Hi everyone
A bit confused.
A few months ago, I connected with a long lost elderly distant cousin of mine. My family has been a little dysfunctional, to say the least. There are many relatives dotted about that I haven’t ever met before.
Anyway, since discovering this old distant cousin, I have been helping him. He is completely cut off from everyone - he has no friends and no family who bother with him. He is on his own and has been on his own for decades. I felt so sorry for him, what with him being in a wheelchair and so severely disabled. He has limited mobility and cannot look after himself well.
Anyway, it’s been really difficult to say the least. He has fallen in love with me, has said some things that have made me uncomfortable and, on one occasion - even suggested my husband was having an affair with someone when he works away. He did this to cause doubt in my relationship. I thought this was an evil thing to do, as he wanted to plant a seed so that it ruined my marriage. I let this go but have been really angry about it and so was my husband when I told him. When I walked away from this discussion with my cousin, he dropped himself in it by saying “I’m not saying this to split you and Richard up so you can be with me”. (I wouldn’t be with him if he was the last man on Earth btw - he is an old, old man and I’m in my 20s!)
Anyway, I’ve been doing what I can to help - spoken to the council and social services and they’re now trying to find him a residential home which he is thrilled about (he wants to go in a home but waiting lists are long) and I have been allowed to provide ‘essential care’ to him over coronavirus times (social services are actively looking for a proper carer for him too....he flatly refuses anyone from an agency and so this is causing some problems). To give you an idea, his floors had not been cleaned for twenty years and the dust in his home was inches thick. He has been breathing in all this with lung disease.
He always tells me how blessed he feels finally finding someone who cares for him. Since I’ve met him, he has taken up hobbies again and has started to take care of his physical and mental health a whole lot better. He always stresses how he has been alone for decades and that he is so grateful I have come into his life.
I have fought several battles for him with social services staff (although generally they’ve been really good), the coronavirus support network, PayPal etc - all incidents when people tried to rip him off or fob him off.
He has bought me loads of presents. I have been so uncomfortable with this and have told him many times that this isn’t appropriate.
I worked away for the last two weeks and when I got back he had delivered me a diamond bracelet. I immediately emailed him to say - sorry - I can’t accept this to which he said he understood why. I told him that I hoped he didn’t think I was being rude but he really didn’t need to buy me things.
The next day, he’s emailed me to say he’s been doing some thinking and thinks he wants to go back to being on his own until he can get into a care home. I said - ok - but is there any reason why? He said he wants to now be on his own and that he wants me to just enjoy my life. I replied to say ok...I understand and I will leave him alone.
It doesn’t feel.......right though. My husband has told me to just leave things as they are and thinks he is playing a silly, attention seeking game (which I cannot be doing with!)
Anyone have any thoughts? Do you think I should just leave things as they are or make contact with him again?
Or do you think he is playing silly attention seeking games to see how I would react? If so, he’s probably panicking a bit now I’ve said - ok, I’ll leave you to it.
God knows why I didn’t tell him to shove off when he said that about my husband....but me and my husband felt sorry for him being on his own and so decided to continue to help where we could.
I feel a bit guilty that he’s left on his own still.....hmm.
Thank you for any words of wisdom! xxx