What do you think about being forced to look after elderly parents? Baroness Deech says we should.

[BendyBob]

Here Would you do it? Should you be forced to do it?? Would you want dc to look after you?

I understand care of an ageing population needs more consideration, but no, I think I could not do it nor would I want dc to do it for me either.

What does she suggest happens to those who had their children removed from their care? State poor houses?

I feel as though I am living in a parallel universe to most posters here.

I am a single mother of 4 who works full time. If one or both of my parents came to live with us, we could manage. And yes, I do know what it is like to have an elderly dementia sufferer around, because we looked after my grandmother when I was a teenager.
I am ready to do the same for my own parents, because that is just what you do, you look after members of your own family.

I don't think it's the problem for those who are able to or are willing to care for their parents. But some are simply not in a position to - for financial reasons or due to their own immediate family situation. And to be forced legally into a situation that may be detrimental to the parent or family is not the answer.

If they are so concerned about the grandparents having to help out with childcare, as there is a "dearth of affordable reliable childcare", then maybe they should be addressing THAT issue instead.

There's the objective view and the subjective one.

Many people will not be able to do this so it is unfair for baroneess deech to suggest it is enforced.

From my own personal point of view, I would consider taking in a relative as I think it's something I should try to do if necessary. However, there will be certian big obstacles.

My mum is a bit of a cow and my dad is...well, it's difficult to explain, but they are neither of them feasible

I am willing to Do My Bit and look after someone else's aging parent in a straight swap tho

Well, we couldn't manage. Mentally, I'd wind up sectioned. I really would.

Some could just manage.

I couldn't.

My parents and PIL have never looked after DD. One reason for that is that they are so fucking old.

Baroness Deech seems to think that there is an army of people who neatly have their children in their twenties, raise their children by their forties and are then on stand-by for when their parents hit old age and need looking after. (In one wing of their lovely big houses bought on one-income of course).

For a lot of us, it's a car crash all at once, with the need for two incomes but also looking after various sets of aged rellies and toddlers at the same time. Witness today, when I was working two hundred miles away, while DH took annual leave to look after 2 year old DD, visit decrepit MIL in hospital and then go to the other side of the city to check 85 year old FIL had not fallen down the stairs while home alone. No free childcare for us, no sirree bob.

ps. I have met Baroness Deech and she is vair posh.

No spare room is only sort of an excuse. I'm sure for many people having a spare room is a modern thing. Kids can share, Granny can go on a single in the dining room?!

I've noticed I haven't actually answered the question, would I do it? Not sure, I think I would (for mine and his parents). I think my DH would throw a fit if I suggested it though. Not sure what would happen. I hope they have sufficent dosh that I can put them somewhere decent near me if I need to. Dad has told all of us to push him down the stairs when the time comes. He and Mum had a hard time caring for my Grandad, who needed nursing care. If they had their marbles I would be much more inclined to have them move in.

OOOH yes please! I'd dearly love to get my hands on my father when he is old and helpless. The thought has quite brightened up my day!

Kewcumber

mooma, no spare room is often a real issue. High house prices mean small houses for many.

My children do share a room. Some people have boys and girls who can't share. We don't have a dining room and most people I know who do put their table and chairs in it as they do not have any space for them in the kitchen.

There are a lot of assumptions about houses, space, money, work, etc.

Moomaa I do agree with that, having looked at the old census data there were a heck of a lot of people living in each house in our road in 1901. I'm not sure it would feel like that much of a step forward to recreate that though.

I definitely can't imagine consigning any of my parents or inlaws to a home, but it's easy to say that before the said generation has developed dementia or has become much less mobile.

Most of all I would love to have them close by, in the same street or thereabouts. But they and I have all made choices, and had them made for us, that have scattered us, although we are all in the UK.

the issue here is compulsion - i'm sure plenty of us would look after our parents and parents-in-law, regardless of circumstances - but plenty of us would have good reasons not to.

the law shouldn't presume a good relationship where there may simply not be one.

no matter the size of house, or amount of work i was or wasn't doing, or number of children still in that house - living with my MIL would be a no-go!!

I wouldn't do it and my mum wouldn't let me either, she has said herself that I'm to put her into a home and it wouldn't be fair on me and the kids

I am just appalled at the statement that this would "certainly become a burden on the women in the family" from a highly successful woman at that. Why should it be a women's issue? We all have parent's don't we?

Anyway, dh and I have emigrated, and I doubt they'd let our parents in. Does that mean theta the responsibility would only be with our siblings, or would we be stopped from leaving I wonder? dh hasn't spoken with his father for almost two years, and he's never really liked any of his grandchildren, does that mean he deserves to be abandoned (I'm assuming that the state will opt out once children have to look after their parents, via some sort of Oldies CSA perhaps?)

I am going to read the article afterwards, but wanted to post my gut instinct.

I think that forcing people who either dont get on with parents or ILs to look after them is not a solution, or in fact people that just may not be able to cope of which there are understandably many.

However, if it is possible then I would look after my parents, they have looked after me and done so much for me that I would at least try. My dad looked after my GP after my GD done some quite awful things, even giving up his job and "leaving us" for 4 months to take him home so he could pass away at home.

I dont get on with my ILs at all, but if push came to shove and DH wanted us to do it then I definitely would.

I appreciate though that there may be a time or condition that we couldnt accommodate and I would do my absolute best to if they had to go into a home to get the absolute best that my means would allow and they would be nearby.

Would I want my DC to do it, no I would not expect it, and would hope that I had been responsible enough to provide the cash ect necessary to set me up in a nice home, but I would expect visits.

Have now read the article and the thread and pretty much stand by what I said, I would do it if I could but forcing people to do it is just ridiculous in the extreme.

Are they planning to ask the elderly parents their opinion on this? Because I know for sure that my mum would NOT want to come and live with us - not because we don't get on, but partly because a household with three boys is a bit too noisy and tiring for her, and partly because it would mean her moving a long way from all her friends, but mainly because she KNOWS how hard it is to care for an elderly relative in your home.

When I was about 9, my maternal grandma came to live with us so mum could look after her. She had increasing dementia (due to a brain tumour that wasn't diagnosed for ages), and mum found it hellishly difficult coping with caring for her mum and for two small children. Apparently our behaviour deteriorated during that time, and mum felt it was because we weren't getting enough attention from her.

Her mum also hated having her daughter caring for her in such an intimate way - cleaning her up, bathing her etc, and it upset mum too, having to see her mum like that.

Later on, long after grandma had died, my mum told me in no uncertain terms that I was NOT to do the same for her as she didn't want to put me under the same pressure she'd been under. I am to put her in a good home (if neccessary) and make sure she is well looked after and happy.

She is a very intelligent and independant woman and I am sure she would be exceedingly unimpressed to have the Government telling her where to live in her old age!

ormrenewed good questions, the issue is not magically going to way. there are too many of us aging and the issue tbh is not our parents but US. Many of our parents have reasonable pensions and funding reasonable care to avoid heavy duty nursing care in the home is more likely to be possible. Many of OUR generation ourselves will NOT have good pensions - some have none at all. So i've got another question:

do we want to live in a culture where it's considered unfair for an adult chlid to have their life horribly constrained by care of aged parents, and the general principle is that sorting out elderly care is between the elderly person and the state, unless family happen to feel like helping?

or do we want to live in a culture where it is seen as something adult children do have an obligation to do, with the state supporting it?

I'm not talking about compulsion, more culture. Lots of people just won't be able to care for (as in help, support, not necessarily live with) elderly parents. But amongst those adults who can help parents, is a culture where they feel an obligation to better, or one where it's totally socially acceptable to say 'we can't live with MIL, so we've left it 100% up to the state'.

Hellish as it is to care for people we don't ge ton eiwth it could come back to bite us on the bum if we push for a culture where we don't have to.

i don't think anyone should have to have elderly relatives to live with them but I think that's a bit of a red herring. Sorting out good care is also hard work, as is managing someone's affairs while they're in that environment. I think that's just as important an obligation. doin heavy duty nursing care in the home is not efficient, you get economies of scale in a nursing home or care home, it's just as good an option. but I want to live in a society where sortin gout that care, visiting often, being an advocate for elderly people etc. - all that's seen as an obligation for adults in middle age, not something they ought not to be hassled by.

it's finding ways of doing that so the load is shared, so it's not just the women doing it, that will help.

And it extends to adults who are not parents, at every stage. it's obviously unrealistic to pair up individually childless elderly people with adults who for whatever reason have no elderly people to care for but the more we spread the load - the more we create a culture where caring and advocating for elderly people is seen as important, the better.

Maybe what it comes down to is respect for elderly people - but we don't ge tmuch of that as our culture at the moment is so heavily youth oriented.

I think i'd like to live in a culture where not ever doing any kind of voluntary work as an middle-aged adult (past the early childrearing years, or without existing caring responsibilities) is seen as just a little bit shameful or embarrassing. So whether it's visitng isolated people care homes, sitting on the equivalent of 'boards of governors' of care instituations (i'm jus tmaking it up as I go along now ), doing shopping, able bodies adults all do stuff. Not by compulsion but by culture and social expectations.

I'd rather than than a society at the other extreme where you do everything as a private consumer. Then it's all a bit more shared.

moomaa- I think a lot of kids already share with no dining room don't they? We do actually have a dining room (playroom / guest room)there's 3 in one room and the older asd one on the box room'technially asdds3 needs hiw own room and even that isn't going to happen. Dining room not suitable for the boys due to the Sn and proximity to front door. Could we put an aged aprent in there? Yes. Could I rpovidecare on top of existent caring commitments? nope. I'dtry if my sister didn't have plans, but its mroe expensive for the state if I go under and they ahve to house a parent plus 2 disabled kids.

Anway with mine its not an issue, only PIL. FIL sorted with young fiancee,so just MIL. As it happens she has BIL living with her but I don'tt hink he'dmanage, there's a reason he lives with her at 36 after all. Would we take MIL?hmmm lets see. No. Last time we had her in our house she made up a story for the boys about FIL beating her up, and has been known to refer tods1 as a freak to his fce thinking we couldnt hear. I asked Dh and he said he's have us all ont the first ferry to the Shetlands by dinner, with no forwarding address. Once upon a time I;d ahve done it through duty but she blew it entirely.

Mumlooks after my Gtandad in a non-residential way and its horrid for ehr as she and him never got on. I know in order to have him live with her she'dhave to give up her sanity and probably her marriage as Grandad constantly throws insults at my Dad. He's90 this year so who knows what the next few eyars will bring (death being likely obv) but I hope it dosn't involes Mum having tot ake him in for her sake. She has three siblings who limit their help to a wekend a year and the occasional comp-laint but TBH I genuinely don't think they could cope either- as Grandad is 90 his children arebetween 55 and 70, and needing to slowdown a bit themselves.