My parents are causing me so much anxiety.

[Afternooninthepark]

I need to firstly say that I do love my parents very much and they are lovely parents.
BUT recently I have been feeling very anxious and overwhelmed by them.
Basically, I am in my late 40’s they are in their late 70’s. I never moved far from them. I live in the same area I grew up in (I live with dh and my 2 dc), my dsis also lives nearby with her partner (they have no children).
I have always been close to my parents and pop in to see them several times a week, which has always been fine and up until recently was easy as I was a SAHM and had the time.
Over recent years my mums health has been deteriorating, she has heart problems, is bent over with osteoporosis and sadly was diagnosed with the early stages of Alzheimer’s last summer.
I feel that they are very lucky to have their two children and grandchildren living just moments away but I feel they never truly appreciate this and I often feel they (especially dad) takes this for granted and almost expects me to be on hand.
My sister pisses me off to be frank. She works full time but is home by 4/5pm most nights and has no kids or any other responsibilities yet hardly ever pops in to see them during the week, saying she has to work and is ‘knackered’.
I now work part time, look after my kids and still find the time to see our parents most days.
Since mums diagnosis dad has put on me more and more. I appreciate its hard for him, she doesn’t even like him popping down to the shed these days. If he goes anywhere he will often ring me and ask for me to pop in to see her (often at late notice), if I go more than two days or so not seeing them I will get a ‘oh we wondered where you’d gotten to??’ remark when I do see them, yet my sister never gets this as she is ‘working’.
I’m feeling overwhelmed by this (not helped by the fact I suffer from anxiety) and as mum has a condition which is obviously going to get much worse I can see my life is going to be more and more bogged down by it all. Of course I want to help them but I feel like they just expect me to be there (which of course I have brought this on myself by going round too much).
My parents aren’t hard up (mainly from inheritance from mum’s dad) yet they are really tight with their money. I don’t expect any thing from them and have never asked for anything (unlike my sister who regularly asks them to pop round hers to wait in for tradesmen etc, she never takes the time off just expects dad to do it. And they have paid her debts off in the past).
One thing which has really upset me recently is that Dad has been sorting his will and the solicitor said that by law he can give away, as a gift up to £3000 to family, friends etc. Yet the first thing he said (and keeps saying) is ‘why would I want to do that, why would I want to give any of MY money away?’ I found that really upsetting it’s as though I don’t count. Only this week he rung me up, basically asked me to drop everything to go get my mum some flowers as he had forgotten their wedding anniversary. I am always there for them and struggle with money at times, I have never asked for any money but a little offer here and there as a thank you would make me feel much more appreciated in fact just a thank you for being there would be great.
Does anyone else have these kind of issues with their elderly parents? I just feel it’s going to get worse and drain the life out of me, yet I don’t think there is anything I can do about it now. Btw it’s no use saying anything to my sister as she just gets angry and defensive saying she has too much on (she says her life if full on even though after 5pm her day is her own!), she has form for burying her head in the sand.
Any advice how I can get through all of this without loosing my marbles would be gratefully appreciated.

Speaking as someone whose father has Alzheimer’s and being an only child, I can confirm that things will definitely get worse. I’m about 5 years down the line from his diagnosis and it’s really taken its toll on me.
I think you need a frank and open conversation with your parents. My father was very tight with money too despite having plenty of it. When he was first diagnosed I told him that the rainy day that he had been putting his money aside for was now here and that he would have to start spending it on care. So even though I didn’t have financial worries for him I still ended up very involved with a care agency, privately arranged care, social services, doctors and occupational therapists etc.
From my experience, someone with Alzheimer’s needs an increasing amount of care as the months go by and your father needs to know that he will have to pay for it and that you will not be that carer.
As far as advice on how you don’t continue to be at his beck and call, all I can say is that you need to start saying no. If you don’t, your own health will suffer.

You need boundaries. You decide how much you're prepared to do and stick to it. You will feel awkward at first but you must stick to it because believe you me, this situation will indeed get worse and those around you will happily stand by and let you do it all if you let them. Maybe arrange a meeting with your father and sister to have an open discussion about the care your mother is going to need and who is going to do what.

As for the money, that's a seperate issue. I understand where you're coming from but it is his money and it's time he spent some of it on care.

I'm glad you are getting responses here op but I would suggest asking mn hq to move your thread to the elderly parents section here, you will get much more responses there. Click on your post at the report bit and just ask for it to be moved.
Good luck with your situation, I was in similar and I feel for you.

I read this and the details are so similar to my own life I"m worried people will think it's me.

My Mum doesn't have alzeimer's but she does have an expectation that she is entitled to know what' I'm up to and I have to justify it all to her!?
My sibling is entitled to privacy though.

My ONLY advice is to learn to sit with the excruciating discomfort that you feel when you try to maintain a boundary that they won't respect/deflect their questioning/refuse to answer/do the opposite of what they asked/do not do what they ''ask''.

People with parents like mine come on here (I include myself in this group) looking for some perfect way of phrasing it all that will make the parents suddenly get it.

There is no perfect way of phrasing it. There are better ways to react to them I know but the only progress for me was learning to sit witht hat discomfort of knowing that htey were annoyed and disappointed or outrgaged with me/by my ''behaviour''.

Sit with the discomfort, and instead of racing to reason with them and get them to understand just let the feeling pass through you.

This obviously extends to your sister, especially your sister and their views and perceptions of the value of her time and your time.
YOU are the one who determines the value of your time.
Do not REACT with pleading and reasoning if they put a higher value on her time.
They cannot MAKE you give up your time because she values her time more. They can ONLY make you feel bad about that.

Every single time that you have an ''episode'' (ie) feelings of overwheming discomfort wash over you because of their reactions/perceptions to something they will not view reasonably, do not react in a futile attempt to make them see

Just sit with the feelings of anxiety and their cause............ and the next time the feelings will not hit so hard.

Haven't you already posted about this and Name Changed?

We're just moving this thread over to the elderly parents topic at the OP's request.

haricot thank you, it is such a tough road, I am dreading it. I have made many suggestions including them joining our local Alzheimer’s groups but they keep refusing. I do need to get tougher.
burnt it’s so difficult to get through to them or my sister, all she says is when things get tough her and her partner will move in with my parents, she’s living in cloud cuckoo land, she has no idea how tough caring for an Alzheimer’s parent would be. I feel like banging my head against the wall at times!
ssd thank you. I’ve requested it gets moved.

ps, my parents aren't tight with their money - the opposite. But then they confused obedience with gratitude. If I do not do what they think I ought to do, I am told I'm not grateful. So view the tightness with money in a neutral not negative light.

I have sorted it all out in my head now and my parents don't understand. I am forever grateful to them, my gratitude for their generosity (financial) is eternal, but I owe them GRATITUDE and not obedience and the fact that they do not understand that is not my problem anymore.

I have finally stepped away from those feelings of powerlessness at their lack of understanding of that distinction.

I hope that makes sense. It is a long mental journey through many mazes of thought getting to this point. I guess I have detached. They may think I'm ungrateful but they're wrong and I can live with that without it driving my crazy any more

My sibling although NOT THE PROBLEM accepts their narrative. There are two ways of looking at most things and he accepts their narrative so that without him actively eroding my boundaries or disrespecting my life or accusing me of anything, my sibling just unquestioningly accepts their narrative that I can never be pleased, I'm spikey, I'm sensitive, I'm ungrateful, you can't say anything to nabiagol!

NaBiAgOL thank you, I really will take that all onboard.
Avengers no, that wasn’t me, Ive never spoken about this (in RL or on here) before, have been bottling it all up!

NaBiAgOL it’s tough going but I will have to learn to be similar in my outlook to this all. Sorry you have been through this too, it’s very hard going, I am just going to learn to take a different view/attitude to it all.

Yeh, I have/had a much much more people-pleasing type of personality to my sibling. None of this is understood/acknowledge by any of us (accept me).

We all have our roles now and they're all carved in stone. I have changed a lot over the last decade or so and they have only caught up in so far as my boundaries are adhered to a little but not respected! No, they'd be adhered to with eyerolls and mutterings of ''you can't do right for wrong with Na bi ag ol'

I know your mum has Alzheimers so it will be even more unlikely that she'll have any great epiphany that will get you ''off the hook''.

But your father and sister may learn that if they want your ''service'' they have to pay lip service to treating your time as equal. That may have to be the best you get - but you will eventually accept this without the anxiety it's causing you now.

I read a book years ago called nice girl syndrome by dr beverley engol. don't know if (after googling) it might be of interest. I also read a book by jonice webb about childhood emotional neglect. that helped a lot and I understood why I was the people pleaser in our family and more dangerously for me, outside of our family.

The only way that their negative interpretations of your actions will stop causing you anxiety is if you re program yourself to no longer be motivated to 'win' their good opinion of you (and general approval).

Sorry if this sounds obvious. I know I could have read it ten years nodding but I didn't really get it INTERNALLY

Thanks, I will check out that book, will probably need something like this.

Great advice on here. I would also really push them to start getting help in- does your dm have attendance allowance? Non means tested.Would help cover some care costs. It’s about gettin* them to accept external care ASAP.
Age uk or carers association can offer advice and support.
And look up FOG- fear,obligation and guilt.

thesandwich thanks for that. No she doesn’t get attendance allowance I will look into that for her.