuff, we were really not able to do it. My dad was a gem of a man, we were properly devoted to him, but we could not have cared for him with no professional help. My health was affected, I ended up on a disciplinary at work because of mistakes I made when exhausted from caring.

AND THAT WAS WITH A HUMONGOUS CARE PACKAGE.

OP, stand firm, refuse to do it, and refuse to allow your DH to do it. They are emotional and can't be rational about what they can do without risking their health and jobs.

Sil has now realised this plan will mean she never gets a night off. Every night her kids are away she will be with her parents. She is beginning to backtrack I think. Thank goodness.

Phew! See, they've just been too emotional to think it through

@HollowTalk - not a great deal, she was paid the carers allowance so did his shopping and washed his clothes and dad was quite friendly with her and her family (she was about my age then so around mid 30's and she'd cared for her dad when he died - but they lived in the same village and caring was her job, I had moved away for university years before, dad had moved away multiple times from where we lived as kids so no familiarity of the area - I can't make up my mind if she was jealous of me having moved away from home, having a degree and PhD and career in science .... or if she was just ignorant - she was certainly mouthy and nasty when I was so low because dad was dying and I had a new family plus going back to work

This is a totally mad idea. Unrealistic and unsustainable. Your PILs current state of health is already poor and it will only get worse. That means they will need more and more doing for them, including personal care and in the worst case scenario will need care 24/7.

My dad was my mum's carer and when his health started failing, we had a right job persuading my mum to accept help. Dad had to go into hospital and she couldn't be left on her own. With the help of SS we persuaded her to go for respite care to a care home. The care home couldn't take her the first night dad was in hospital so I stayed overnight and she went to the care home the next day.

My darling mum drove me nuts that night. She needed this, that and the other. Then when I thought she was settled in bed and I went to bed, she was shouting for me all night. It was a nightmare and that was only one night.

Don't do it OP. And unless you are looking at paying privately for carers to come in, I would look at a care home, because having carers in 3 times a day from Social Services(which is what my parents got when Dad came out of hospital) just wasn't enough.We ended up having to supplement it and just "popping round" always turned into a 2-3 hour visit.

I went round one night about 9 o'clock just to make sure they were ok and to make tea and toast. I had to help Dad go to the toilet and then he couldn't get back into bed. I had to ring DH to come and help me get him back into bed. It took us over an hour as he was so heavy. By the time he was finally in bed, it was gone midnight, and we were both exhausted . DH had to be up at 5.45 am the next day to go to work, and I had to go to work and get 3 children including one with autism, off to school. That was only the start of it.

My parents eventually went permanently into a care home. as their health deteriorated. They needed care 24/7, they were both incontinent, had poor mobility and had frequent falls. They needed help with washing (including intimate areas), dressing, toileting and frequently needed cleaning up after accidents.Dad had to be lifted with specialist equipment. They needed about 15 lots of medication at different times during the day.The carers all worked long shifts, but at least they got time off in between. You won't.

So it's okay for them to say no to pay for carers but you have no choice?

Just keep saying no. It is your life and you choose how you live it. If that is working full time with a young family and occasionally helping them then so be it. They can't make you do anything and they are very selfish if they think they can/should.

I am very at the self entitlement of some older people.

I had to double check that I hadn't written that last post.

With two ill and frail people, my parents in their 80s and 90s we started with carers x 3 visits and us 'popping in' every day.

Graduated to a live in carer but she had four hours off per day (fair enough) and they couldn't be left so we went round, (luckily we were recently retired) for those 4 hours.

Eventually we got them to have another carer for those hours plus of course we ran the house administratively, harder than you think, and did all the shopping, medical appointments and medication issues as the carer couldn't leave them.

Dad fell over and broke his leg in the lounge when the carer was upstairs with Mum. The electricity failed twice as their wiring was ancient, there was an electric stair lift and Mum was in an oxygen machine pretty much 24/7 so reliable electricity was essential.

Eventually they went together into a locall care home. It was an extremely difficult time and they passed away within a few months of each other less than a year after entering the Home. You have my sympathy.

The plan that is currently proposed to provide care for relatives that live 45 minutes away, makes no provision for holidays, sickness of the carer and cost of petrol. There is also the huge amount of time that is expected to be away from the carers own home and loss of freedom. The relatives are asking for a huge amount of support, physically, time, emotionally and costly. I agree that their existing home needs to be assessed and they need to pay for some services. Your family can provide some support, but I would NOT be committing to what they are currently asking for. Can they move into SIL or your house, why should anyone travel to their house ? I agree unless you have done this, you don't know how draining it can be !

Just keep repeating that it won't work.

Your pils need to move closer AND have carers in. Even if they lived with you or sil it's too much for too long.

I would stay out of it and let your dh and sil come up with suggestions. And social services. I don't know if even carers would be enough, maybe some kind of supported living would be more appropriate.

Would they consider a live in housekeeper/nurse/carer maybe? If they are adamant that they stay in their own home? You could say its just until mil is better?

Just came across this thread again - how did this resolve itself @Knitjob?