Elderly parents can be exasperating

[LovelyBath77]

DH and I both have parents in their 70s.

On one side: have a business they run and premises which means they need to be there full time, they don't need to financially but they do and it seems to cause no end of grief, it is failing and they always have drama about it and how much it costs yet don't seem able to give it up.

Other side: retired but separate and have divorced years ago but continue in a passive aggressive, codependent type way, but seem unable to give each other up and move on. Both have health conditions bit won't manage / go for tests while continuing to share with us the details. Seem to be hoarders and refuse to make lives easier for themselves.

I have got to the stage of finding it all overwhelming and just trying not to get involved when they start about it all. Then feeling guilty. AIBU? And anyone else in the same boat?

Lets see if they are right. Experts are also predicting that because of rising obesity, this will be the first generation in living memory to die younger than their parents.
Yes I am a cynic.

I feel your pain. My mum is 71 and fully compos mentis but an almighty pain in the arse. We love her so dearly but if there's a way she can find to make her life harder than it has to be, she'll take it. Then moan.

Every little thing becomes an emotional, financial and physical palaver. This is what works for her as it keeps us all in attentive mode. I do my very very best to disengage and to remind myself these are her choices but it's so hard when the consequences affect us all.

Morris there are some good ideas in this Toolbox area of out of the fog site, it is meant to be for personality disordered parents etc but also works for others, too. Medium chill for example, I will find a link. HTH.

outofthefog.website/what-to-do-2/2015/12/3/medium-chill

Hey that medium chill thing is weird.my in laws were born like that

I was just thinking medium chill is quite a good way to deal with AIBU- Never give out info about yourself, and don't get involved in drama. It does work though, if you are getting pulled into something and being asked to decide what to do.

My in laws are like this. Could be rolling in money, set up for what they have left but they are a total disaster.

It seems to me that the world has moved on since they were working adults. How to make life cheaper, internet bought insurance, online banking, shopping around for deals, not buying a brand new car as it won't break down or need an MOT seems to have escaped their radar.

The have dragged a now very old fashioned thinking into 2017 and the world doesn't live like that any more.

They are being ripped off at every turn but refuse to change or adapt.

It makes conversations extremely hard.

£7000 for a week in a villa through a travel agent. I found the same thing online for £2000 etc.

It's so hard to watch, age aside, but there's now a considerable gulf between what used to be ok/manageable and how we live now.

Not changing will be their downfall. To younger people the finance decisions haven't changed.

Same with health. Ill? NHS24 straight away, google it, no waiting to see/not bothering the GP etc.

It's tough I get you OP

Yes that sounds similar to DH's parents. But it is difficult to say anything or they get upset. We've just had all weekend how terrible the business is doing etc, (again) and had to bite my tongue to say, well don't do it then! they don't need to.Argh.

Hi OP.
I can sympathise. My parents are in their 70's. Old but not old.
DF is so bad tempered. DM enables his behaviour and then plays victim.
I worry about them, especially as we live abroad. Both very able at present. I am lucky.
Currently staying with them til 3rd week in Aug. Haven't seen them in a year. So far DF has hardly engaged with me at all. dM has been spitting chips at me since we arrived.

Bro lives 10 mins away and DF is on the phone to him about 3 times a day, and sees them quite often. DM helps with school run and a bit of babysitting.

I've asked for nothing but yet am seen as a massive inconvenience.

They just seem to get angrier as they get older. They hate the ageing process and all that comeswith it, and seem hell bent on dragging us down with them.

Life has its bittersweet moments. Some of my friends would give their right arms to have their parents back, whilst the rest of us are left in a state of guilty confusion.

Can't offer advice. Only

Thanks, city and yes that sounds difficult. It's the worry that what happens when it goes tits up- one of them gets ill or risks something like the lease on the business and the fallout from that. With mine, they don't support one another at all, my dad with ring say he needs a test then won't go to it, or she wont agree to pick him up...or with DH's they have no plans in place if things change, it will be a huge drama. For a start the council says they would need to get someone else to take over the business lease, that would be there responsibility so imagine that as well. Argh. At least DH has siblings like you to share it. But that's not great for them, either.

City I relate massively to your post