How to manage caring for father-in-law without growing resentful

[Whatnown]

I’m looking after my father-in-law. He has a house around the corner the family is paying me £25 an hour.For 4 hours a day - which is a good wage. A carer would cost £28-38. My challenge is that he is taking more and more of my time. So now I’m averaging 30 hours plus he’s here in the evenings/ nights and at weekends. So wages are suddenly not so great actually.
My husband says, ‘ just tell him you have to go to work’ but I’m a softy and fall for the delaying tactics and the sore tummy etc.
he is now living with us as husband is worried about his loss of memory, but it’s doing my head in, he is there from 6.30 when I get up and all day whatever I’m doing.like today, I took him to the podiatrist and then I had to get stuff for me, so I had to take him to the shop which takes forever as he has sore feet. I do feel for him, it isn’t easy knowing that you are losing it, but I am tired of being the one to constantly reassure etc.
. I don’t know what hours I can legitimately charge for. I’m a freelancer so this is impacting on my work. I am also struggling to keep his house and my house sorted - tidy but also maintenance of gardens, putting recycling out etc.
im also resentful because my mum didn’t have this level of care. DH does watch footy with him in the evenings - while I make dinner and clear away, and I leave it more to DH at the weekends - but he is still always here. Trying to chat with DH and FIL is hovering outside the door, or just standing in the way.
Not helped by SIL who lives abroad, spinning tales about how poor she is and how we don’t like her. I’m getting bitter and twisted and thinking how my life is draining away and she will just stroll in and take half the inheritance.
sorry, I’m venting, but would appreciate help how to deal with this as obviously this is just the beginning. And I don’t want to be mean and resentful.

FiL needs to spend more time at his own home around the corner and come to your home more when your DH is around to spend time with him. You are being paid for 4 hours a day so stick to the 4 hours. If you arrive at 10am tell him sorry FiL but I have a work appointment at 2.30pm so I have to leave on time to get back to prep for meeting. Be firm.

Your husband can take over. Your job is just as important as his, and he's your husbands relative, so his responsibility.

Value your time and peace, the man's house and garden are for paid labourers to work on, not you. You'll end up burnt out if you allow this to continue.

OP, you have agreed to look after FIL for four hours a day at his house, not have him move in with you. Setting boundaries is up to you - he’ll use delaying tactics because clearly, they’re working - it’s up to you to say, “Actually, FIL, I’m here until three and then I have to go.” Don’t let him spend all his time at your house - I’m sure he likes it, but you need your own space and your own life. You didn’t sign up to live with FIL, much less when his own son isn’t there. At the moment, you are providing the full hotel service. If four hours a day isn’t enough, then FIL will have to thunk about paying carers to come in during the evening. It’s really not fair for you to sacrifice all your time like this, and you will end up resentful and bitter if you don’t take charge and put in some boundaries.

I think what is happening here is that your FIL’s needs are increasing and you are absorbing all these needs without any forward planning or strategy.

Similar happened with my husband. His mother died and he stepped in to support his father with the occassional bit of company, a meal, sorting out a bill. This escalated quickly. He had to start living at his father’s 3 days a week. Not enough. Instead of pretty much moving in permanently, I suggested and we brought in carers, but after some brief caring respite, my husband had to start intermittently living there again. In the end, we had 3 familiy members providing round the clock support, plus a gardener, plus paid carers 4 times a day, plus someone to take him out in the car/visits for entertainment, millions of hospital appointments, video cameras 24/7, one of those emergency alarm thingies round his neck, a rota of additional adhoc visitors. In the end it was a team of about 9 people. Still not enough. He still ended up somehow walking down the hard shoulder of a motorway. He was allegedly fine and everything that went wrong was apparently everyone else’s fault.

my point is that your FIL’ s needs are not going away. In fact, they are going to continue rising exponentially. Without taking action, you will be the frog in a pan of heated water. There are some red flags in the desscription of your situation, too, that I recognise, such as the hovering around you and your husband’s private conversation. This is called shadowing. Old people do this because they know something’s wrong, feel vulnerable, and like a toddler they follow you everywhere with questions. In the end he had to go into a home.

Two things can happen:

1. you rightly re-set the boundaries and then if fil’s family do not put a plan in place there will be a crisis involving a hospital visit and possibly some stern words from the local plod
2. You rightly re-set the boundaries and his family put a plan in place to meet his escalating needs

Actually, if I’m honest, I’d like you to step back completely. Get some respite. The whole situation sounds really annoying and Id have exploded with British rage along time ago if I were you. Can you fake an ankle injury? Is there a work conference you ‘must’ go to, perhaps in Berlin? This will expose the situation immediately.

You can’t go on like this. What if you end up doing the work of about 9 people and then get terribly ill?