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1) Moving to where a person had planned to move anyway is one thing. If that happens to be where you wanted to go, OK.
But intentionally picking a place that is hundreds of miles away JUST SO you CAN'T help out? Really?
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Quote:
Originally Posted by Curmudgeon
Are you aware that in some states, our former one being one of them, children are charged with the responsibility for caring for elderly parents of limited means. It's actually a crime to fail to meet that fiduciary/familial responsibility. However, in all my years there working in law enforcement and politics I cannot remember one case where the law intervened in that regard.
I have heard this and I truly don't understand the legal underpinnings that allow this to be so. It is one thing to make a parent responsible for a child that they brought into the world through their life choices. It is entirely upside down to put the burden on the child to support the parent.
This is the scenario; here I sit on the edge of retirement (days to months) and the plan has always been to relocate. However, concerns about care for the aged parents of my wife are starting to impinge on the plans. I freely admit that these people need a certain level of help which is sometimes difficult because they have always been as independent as hogs on ice though they are more than willing to accept anything you give them and the mother-in-law in particular is very adept at throwing the guilt trip if she doesn't think she is getting her due, they just won't do one damn thing anyone tells them. So very rapidly commuting distance to their house so they can be assisted is becoming a governing factor on what we do. I am very concerned about my wife becoming the servant, or at least one of two servants because her sister is doing a commendable job in assisting but rapidly reaching the end of her rope. My wife is spending a couple weeks at a stretch with them now with increasing frequency. The Mother-in-Laws stated position is that she sees no reason to use home help (she runs off everyone we've tried) when her two daughters can come and live in and take care of anything than they need. Their son lives across the country and shows up occasionally but is typically not a whole lot of help. I have been probably too ready to help them financially in the past when they were in a bind. Being support to the in-law parents has certainly not been my retirement vision. My marriage is decades old and a good one, never expected or received a whole lot from my wife's parents and I am entirely happy with that. To be honest, I'm really, really tempted to relocate far enough away from that commuting to help is a real pain in the backside and then become as obstructive as possible. I really hate the automatic assumption that we're going to do this just because that's what they want. Hope someone has a silver bullet solution but I realize there isn't one, this is more a rant than anything.
Wanderer, I not only understand your problem I am living it. My mother who never asked for help and we never asked for help from her is now in need of 24/7 care. She is with it, just can't walk, but now doesn't seem to even consider the strain she is putting on me and my brother, all to stay out of a nursing home. It gets worse, my in laws always gave and gave and gave to my brother in laws, we never asked or needed help, we are considered the responsible ones of the family. My MIL passed with my elderly FIL left, now my two brother in laws, one already moved out of town the other is retiring and moving next month and who is left when it comes time for my FIL, you guessed it, me and my husband. So much for our happy retirement years, yet the two that took and took won't be anywhere around.
1) Moving to where a person had planned to move anyway is one thing. If that happens to be where you wanted to go, OK.
But intentionally picking a place that is hundreds of miles away JUST SO you CAN'T help out? Really?
Sure, at first glance moving away just so you can't help seems cruel, selfish, and heartless on the part of the adult children who flee. However, if we have read some of the stories in this thread, we must acknowledge that some old people are demanding, selfish, narcissistic, and so focused on themselves that they completely lose sight of the burdens they are placing on their own children who have jobs, lives, and perhaps children of their own. That selfishness becomes all the more intolerable when it is coupled with a pig-headed refusal of all suggestions which will makes things easier for everybody. No, it's got to be THEIR way (the way the old folks want it), no matter how impractical and unrealistic that may be. And oh, did I mention the laying on of guilt?
Well, I am sympathetic to the adult children who finally say to their parents, "All right you want it your way and you refuse to listen or compromise, so have it your way! I'm outta here!" Let the old folks cope if they can, and if they can't, let them reap the fruits of what they themselves have sown.
If it becomes too painful to watch the misery from afar (or from close up for that matter), then maybe it's time to take off the kid gloves and petition a court for guardianship. I don't get how irrational selfish people are allowed to call the shots.
I'm sympathetic also. I just think intentionally moving away solely so that person CANNOT help -- shows, IMO, a callousness that I don't even know how to describe. That shows the INTENT of abandonment. And that says more about the child than the elder, IMO.
If it becomes too painful to watch the misery from afar (or from close up for that matter), then maybe it's time to take off the kid gloves and petition a court for guardianship. I don't get how irrational selfish people are allowed to call the shots.
Guardianship is a very difficult position to acquire. The courts award it sparingly.
Sadly, there are no laws precluding stupidity, irrationality, meanness, ugliness or selfishness so long as you aren't directly threatening anyone.
I have heard this and I truly don't understand the legal underpinnings that allow this to be so. It is one thing to make a parent responsible for a child that they brought into the world through their life choices. It is entirely upside down to put the burden on the child to support the parent.
It's to preclude the parents from becoming burdens on the state. Never mind the phony disability claims and chronic unemployed.
Sure, at first glance moving away just so you can't help seems cruel, selfish, and heartless on the part of the adult children who flee. However, if we have read some of the stories in this thread, we must acknowledge that some old people are demanding, selfish, narcissistic, and so focused on themselves that they completely lose sight of the burdens they are placing on their own children who have jobs, lives, and perhaps children of their own. That selfishness becomes all the more intolerable when it is coupled with a pig-headed refusal of all suggestions which will makes things easier for everybody. No, it's got to be THEIR way (the way the old folks want it), no matter how impractical and unrealistic that may be. And oh, did I mention the laying on of guilt?
Well, I am sympathetic to the adult children who finally say to their parents, "All right you want it your way and you refuse to listen or compromise, so have it your way! I'm outta here!" Let the old folks cope if they can, and if they can't, let them reap the fruits of what they themselves have sown. [
This. In Spades.
The "current drama" is that MIL was having stomach trouble and called crying for help. Spouse got on the phone with the nursing staff and the kitchen staff and told them of her troubles. Turns out all the things she should not be eating - she's requesting. Like milk and high acid foods. So spouse is working with the nursing and kitchen staff and her doctor and gets medication adjustments to relieve the stomach stress.
This goes very well and her stomach responds in kind.
This week? Her face breaks out in a skin rash - and of course, it's spouse's fault. She calls and yells at him and tells him to stop helping her because of course it's his fault.
Not to mention that she's using makeup that's years old and probably filled with bacteria making her face break out.
This is dementia. Spiraling dementia. And it's not going to get any better.
Let her make her choices. She will die - we all die - but not at the expense of our mental health.
This is dementia. Spiraling dementia. And it's not going to get any better.
Let her make her choices. She will die - we all die - but not at the expense of our mental health.
1) IF a person has dementia, be definition of the illnesses, they canNOT make certain choices.
"so the let her make her choices" isn't even applicable.
2) No one said ANYone's "mental health" should be sacrificed to help take care or see about an elder.
Separately, and not related to the above, sometimes people just need to own up to the fact that they are (IMO) just callous and selfish -- and are perfectly fine with letting their elder or parent languish or decline -- just because they don't want to be bothered. Some people just don't see their parents as their 'responsibility' and -- won't lift a finger to help even though they can. And if that's the way they feel they should own that.
Clearly there are limits to what a person CAN do. Some people help and do what they can and are wiling to be 'a little" inconvenienced (and that's subjective) ...others sacrifice to their own detriment.....and others would step over their parent in the street and keep on walking. They wouldn't walk into the next room to get them a glass of water....so they sure as heck wouldn't do anything more.
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