Hello. I'm feeling very angry, sad and frightened right now. My dad died 2 weeks ago, suddenly. He was 77. His partner of nearly 40 years is 82. She is bereft. They were not married. So as not to drip feed, some basic background:
My parents split when I was 7 after a rocky few years where they both cheated. Dad left my mum for my stepmum. I'm an only child.
Parents had a very very acrimonious divorce. My mum did all the stuff you read about - training me on what to say to social workers when they had a custody battle, telling me all sorts of poisonous stuff about him like he never loved me, never wanted me etc.
Dad never said a bad word about mum. But my stepmum was often cruel to me (verbally, she was never physically abusive) - very harsh in discipline and lots of your dad doesn't love you etc. Dad himself was always loving to me and my happiest childhood memories are with him. But he absolutely knew what stepmum was like to me, and brushed it under the carpet.
Due to their difficult relationship I saw dad rarely growing up and actually didn't see him at all from 13_18 yrs old. At the time mum said it was that dad refused but I now know it was more complicated than that.
Mum had mental and physical health issues all my life and died suddenly when I was 21. Dad and stepmum helped me a lot at that time, immediately afterwards and for a few weeks following.
I wasn't close to dad but made an effort to see him a few times a year. He and stepmum came as a pair - they were never separate.
Both dad and stepmum came from very seriously abusive and poverty stricken homes. They weren't family oriented people.
Since having kids we have been a bit closer and my kids know my stepmum as their grandma.
So dad has died. And now my stepmum needs me. She has no living relatives at all. Is frail and in poor health, with severe anxiety issues. She has not quite lost her marbles, but definitely on the edge (talks into the remote as if it's a phone, leaves the house with hat but no coat, gets the days confused). Dad left everything to her (his will mentions his 'children' as next beneficiaries but does not name me except as co-executor with her). They own the property jointly but all bills are in his name. No joint account. She has no pension except state - dad paid for everything. She hasn't dealt with finances for nearly 40 yrs. She's deep in shock and grieving. I can't leave her. I will of course help her and look after her. But I am really struggling with how nasty she is being when she feels low. I can cope with tearful, stressed, snappy. But she has made quite a few comments over the last 2 weeks around money and that she feels I am taking too much control and she might just sell the house and leave. She has had panic attacks over the bills and spent hours clutching my hand, crying and asking me to help, that she can't manage her finances. So I've offered to manage the estate as executor and have started doing that, whilst telling her everything that's happening. And so it feels like such a slap to then have her make nasty comments about me shutting her out. I've told her that I'm happy for her to manage things herself and then she backtracks and wants me to do it.
I just can't cope with her being nasty to me, it takes me back to being a kid. I know she can't help it, but it makes me miserable. And I'm so resentful that I am now probably responsible for looking after her for god knows how many years when she was so awful to me growing up.
Sorry this is long. I have a lot of feelings right now and just wanted to vent.