Parents moving back somewhere I worry is dangerous

[Nonky]

Hello I’m not sure what to do (if anything) so thought I’d ask here as I always get great advice!
I have never really got on with my mum (long story) but have always looked after her and my father and been supportive. Recently Dad nearly died. Again, a long story but he is now on the mend. It is going to be a life long condition he has to live with and my mum has also been ill resulting in her being unable to drive.

Whilst my father was in hospital for 9 weeks she was unable to do a thing. Partly due to living in the middle of nowhere, 2 hours from where me and my sister live. She couldn’t even walk to a shop or postbox it’s so remote. I went on leave for 2 months to do everything for her including visiting my father with her (a four hour round trip from home) in hospital every single day.

I have begged them to reconsider living there. Whilst Dad was ill they said they realised they couldn’t carry on the way they were. I did all my fathers consultant meetings, was officially next of kin and my mum just froze.

Now he is on the mend and will hopefully be able to drive in the next few months they’ve decided now to stay where they are! I’ve tried and tried (and cried and shouted and everything else in between) to get them to see if my father has to have another hospital stay (which is quite likely) she is again in the middle of nowhere.

I put my life and my families live on hold for two months and I’m pleased I did this (even though my mum has shown no gratitude and just says she didn’t ask me to help!) but I cannot do this again.

I’ve explained this and they’ve both just said they will deal with it at the time. I have stressed to them that if they make this decision they are putting both their lives at risk and whoever is left at home will be stuck. They don’t seem to care. On one hand I understand but on the other hand I think they are being very selfish as who is going to help them out when things go wrong again?

Any advice? Reading this back I don’t think there is really. It doesn’t help that I have other elderly relatives phoning me to say they can’t believe how I haven’t moved closer to them (er... jobs, kids, mortgage etc), why I haven’t given up my job to help them more (again mortgage!) and how if it was their daughter they know their daughter would not let them live so dangerously!

I have no advice but you have my sympathy.

The circumstances with my aged parents are different but I ‘m constantly frustrated by my mums stubborn refusal to face the reality of their changed circumstances.

Both are 88, dad is in the late stages of dementia and every week brings a new low, yet her favourite saying is ‘when things get back to normal’. Complete denial; as if we just ride this week out somehow everything will all magically go back to them living as they did in their 60’s.

I understand it but It’s selfish because it puts you you in constant state of anxiety as you wait for the crisis that you know is coming and that you’ll have to clear it up.

Alas I wish I knew the answer.

Step back. You have been facilitating them by being on-call for two months, so they have not had to face the difficulties of living alone. As adults, they have made the decision to stay. Give them the local taxi numbers and set up online shopping for them (if they don't have it already).

Give yourself a break. At the very least, it allows you to recharge before the next crisis hits. It's also worth remembering that although you are their child, you don't have to be their rescuer. Ignore the other elderly relatives. They are being impractical and just laying the guilt on you as a default, since they are not exactly helping themselves!

Let then live with the consequences and they'll soon change their minds. Suggest you have a hugely busy fortnight and be completely unavailable.

Thank you. I think this may be the kick up the arse I needed and to hear other people say it’s ok to do that. They told me I was selfish for wanting them to move to make my life easier and they don’t need my help. But having given up everything in the last two months to a constant carer and driver and hospital visitor and medicine collector and sorting out online shopping/online appointments everything as they weren’t able to do it I don’t think I am being selfish. They can’t do it on their own. They keep saying their friends will help. But they didn’t when it really mattered so why would they now?!

Step back easy to say much harder to do.

Your mum has a capacity and if your dad is likely to be driving again it sounds like he does too. Tell them in a letter if necessary, that you do not have the ability to drop everything again if either of them need support. You have to now put your children first they have made their decision and now they need to live with it but you will not be there to pick up the pieces, If help is required you will make sure that adult social care have their details.

Really you have to play hard ball, they are walking all over you and it will not get any better. ( as for the older relatives they can do one.... they do not get to fill you with guilt over something you can not control )

Suggest to the Elderly Interfering Relatives that they redirect their energies into phoning your parents to persuade them to move.
At least it might get them off your back. Don’t feel guilty, your parents make their own choices and you have other responsibilities.
When my Great aunt became too fragile to manage, her sister moved in with her. Perhaps the Ageing Relatives might liketo consider that?

what does your sister think?

would she join you in a kind of intervention where you say, right, if this happens again, YOU will have to do the following because we can't just drop our jobs and our families?

My sister leads a busy and child free life with a full time job and for some reason my parents and her have presumed (wrongly but that's how it is) as i work part time then of course I could do the bulk of the care. She is also as stubborn as they are!

As far as my mum is now saying, she never needed my help and didn't want me to do so much as she was perfectly capable of managing at the time. The thing is, I hadn't done what I did, my critically ill father would have been on his own in hospital for 8 weeks whilst she sat at home unable to get anywhere or do anything!

I can see I have little choice other than to back right off now which seems awful after we thought he was going to die.

I am so profoundly not going to do this to my kids. Well, as long as I have my faculties I won't.

You can't make the horse led to water drink any of it, sorry.

OP, so your sister doesn't help but she expects you to?

I find it extraordinary that your mum isn't appreciative of what you have done.

I think you do need to have a serious talk with them and say "right, you say you would have managed without me, so I assume you have plans in place to do that if I'm not able to take another two months off work"!!! Jeez. I feel for you

Thanks all. Yes Grace she does and I had that exact talk with them all last night and it ended up with me in tears terrified that I’m going to have to do what I’ve done in the last two months all over again in the not too distant future. Even then their answer is they don’t want me to have to do it and can manage perfectly well on their own without me! Well I’m going to have to let them find out themselves. If they can do it without me - great! I will take back every word. But I am not putting my children and husband and myself (and my friends who helped me out by looking after my children a lot and my job that lost £1000’s of business due to me suddenly having to drop everything) through anything like this again.

Now to just not feel sick and guilty when it happens! I will try my best!

aw, Nonky, do you want a hug? (we tend not to call hugs "unmumsnetty" on the Elderly Parents board).

You sound like you have done so much for your folks. i know the guilt thing is easier said than done, but honestly, you have made so many sacrifices, you couldn't have done more. I hope for everyone's sake it doesn't happen again, but they will have to manage, even if it means taking a lot of taxis - which may cost less than the income you've lost? - and a parent spending time alone in a hospital.

I am hoiking my bosom in indignation at how they are treating you really!

Thanks Grace212 - a hug is lovely!!! My kids don’t know how lucky they are - if nothing else I know I shall never do this to them (though I’m sure I will do something else to piss them off, nobody’s perfect! 😂). Thanks for your kind words xx

My parents did exactly this to my Dsis and I when they were 74. They moved somewhere an hour away. My DM was exhibiting signs of dementia and my DF's driving was going downhill fast. New location had no near by bus service and a taxi to the station was £12.
We wrote them a letter and we talked to them and it made no difference.
If anything we made them even more stubborn. What made matters worse was that house overlooked a landfill site.
Your recent update is the way to proceed. Do more of your own thing and MUCH less of theirs

You must not facilitate them next time - because there will be a next time, and a time after that, and a worse time....

Have a think now about what you are prepared to do - and you will have to do some stuff, there's no escaping - but have some kind of a plan in place. Eg one visit a week plus their online shopping or whatever.

Also may be worth checking out local services round them (Good Neighbour networks, taxi services, Age UK Home Helps, care agencies, care homes that offer respite, pharmacies that will deliver/online pharmacy etc etc) and get a handle on whether they have savings that would mean they would be self funding if they have care needs. Don't tell them any of this by the way, keep it for when you need it.

If they do crack, could they afford to move nearer to you?

@Fortysix

how did that turn out?

I do know of one similar situation when a widow of that age moved somewhere far from her children, but she didn't put upon them for support.

The could well afford to keep their house AND buy one closer to me and live in that if they really didn't want to sell their home. They could also afford help, cleaners and multiple taxis. But they won't. They say they don't like the area I live in and don't want to be anywhere near here (fair enough I guess - we certainly don't have the money they have). It really is a very hard situation. My father could not ever be in a worse situation than he was two months ago other than actually being dead. If this hasn't given them the shock they need, nothing will.

But after ALL that to continue to live somewhere which gets regularly flooded, has no shops, post box, pavements - ANYTHING at all, when the chances are my mother could well be stuck there with my father in hospital 30 mins away, with no family nearer than 2 hours a way seems bonkers.

Thank you everyone for your advice. Just hearing that I am not being silly by thinking this way has made me feel much better. At the end of the day they are unwell yes, but are totally 'with it' and have every right to do what they want. Even if it is something I would never ever burden my children with. They have said they would never have looked after me the way I looked after them so I guess that says it all!

Also, the tricky thing is they have never once asked me or told me to do anything for them. However, if I hadn't, my disabled mother would have been on her own for two months in the middle of nowhere with nobody whilst her husband was (in the end) 2 hours away in a coma with no next of kin! They say they don't need me but that is what would have happened.

Nonky, from what you are saying, it sounds like that really is how they want things to be.

do you mind if I ask how old they are? I have heard it said that at a certain age, the stress of moving can be so full on - wondering if your parents would prefer to just be stuck, or reliant on cabs that they can afford, it seems, rather than move?

can they do their own online shopping?

If they had said that to me about how they wouldn't do the same, I don't think I'd ever speak to them again, to be frank.

It was more of a 'we are old and ill and frail and couldn't look after you and couldn't face doing what you did' (but they would have said this for the last 20 years!). But then not old and frail and ill enough to not live in the middle of nowhere! They are early 70's

Yes they can do their own online shopping as I have set this up for them. But they can't get anywhere to post a letter or withdraw any money. My mothers eye sight would be too bad to even use a cash machine without my Dad being there to help. He was always the one who did everything but now can not do this.

Sounds like they either have to get paid help or move...I feel for you OP, but it seems like they need to experience the consequences of their choices.

if they have money, they can get where they need to go by taxi. I agree, if they can live in the middle of nowhere, they are able to cope with stuff.

Grace212 - yes x

Nonky It's hugely hurtful and distressing when they choose to forget so quickly just how involved you have been. However, in my parents' case, they became even more defiant and did it any way.
Back off for the next year or two. Prioritise your children and DH. See them once a month and try to tie in that your sister sees them the alternate fortnight. Encourage them to find a decent GP surgery and avail themselves of all the local services that may support your mum's disability. Try to suggest a downstairs bathroom and bedroom is a minimum requirement. If they are in their mid 70s, they may limp along for another four or five years before they actually need major intervention.
Let them reap what they have sown; if things go pear-shaped big time it sounds like they might have financial means to undo their mistake so it might not be forever.
My mum was eventually sectioned and my dad had a catastrophic accident in the house because of the unsuitable stairs. However, I'm sure if my dad was alive and my mum had her marbles, they would still do it all again.
Mine were very fortunate they had the services of an exceptional social work team for nearly ten years and better than average hospital provision. They actually lucked out by their new postcode. However, the reality of the situation was because my mum was isolated her dementia took hold faster.

I could fill a book with their tales. My DF abandoned in the garden for four hours one January teatime when he tripped in the garden and my muddled mum thinking he was at a hospital appointment. Or when they had the police rescuing them both walking separately on a motorway hard shoulder. Or being driven to a cash point by bogus tradesmen who stole £700 to wash their driveway. But it was their choice and they never once regretted it despite their troubles.

Blimey! Forty six! How awful for you! But I guess if they never regretted it then it was best for THEM.
You are right, it’s very hurtful that a) they are carrying on as if none of this happened and b) they won’t even consider changing things so I wouldn’t have to go through it again. But you are all correct - I CAN’T do it again and I won’t be doing it again and that is 100% their choice so they need to deal with the consequences, not me this time. I’ve done more over the last two months than most people would ever have to do. I don’t have any resentment that I did that but I do now that still they won’t consider what I did. Anyway, onwards and upwards! Thank you xx