How to tell her politely- clear up your mess!

[threesecrets]

My MIL is a narcissist and hoarder. It's a nightmare combination. Recently she has decided that she wants to leave her rural bungalow and move into a retirement flat more central. Good for her I think. Except she keeps emailing saying that she can't sort things and that no one wants to buy her stuff junk. Her latest email was that she should just lock up her bungalow, walk away and leave someone else to deal with it as "that's what would happen if she died". She has also sent threatening emails saying she is going to donate her bungalow and contents to a charity now so she can "wash her hands of it." How can I politely tell her, that as an adult, she just needs to accept that she accumulated the mess and she needs to take responsibilty for it and sort it out. We have made so so many offers over the years to help her and she wouldn't accept our help. She essentially needs a skip for a lot of it!! (40+ year old carpet off cuts etc). I find her attitude of leaving it for someone else to sort quite selfish. I want to find a way to tactfully tell her to stop passing the buck and take responsibility.

@Thestrangestthing I don't expect her to do it herself but I expect her to accept help. I'm also stressed as we have been saying for years that she needs to start decluttering etx and she has always just laughed and said you can clear my mess when I die. I think it's selfish. I would happily take a week off work, go up there with a van and hire a skip. But she doesn't want to do that. She thinks everything has a value because she bought it for such and such a price £15 years ago. In the past she bought another house, moved whilst leaving the bungalow furnished, and kitted our the new place, decided she didn't like it so sold it and brought back duplicates of everything. She wants to abandon her shit tip, buy another flat and move in and turn that into a dumping ground and then when she dies leave us to sort out the chaos because she never could be bothered.

But also, both her sons live 300+ miles away. They can't just drop everything to go and clear a 4 bed detached bungalow with triple garage. It's an enormous job.

OP, it sounds like a nightmare. I can really empathise with you. Perhaps you just need to detach? "Smile & wave."

Another idea is that you/DH decide what you are prepared to do to help her and you tell her that. If she tries to say anything else, you just repeat what you've said and say no to whatever else she's saying you'll do. That's it. You don't escalate it or get heated or get into a debate about it. You just communicate where you stand and maintain that boundary whenever it comes up.

threesecrets: the inheritance tax situation regarding 7 years is that she must give her money or wealth away 7 years before she dies for it to be exempt from inheritance tax. It’s nothing to do with how long she lives there! I do wonder what tax implications there would be if she gave you the property. If she doesn’t need it or the value of it to
Move on- she might as well give it away. You can then clear up the mess! All sorted in a tax efficient way. Unless, of course she wouldn’t pay IHT because her estate is too small.

@BubblesBuddy she has more than one child. But she doesn't want to give it to her sons but her grandchildren who vary in age from 2-20! This would be a big Nifhtmare managing a trust for them as the house is unsalable. She hasn't looked after it and it is in poor condiditon and full of junk eg 20 year old camping toilet, old windows, 2 broken computers both over 15 years old. 3 toasters, 2 kettles one doesn't work. The oven is broken but she doesn't want it fixed as she prefers a camp stove.

Got stuck on the number of lazy you wrote.
She's 80.
She's done her shift.
She's allowed to be 'lazy'

Sounds like social services need to be involved as neither of her sons are looking after their elderly mother

Can she afford to move to a bungalow without selling the house?

If so, encourage her to do so. Then contact a house clearance firm to do just that. Then contact a cleaning firm to do a deep clean. Then sell it as seen.

If this isn't possible, then as someone else said "smile and wave".

She doesn't want help as such, she wants you to accept and collude with her delusional way of thinking.

If she won't allow you to clear the house once she's moved out, then tell her exactly what you are prepared to do, and let her get on with it.

If she can afford to just buy a flat, then that seems sensible. The bungalow isn’t yours to worry about, if she wants to abandon it, just let her.

I think it's probably best to emotionally detach and let your husband deal with this.

Well, at some point, whether it's now or after she's died, your DH and his sibling/s will need to deal with it. Seems reasonable to me that they could both take a week off work at the same time and help their mother move.

Hoarding is very difficult to deal with. Might be better for everyone if she moved into a flat now and then the bungalow can be dealt with separately.

I have been in this situation TWICE with my NPD, alcoholic MIL.

The manipulation, arrogance and delusion and entitlement was v hard to cope with.

Her original family home was just vile. She accumulated 10 stray cats that shat, pissed, vomited and shed hair everywhere. There were un-emptied litter trays with overspilling “contents” everywhere. Add to that standard “alcoholic squalor”. She hoarded everything - every, single child’s birthday and Xmas toy from all 3 children from 50 years ago.

It got so bad and she wouldn’t let anyone in to help clean, sort or tidy. She would get quite nasty about it. She wouldn’t even let us get a plumber in to fix the boiler as she wanted to tidy it up first (never happened). This went on for 3 years where she had no hot water. She had shed loads of cash.

We got her out by playing to her NPD. We look her on a tour of some stunning high end new build apartments to rent in a v posh neighbourhood. She was dazzled and moved out with just a suitcase the next month. We then cleared, renovated and sold the house - used her money to hire professionals. Saved a few bits. By the time she had moved she never asked for anything else (doubt she could remember any detailed stuff).

We got a cleaner in from day one in the flat to keep on top of it - most of the cats didn’t go with her and she trashed it a bit and lost her deposit.

We then bought and renovated another property in the nice area once the original house was sold. She quite enjoyed lording it over us and not doing any of the work - but that suited us as we were winning the war.....

She then over the next 6 years made an absolute mess of that next house - again more cats, now herself in-continent (as well as the cats). Again cleaners from Age Concern come in twice weekly before she finally went into a care home.....again only with a suitcase a a couple of bits.

Again just cleared the house with professionals, re painted and sold it.

So my advice would be do not engage in trying to persuade her to sort it or be manipulated around conversations about you actually doing it....these will never happen......because they have never happened and will just drain and frustrate you. Don’t let her yank your chain.

Offer one solution. She moves out and professionals sort it. She pays for it - you are happy to book a reliable firm etc.

But just let her get in with it - she sounds happy, mobile skipping around. Really not worth the fight. Just wait for things to inevitably evolve.

She won't sell her house for rock bottom as she she thinks it's too good and that locals can't afford it. It really isn't that special

This is also ringing bells. Mine said her original home was the “grandest house in the road” - you can imagine what it was like from my description above - when she opened the front door you were knocked flying and your eyes stung from the stench of urine. Deluded. But once she was gone she never looked back and her concerns that “the neighbours” thought it was too cheap never materialised. Jeez I am getting ptsd flashbacks to horror or it all.

Thanks @Kitty2020 I think you understand. I get that people think I'm being harsh because of her age but her attitude really rattles me. She is all woe is me but also superior

@TheQueef
She sent abusive emails when my brother in law named his son saying what a horrible name it was and that everyone would laugh. She cut my husband off for 5+ years because she didn't approve of his career choice. She constantly moans that her sons don't visit weekly to cut the grass (they live 350 miles away), she left my husbands older brother to make his dinners when he was 11 and 4.

Just sent this email:

Fair enough- one solution is that you give the house to son and son and move out to where you want to live, with the stuff that you want. Then they can pay professionals to clear the house for you, get professional cleaners and put it on the market. How does that sound? It would sort things out for you and you can move on.

I am 50 and what you describe is over whelming for me!! I think you are being harsh as at 80 plus it’s unlikely she would have the energy to sort such a hoard.

Sounds spot on. Mine had the whole suite of NPD parent-child RSs - so totally cut off one son (scapegoat) and only saw her daughter twice a year (ignored) sadly my DH had the burden of being the golden child so was on speed dial morning, noon and night (he had to divert all of her calls to VM as would get typically 15+ in the working day - that was after we stopped answering our landline where she would ring shitfaced every evening.......sorry to hijack your thread but it’s bringing it all back!!! You can imagine that she loved me!!

kitty gets it.

I don’t think you’re being harsh in that I don’t think you’re unreasonable to be frustrated at the situation, and at her - I just think you’re wasting your emotional energy wishing it was different! It IS a selfish way to behave, but it IS going to end up being your problem in the end (or your DH’s problem) so just do as you have done - offer one solution, don’t get sucked into arguments, and keep offering that one solution over and over. Accept it will be an issue at some point but decide what you’ll do to minimise the annoyance.

I do think if she moves out it would be out of sight out of mind with the hoard, so that’s your best bet.

My mother couldn't deal with her hoarded junk.

She died, she left it to me to deal with. It's taken me a year, but I've dealt with it.

Could you get her to move and then you and your OH clear her house?

It IS a mental health issue, rational argument/discussion won't change things.

Sounds like my mother. We are Australian, but I was living in the Netherlands. I just said, “Okay then... if that’s you want to do. Sounds good.” When she became infirm, Aged Care Team couldn’t come into her house. Had to get her into hospital and get squad of cleaners in who took her shit away and made the house safe, clean and accessible. She said “If I knew that’s what it would take, I would have become sick years ago!” I could have killed her.
Like a lot of NPD people, she loved being sick. Adored the attention. In the years that she was dying (it was years) I would say it was the best time of her life! Grrrrre!

Like a lot of NPD people, she loved being sick. Adored the attention. In the years that she was dying (it was years) I would say it was the best time of her life! Grrrrre!

I never knew that about NPD - but my MIL had “a fall” at least once a month which involved ambulance breaking into her house, a nice stay in hospital, loads of tests and drama - never once a bump, scratch or bruise discovered from “the fall” where phone was always within reach!

She once told us that after one of her hospital stays when she was leaving all of the nurses lined up to wave her off - and they were all crying as she had been the best patient ever........

Sounds familiar!