Complete refusal to use technology

[Senttotestus]

My mum is 79 & a completely technophobic
In her mid 50s she resigned from her job as a Drs receptionist because they introduced computers. She worked for a few more years on a helpline then retired at 60
She has never sent a text message or WhatsApp
She has never sent an email
She cannot google anything
She has never purchased or booked anything online

A man from a tech charity for the elderly spent 2 sessions with her with no improvement

Over covid I told her she must learn to FaceTime & she has £1k worth of iPad for this purpose, she can also log onto her Halifax app to look at her balance - she cannot make any payments.

i do all her online banking, food shopping &
booking of appointments, she eagerly gives out my email address as if I am her PA

She has just rung to see where her Waitrose delivery is & she was unable to open the Waitrose app on her iPad - ITS 3 CLICKS - she presses everything with such force that most times the IPad thinks she is trying to move the apps around

I am accepting of this most days but today it just feels wilful that she has rejected all technology for over 20 years and thinks it’s acceptable to shrug and get me to do everything , laughing at any suggestion that she should be able to do some of these very basic things.

Rant over - deep breaths!! Anyone else in a similar position?

Isn't it?

I think there are people here with no idea how a phobia works.

My DM's next big birthday will see her getting a letter from the President (of Ireland) and although her siblings (now all over 80 and one older than her) embraced the internet as it appeared and developed, she dug her heels in and refused point blank to learn even the most basic phone functions. She does not understand tapping as opposed to jabbing a screen, and thinks you have to be excellent at maths to use a smartphone. Because 'smart'....

She complained to me five years ago that nobody sends her photos any more. I explained to her that we all exchange photos regularly, on our phones, and that nobody uses cameras or gets photos developed these days, and haven't done so for about twenty years.

She has a look of terror in her face when something goes wrong with her TV (usually as a result of pushing a button inadvertently) and is inclined to simply shrug and say, "Oh well, no more tennis then", and sit twiddling her thumbs instead. She is the same with all tech - terrified of the washing machine, won't let others use it, hand washes most of her clothes, and manages to press the wrong button or move the dial to the wrong setting so often we've wondered if it would be better to get her a washboard.

Terribly short-sighted. Debit cards have been around for decades. I often see signs in coffe shops and restaurants now saying that they are cashless. I totally understand why. It costs money to handle cash and it's a security risk. Fewer and fewer people pay that way, so why bother with it at all? The time is probably coming when it won't be possible any more, and then the people who've refused to learn how to use other methods of payment in earlier years will be up the creek.

Same goes for not having a mobile phone. Increasingly businesses, hospitals etc all expect to be able to contact people on a mobile or by email. They're not going to pay the extortionate cost of posting letters to the tiny minority who refuse to keep up with the times.

This is my MIL.

Plays games on her computer all the time but won’t try to do something easy like renew car tax or buy something. Asks us to do it all for her.

Same thing with her TV. It “goes wrong” all the time so finds something else to so rather than try to solve it.

Advice is always “turn it off and back on again”. Always works but never tries it herself.

Agree.
Online banking would be a nightmare with my DM, who is a sucker for a naice accent and was once on the verge of giving her bank details to a 'lovely girl' who called her one day. She was saved from disaster by sheer dumb luck.

I found that small touch screens were a step too far for my late parents. They had kept up with technology with computers and mobile phones and my dad loved digital cameras and was constantly printing pictures he had taken or copying old pictures on his printer (I honestly didn’t even know the printer did half the things he was getting it to do) but smart phones and iPads were just too fiddly. I did try to get them on smart phones but it didn’t go well and I didn’t push it and when the time came to help I just kept it simple.

I don't know if this applies to your Mum, @mathanxiety, but my Mum could have had help with her anxiety decades ago if she'd recognised that it was a medical problem, but she didn't. As far as she was concerned, it was 'just how I am' and nothing to bother the doctor with. Tragic, really. Thank goodness people are far more understanding nowadays about mental health problems. She was prescribed an antidepressant eventually which was sold to her as something to help her sleep. It does do that, but it's also transformed her mood, thank goodness, greatly reduced her anxiety levels, and she is much less stressed than she was. Still technophobic, though!

Apologies if I’ve misunderstood, but you keep in low contact with your mother just so you can get your inheritance? 😳😳

I take a slightly different view more along the lines of “be grateful you have you parents because you’ll wake up
some day and they’ll be gone”.

I couldn’t agree more.

@Senttotestus my mum's very similar. She worked in a factory until she retired 25 years ago, so she never worked with computers, and can't get on with anything technological, no matter how many times you show her.

My sister takes her shopping each week and she always pays with cash as she doesn't trust debit cards. She gets cash out over the counter at the bank as she doesn't like cash points.

She had an eye test a few weeks ago and took cash to pay for her new glasses. The opticians only take card payments so I had to pay by card over the phone and she had to go to the bank and transfer the money to me.

It can be frustrating, but she's not been well for several years now so there's no point pushing it with her, and she is grateful. She gives my sister petrol money, for instance. We definitely wouldn't be happy helping her this much if she wasn't grateful!

My teenage DS was very patient at teaching me technological stuff and accepted that he had to repeat things several times. As you have teenagers maybe rope them in. Granny might be more obliging for them.

I am going to be really harsh here as I had two parents who refused to have mobiles and liked to go into banks and council offices waving cheques around or worse cash. They didn’t expect me to do it though. At one time my late Father indicated he would quite like me go to his bank, take out some cash, then go to the council and physically pay his monthly CT. The next month could I do the same thing.

I said I would get the CT paid but in a more efficient way and because he was in the cusp of going into a home he accepted it.

They both ended up in care homes so as POA I ran their bank accounts and did their life admin but I am heartily sick of older people refusing to change their ways. It’s their way or the high way. They are also most vocal about feeling as they are been discriminated against for not being bothered to try even the simplest things.

Banks are closing everywhere because if the only people using them are the elderly or stubborn to pay in cheques or to enquire how much they have in their accounts they will shut (told to me by a bank manager friend).

I also think there is some attention seeking going on here.

Quite honestly do you really see a 70 plus women starving because they cannot use technology? Bet the OP’s parent would call a taxi to take her to the supermarket, tell them to wait for her and then spend hours complaining how much it all cost her.

MIL loves her tech but struggles with the level of touch needed to make things happen - it seems to be a bit of an age thing. Solution is a 10 pack of cheap stylus thingies from ebay in her christmas stocking every year.

Although your DM sounds just plain wilful.

Hitting the iPad like it was a typewriter😂 my 3 yr old niece worked out for herself how to open what she wanted on an iPad. This does sound deliberate. Have you got a very young child in the family who can say ‘no granny not like that you do it like this’. She would then be too embarrassed to do it wrong when a young child can do it correctly

Yes, I would. In the same way I wouldn’t do things for anyone that they could do themselves. You can’t do everything for another person because they refuse to do it.

My mum (81) just set up Apple Pay on her phone so she could use it on her croquet holiday to corfu.

I will pick up on this point
My parents had me later in life, I’m an only child and have supported them through my Dads dementia years, covid, dads death and now mums ill health and various other needs. I have been in this care role for 10 years - I’m only 46! When the one day”some day” comes I think I’ll be ok with it - I’m exhausted already

Banks are closing everywhere because if the only people using them are the elderly or stubborn to pay in cheques or to enquire how much they have in their accounts they will shut (told to me by a bank manager friend).

No doubt about this at all. When the Bank of Scotland announced that my Mum's branch was closing they put online an analysis of the customers who'd visited the branch over the previous year, broken down by age. Not many people of working age visited in person. The numbers were pushed up by people like my Dad who refused to use the ATM and drew cash out by cheque. Even he used online banking to check the balance, though.

Of course not. Some of these types of responses are pie in the sky

Lots of people have difficulties with executive functioning that over the years wouldnt have been evident, but something new comes along which challenges that, and they cant do it and now it comes to the fore

My mum has never been able to operate an ATM, she isnt compentent in lots of areas now due to significant MH issues but even before that she couldnt do it. She tried to tune in a radio once which was actually a cassette player, didnt realise what she was doing

A bit like when grandad on Only Fools was trying to get Dallas on the microwave

I take the view that though I Ioved my dad and adore my mum, there is really not very much joy in extreme old age or in caring for someone at that stage, and it is ok to feel only relief and happiness once that stage ends. I separate that from grief - I will grieve the loss of my dear mum who was wonderful to me very hard- but the end of this bit, 86-90+ I’m afraid will be a happy day, because it bears no resemblance at all to what she regarded as a good quality of life. And to deny that it’s hard is silly, it should inform your own planning.

Totally agree @PermanentTemporary

I find statements like “it’s an honour to care for them” or “one day they won’t be here” very difficult

it’s one thing to lose a parent early, another to nurse a loved one through a six month terminal illness but years and years of supporting elderly parents whilst trying to raise your own family, hold down a job etc have utterly drained me - I have not much positive to say about it

When people say it’s a honour to look after an older person - well they clearly don’t have a full time job, children or any interests outside their parent. No holidays, just running around and being the single point of contact for almost everyone who comes in contact with the older person. And the worst thing about all of it is that you really don’t know when it going to end. With my parents I found the hospitals just threw the kitchen sink at them to patch them up and literally be wheeled out back to the care home. No thought of quality of life.

My late Mother begged to die or to have someone give her a pill which would make her years younger. Her last 4 years on this earth were not great. She told me many times she just wanted to go to sleep one night and quietly slip away.

Medical advances and the fear of the medical profession to not be accused of ageism meant she didn’t get her wish.

I think you might be on the right track there. The tech issue with my DM is part of a pattern whose common thread is avoidance of machines and electricity in general. All her life she's been a knit yer own lentils kind of semi hippie, doing everything by hand even when it meant hours and hours of work. She made all of our childhood clothes, cooked meals from scratch every day..

She didn't even learn to drive until her late 60s (as a widow), and only then after being involved in an accident in a friend's car.

She basically won't listen to anyone telling her what skills would be to her advantage to learn. After the traffic accident she finally took lessons, and a few years later when she passed her test on the fifth attempt she called me brimming with excitement to tell me how easy it had been to drive to the supermarket that morning and get everything she needed - which Dsis and I had been telling her for ten years.

My mil at 87 had one of her sons move abroad he bought her an iPad so they can FaceTime , Whapsapp or Skype . She got her granddaughter to show her how,and at 90 still does it .
Yours hasn't because she does not want to . Gradually withdraw be able / willing to do it , show her how , and even a simple written how to and leave her to it .

My mum was like this (died a couple of years ago aged 82). Refused to use a mobile phone. We got her one about 20 years ago and it just sat in a drawer. Yet she had no problem driving a car or using SKY TV. I think she was just scared of having to learn something new. It made me sad because my dad died very young in the 80s of cancer and never saw the Internet, which he would have loved.

I have no phone signal where I live so regularly offer visitors use of the WiFi. I've been surprised by the number of people who don't know how to connect their phone to WiFi and ask me to do it for them.

DM would benefit from medication, but ‘there’s nothing wrong with me’ it’s the fault of everyone and everything else so she won’t be taking it.

She’s suspicious of medication. Suspicious of all of us- she won’t release control of anything. We are all unreliable and prone to erratic behaviour like not always agreeing with her about everything.

Occasionally she makes life really hard by ‘trying not to impose’ and actually we’d all have been far happier if she’d just let us do it in the first place.

And as for those of you trying the ‘just be glad you still have a mother…!’ line- just be glad your experience with your mother hasn't been like those of us who have had a long hard journey with an obstreperous curmudgeon who appears to delight in thwarting every effort made to help.