My mother can be so difficult.

[Fragggggie]

I live at home due to a housing situation. In my locality and where I am close to work, there's no rental properties available and anything available is some distance away and it's so expensive now too. I don't take advantage of living at home and I help. My mother has no one else in her life. She's divorced, her large family of siblings don't socialise with her, and all my siblings live abroad. I provide security at home and some company too when I am not at work. She has no friends or hobbies. She has acquianstances but it's nothing. There's no real socialising.

She's in her early 70s. I help at home but I am careful not to criticise or being sarcastic and I am careful not to be too smothering and give her loads of independence.

The family home is old and it's not insulated in the loft. It can get so cold. We are currently going through a cold snap and I am having a terrible time at home.

She is obsessed with opening windows for ventilation. I agree ventilation is important but she is obsessed with opening the windows and leaving them open all day long. I have them closed and she doesn't seem to be somewhat content with them closed right now. I have a fire in the fireplace on and the radiators are warm now, thank goodness. There's a huge problem in that she keeps drying laundry on the radiators and the damp clothes on warm radiators, it's only really adding to the cold house. I offered gentle guidance and suggested not drying clothes on radiators because it's only making damp worse. She won't listen to me. She just won't listen to me. It's so hard. I am trying to do my best for both of us and the family home too. It's impossible. It's so hard.

She doesn't dry clothes on my bedroom radiator. She used to but I have to lock my bedroom door now. There's one bedroom that is so damp and mouldy and nothing valuable should go into it and certainly not trying to dry clothes in there especially undies. I have seen her underwear in there before. I can't imagine what it would be like to wear clothes so close to you that likely has mold transferred onto them. There's no reasoning with her. She just writes off my suggestions.

She's used to living and operating her house that way, I wouldn't take it personally and I'm sure she's too stuck in her ways to change unfortunately.
It's good you've got a locking your door, probably best to spend most of your time in there if it's warm.

I think you can get a grant to insulate the loft which will make a considerable difference.
If your mother is not a sociable person there’s not much you can do about it. Is she complaining that she’s lonely?
It’s difficult living with other people even when you love them. Do you have a plan for how to leave?

You seem to post regularly about this, are you just venting or do you want advice?

Suggest a tumble dryer?

She won't dry a wet load in the dryer because she's paranoid of the electriticy cost and bill. She will use the dryer but more so to warm her clothes or to air clothes at the end of drying them all over the place.

(I use the dryer though) I wait for her to go to bed and I chuck any of my wet laundry into the dryer).

The air in the house is so so so so so cold.

I go in and out from other people's homes and other people's homes are not this cold.

I will look into the grant for her.

Bottom line is you are living in her house, she makes the decisions. If you’re paying your share of the bills why not pay a bit more and get some heat going in your room? Take your clothes to a launderette and dry them there instead of the mouldy room. It’s not uncommon for older people to be obsessed with keeping windows open.

What I took from your post is that you are being very careful not to criticise and giving her “gentle guidance”.
Just stop pussy-footing around. Have a row! Put your foot down, loudly, say you cannot live like this!
This is utterly ridiculous and she needs to make the house warmer.

It's not about freezing my ass off and trying to make the house warmer for myself. I am trying to make it a better place for the two of us. I am trying to protect the family home I grew up in and she is saving me from homelessness and I am trying to preserve what we have. The actions she's doing is making the place colder and damper. I created a system for drying clothes in the summer time. We don't have a dediacted utility room but I found floor to ceiling railings and i installed them in the hall. It takes mountains of laundry. It was done across from the radiator. I have a dehumidifier running too but she won't leave it in for long at all. The worst is any time there is any heat on the radiators, she's putting wet stuff on top of them and I see steam. I already observed rust on the radiators and she just won't stop.

I think I vaguely remember my father having the same battle with her when I was younger. I think he was always advising her not to be drying clothes in the rooms.

I can manage reasonably well inside. The thermometers read 6 degrees indoors today. It's likely colder now. I can manage ok by putting on layers but it's absolutely ridiculous.

I went to the local village today and I ordered a lot of fuel and it was delivered. She was only just critical about it all. I got a fire on in the fireplace by 4pm to try and heat it. Some warmth did come in the evening. The air is just so cold in the house and this just can't be good.

It's going to be difficult to change the habit of a lifetime
But ... does she have a garden? Can she dry clothes outside? As long as there is wind, clothes will mostly dry outside even in cold weather and can be finished off in the tumble dryer m. They'll smell a lot fresher too. They key thing is there has to be wind
If that's possible, it might help and she may not need to keep the windows open to deal with what must be a fairly significant damp problem

I think I will search for an article online about why you shouldn't dry clothes on radiators and just print it and let her read it.

We do have a clothes line and we use it as much as we can when it allows. It rains a lot.

Even when we are drying stuff outside she still has the windows wide open all day long to air the place.

Honestly, I do not know anybody who keeps windows open all day long or chooses to live at 6 degrees. These are the conditions of a Siberian prison!
you need to put your foot down and get angry!
she sounds mentally ill, this is completely insane and the conditions are not habitable.

Presumably she is airing the house in an attempt to combat the damp?

Have you established if the damp is just from washing/laundry/breathing/cooking for two people or if there is something more structural going on somewhere?
Is there condensation on the windows, and do you wipe them down if so?

Could you try a heated airer to replicate drying on a radiator for her, or would she not plug it in? A heated airer with a dehumidifier next to it would dry your clothes quite fast without adding to damp problems (though as she won't use the tumble dryer I can see that she might not go for it).

I am wiping the windows every morning. The dampness would be from likely her drying laundry in the rooms. That would be one factor. The windows being left open all day long too. I had a dreadful week a few weeks ago where there was a lot of heavy drizzle for the week. I woke one morning and the bathroom was fine. When she got up, she opened all the windows and about an hour later I noticed the bathroom had so much condensation. There's a window in the bathroom. My only conclusion was because the window was open and the moisture from the outside air was higher than in instead. I don't know. It was so damp that week and smelly.

She won't use a heated airer. She won't plug it in.

There may be a structural issue with one of the bedrooms but I don't know and it's not for me to fix. I don't have the money to do it and she is likely to will the place to a sibling who lives abroad because he's her favourite. I'm not going to take out a loan and pump money into the house. She's like to ignore problems.

A lot of the dampness is the open windows all day long and drying clothes indoors. It rains a lot outside so it is hard to dry clothes. I created a drying system last year with florr to elimg railings and that is worked by suction and all she did was just push it aside for her own stuff wearing the suction thing. At one stage the railings were all down.

I'm sorry, but to be blunt you sound quite domineering in your 'my way is the only way' approach.
Your mother is not wrong to open windows, but not for ventilation reasons - for reducing humidity (which may, or may not be caused by drying clothes).
The air outside typically has less moisture in it than that inside - especially if you have clothes drying or steamy bathrooms etc so getting fresh outside air will help reduce humidity inside.

Damp air takes more energy to heat, so that's also part of your problem with the indoor temperature.

Rather than focusing on the open window issue, concentrate on reaching a target humidity level inside. Do you have an indoor humidity/ temperature meter (about £5 each) for the main rooms? Perhaps agreeing targets for this (e.g. 20c/ 60% humidity) would help you agree what needs to be done.

And run the dehumidifier if levels are too high - you will be able to point to the 'too high' levels on the meter to explain why this is necessary.

But drying clothes indoors contributes to the humidity. I made a simple suggestion of not drying wet clothes in the bedrooms but she won't listen.

This sounds a bit obsessive by both of you, but I get why if it's 6 degrees and damp, it's very difficult to think straight in those conditions.

I agree with opening windows daily but not with leaving them open for hours and when it rains.

Not heating an old house is going to make the damp and condensation much worse.

But all these things are too specific. I think the problem of the relationship between you is more systemic. Tbh I would make a plan to get a job in another area, or which has accommodation attached, with a view to leaving.

Not all clothes can be dried in a tumble drier. Where do you suggest she dries them? The same amount of moisture will come out whether they’re on a radiator or a drying rack.
The issue is removing the moisture from the air.
You do sound fairly incompatible though, and I think you’re justifying your outrage with all this ‘I’m doing it for the sake of the family home’ stuff.

Is it really 6c? If so, that’s ridiculous. No one should have to live at that temperature!

I am struggling to believe the house is 6 as that is very low if you are having a fire or some heat during the day. Opening windows does not cause condensation and particularly in old houses having windows on vent is very important. If we have a hot shower we always open a window. Drying clothes on radiator not great but would not cause the damp you describe. I would look at the roof or chimney and make sure moisture is not seeping in. Spray the mould with mould killer and then put on mould stop paint which might help.

Could you move out into a shared house - rent a room somewhere else as a lodger? Then you wouldn't need to worry about all of this.