I live abroad. DM divorced my alcoholic father when I was in my teens. She had a nervous breakdown then but recovered and although she had a minor wobble when he later died (memories and other stuff stirred up) she was OK MH wise. I moved abroad and DB went off travelling. After I'd been away a couple of years and met (but not yet married DH) she decided she wanted to come and live near me after retirement.
So, she sells up in the UK and buys a place about 10 mins away from me in the country where I live. After a while she discovers it's not all it's cracked up to be and she's not happy. She doesn't like the climate, she misses the shopping, not having central heating, she's never really got to grips with the language. She slides into anxiety and depression and becomes more dependant on me. This coincides more or less with the world economy (and the economy of the country we live in) crashing spectacularly so financially she's trapped here.
Then, to top it all she herniates a disc very badly, has to wait months for an op, that seems to have left her in similar levels of pain to before and added nerve problems so now she can't drive or even walk very far and is basically housebound. When she injured herself it was clear she couldn't really look after herself and would have to live with us. Her house was much bigger so the sensible thing was to sell mine and move in to hers.
We have our own lounge, bathroom (and bedroom obviously!) but other areas are shared and it's her house that we've moved into. That's hard going anyway cos I feel like a 14 yr old living back home with my mum, but it's also the fact that she's so fucking miserable all the time that I can't stand.
I can see why she's unhappy, I would be too, but there's not really anyway out. I find it soooo hard living with her depression, it's like a black cloud over everything. I feel quite angry about it too, which I'm sure is unfair. i came here and made a life and I feel she's just barged in on it. She went away from her parents, she got to live her life with her little family in her own house and I feel that's been taken away from me. I live in a much bigger house than I would otherwise be able to affor but, honestly I'd rather be poor and scrape by and rent somewhere small than live like this, always worrying how she'll be feeling, worrying I'm doing something that'll upset her.
She says a lot that she wants to go back to the UK but can't and I wish to god she just would and leave me alone but then I feel bad about that. It's all so complex and it's going to be like this for years and years and years.
I don't know why I'm posting except that I have nobody to talk to about it.