# Looking after elderly parents who refuse outside help



## peacem (Oct 25, 2014)

....this is actually a follow up to my other thread 'Christmas drama'.

So MIL rang back (was much calmer and meeker in tone) but made a comment that she doesn't think my husband does enough for her. She and her husband are 85. He is fairly fit, but she has a host of health problems (she also has a history of exaggerating ailments or sometimes plain making things up so it is hard to actually tell how bad she is). 

My H has 4 siblings 3 of which live in other cities. Him and his sister live in the same village. Sister is a very manipulative woman who likes to play the martyr and is a drama queen. So if she does any job for her mother we all have to know about it as she feel constantly underappreciated. My H on the other will either just do it, or say 'no' if he can't.

We have a teenage child with very special needs. He is basically a 2 man job with profound learning difficulties. So although my H doesn't mind doing online jobs and visiting occasionally, he really doesn't want to get involved in caring for his mother in any capacity. He also has deep resentment around his childhood where he was basically parentified and certainly doesn't feel he owes them anything. 

His sister is having temper tantrums that he doesn't do enough and that its all down to her. In reality its her husband that does the lion's share of the work. She has made it clear that she will never go into a home. She is also reluctant to buy in care from outside the family. She is very penny pinching and will not spend her savings. 

BTW MIL is not an easy person to be around even for visitations. Manipulative, explosive anger, makes hurtful comments for fun. 

Anyone else in a similar situation?


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## Thor (Oct 31, 2011)

Unless your MIL/FIL are mentally incompetent, they have the right to make bad decisions. In addition, as long as somebody is doing things for them enough that they are gettng by ok, they aren't likely to spend their own money or agree to going into some kind of assisted living facility.

My parents are both quite healthy for mid-late 80's, but I have a very disabled sister who should be in a different kind of arrangement. However, she and my parents are not willng to consider anything different, so the less than good arrangement continues. My other siblings and I have discussed this endlessly! We have concluded there is nothing we can do until either our parent's relinquish control and/or some significantly bad event happens to force their hand somehow.


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## CharlieParker (Aug 15, 2012)

peacem said:


> Sister is a very manipulative woman who likes to play the martyr and is a drama queen. So if she does any job for her mother we all have to know about it as she feel constantly underappreciated. My H on the other will either just do it, or say 'no' if he can't.


Ugh, I understand. The martyr and drama queen is so my sister. If she feels I'm not doing enough she'll usually pull a passive aggressively stunt like texting me the night before "mom's got to be somewhere at 9 tomorrow morning and I can't go [usually because she has to martyr herself for her adult fully capable children]".

We did get her 24/7 help. She didn't want it but truly needs it and otherwise she'd be in a nursing home and not her home. She complains about the money, we reassure it's not being spent on her, it's really for us.


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