Moving Abroad am I being selfish...?

[MrsChristmas123]

I am 60 and retired, live alone and financially independent.

My mother is widowed, aged 91 and is reasonably fit. However, she has just been diagnosed with mild dementia. She lives next door to me and I have looked out for her for the past 4 years since my father passed away. I have a brother who lives 80 miles away who visits every few months. My brother and me have looked after mum between us, sorting out her garden, getting her shopping. She copes very well on her own and only asks for help when she absolutely needs to. She is very independent.

My son lives abroad, my daughter lives in London and my youngest has just left her job to travel for 3 months and, at the moment she is living with me until she goes.

I am not in relationship.

I have had a long time urge to live abroad, just for a year or two, when my family grew up and left home. I had planned to do some voluntary work but not sure what though. I had planned to rent my house out for a year and see how it goes. I had planned to move to Spain next July 2017.

However, my plans may not come to fruition. My mother is getting increasingly forgetful and I can see that her memory is getting worse by the month. The problem is that she has refused all care that has been offered to her. My brother and me have tried to talk to her to persuade her to have a home help, cleaner, gardener but she obstinately refuses it. As I live next door she always turns to me for help and support which I am more than happy to give her. I have told my brother my plans and he has said, point blank that he will not move nearer to help. He says that it would be a 'backward step'.

The other problem that I had not considered is my youngest daughter. If she moves back with me when she returns from travelling then I can't rent my house out as I planned. I have mentioned my plans to her but she became extremely critical of me, implying that I should not leave her grandmother (my mum) without someone to look after her. I explained that it would not be for another year and anything could happen in that time and that mum had refused all help. My daughter has now said that she will give up her career plans and look after my mum if I move abroad. Now, my middle daughter has got involved by telling my youngest daughter not to do this because it would wreck her work prospects for the future. My middle daughter supports my plans to travel abroad.

I know I am being selfish but I bought my kids up single handedly since they were very small and I have looked after my mum virtually on my own for the past 4 years. I just feel it is my time now and if I don't do this next year I'll be too old.

I guess it is up to my conscience and I do have to make sure my house is ready to rent by next July, whatever happens because I need to find somewhere smaller. If I stay and continue to be here for mum as and when she needs me, life would seem very empty and I know I will get resentful.

What would you do?

Hello Gnomedeplume (love that name)

Thank for that advice and thoughts it was really appreciated.

I hadn't considered the problem of mum descending on my tenants! I'll have to give that some thought. Somehow I don't think she would do that but I would have to warn the tenants if I decided to rent this house out.

I like the idea of selling my home and getting somewhere smaller in the same city to rent out when I leave. You are right it would take away my proximity to Mum's house.

I feel better already having made the decision to leave next year.

I hope I havn't whinged too much about my situation because I am very lucky in lots of ways.

You are so right though, if I wasn't here Mum would just have to cope or ask someone else.

Thank you so much for your help and advice.

I feel for you too. Your mum sounds very like my MIL 18 months ago. I agree that the proximity must be awful and will be a huge factor. You moving is likely to upset your mum's mental stability a bit, but it may bump her into having to accept help. We live half a mile away and that was bad enough! We still got millions of phonecalls every night, ever increasing. She also did the threatening to kill herself thing too. She never meant it.

We got to a point that we made her have carers. She argued and ranted, but once they started coming she seemed to relax into them helping her for an hour or two a day. We had to do the same when she got to the stage where she needed to be in a home. We told her we were all on holiday and wouldn't be able to help her for three weeks, and booked her in a home. Again she wasn't happy, but was also worried underneath about being on her own. The home said she was furious and it was touch and go initially, but again she settled.

Good luck. I remember how exhausting it was. My husband's own health was starting to suffer from the stress of it all (he, like you, was the one she always called for help). You do have to be selfish, to some extent. Horrible disease.

If you did move to the other side of the city you would have to harden your heart. Your DM will call and say 'I have lost glasses/keys/whatever. For each thing you will need a coping strategy.

The problem is that your DM is not thinking rationally. At no point is she going to say 'you are right, I need help'. All you can do is push her to the point where she has to accept help.

For your own self preservation I think you need to move. From your description the relationship is one sided. If you want to make a social call you have to make an appointment. If your DM wants help she will turn up on your doorstep. How long until those crisis visits are in the middle of the night?

I am sorry if my comments seem harsh. DH has had to watch while his DM disappeared before his eyes.

Am i being a selfish by moving my 5 year old to a new area away from his dad and school. Basically my and my ex husband spilt up a good nearly 18 months ago and i met someone new and now we have a baby girl together now i live in one area of lancashire and my partner lives 20 mins away in a different area, now my dad says that im being selfish if i move nearer my partner but i want to happy and not stick in the middle as me and partner want this to work so much. cause the only reason me and my partner cant live together is because he has a dog and my son isnt too keen on them, we have tried gradually introducing him to the dog but we have had no joy. my heart is telling me yes go for it and move. cause i mean i moved to 3 different school and to a new area when i was my son's age and it hasnt affected me really. All i want is for my little family to live near each other, also baring in mind the area my partner lives in i also work there too (seems logical to move there to me) but like i said my dad says im being selfish but im 26 years old for goodness sake. Please tell me im not being selfish.

My post may not be agreed with by all but I think older people refusing help and expecting their families to put their lives on hold is very selfish. Someone in my family was like this and expected people to be around 3 times a day to feed her, toilet and wash her, shop for her etc etc. Except most of the family works full time, have small children and or already care for partners. I am disabled and some days am totally bedridden. So many people fell out and some still don't speak as those who refused or simply couldn't be there every day were called selfish. They were even rostering my husband in even though he has to leave for work at 4.45am. In the end she did end up with carers as we just couldn't manage the care she needed, which now included overnights.

I also think of another two people I know. One was bullied into caring for his mother who hung on for thirty years in the end. This man is now in his 60s. His relationship ended, no children and he lives alone because he was constantly guilted into caring. My other friend has also given up her job, let her relationship with her overseas fiance end and probably won't have children either because her mother will not have carers and calls my friend constantly day and night for petty things.

I would go to be honest. Put care in place so it doesn't all fall to your brother and advise that she has dementia so at some point will not be capable of making the decision about carers and will likely need residential care.

Oh crap. This is a zombie thread...

ZOMBIE THREAD
@becky1993, I don't have any advice but you need to start your own thread and not tag it on to old posts. You'll get input and advice that way.