Most people don’t realize that their long, slow decline is at the point where they need help until they are actually past that point - or they realize it, but they don’t want to admit it. It’s really hard to give up the independence most of us have. It’s really hard to admit that our loved one (especially our spouse) isn’t going to magically become independent again. It’s just really, really hard to get old.
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I think this happens more than we probably know.
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Siblings find out with the ‘testing’ of parents needing help/a lot of help and who is willing to step up to the plate. One of my BILs has a wife that tells him what he can and cannot do (he married late, he is the youngest and she is the oldest, so that is how that dynamic works) - he only lives 5 hours from where parents had lived. The very dependable/responsible brother was 1 hour away, and DH and I stepped up in major ways. The other brother and SIL have health issues and also live as far as we do.
The dependable brother (now a retired pharmacist) and DH have always been close, and part of it is the way we choose to live our lives. Our kids are close to each other and some of it is because we put forth the efforts and behave like family in the good sense.
I got the sweetest card and letter from my SIL’s mother - she is longing to be near her grandchildren, and hopefully will be soon. Her H has Parkinson’s, and his lack of doing things around the house for their entire married life before Parkinson’s (maintenance and day to day living help) has almost 100% fallen on her shoulders. SIL had to go for 2 weeks earlier this year to help go through all the stuff they had to get rid of in their offsite storage (they actually had two, one that they had not visited in 8 years!) and in their garage (while I traveled to help DD with 4 kids and her FT job in his absence). Some of it was his career/travel, but once he had a M - F work hours near their purchased home, he didn’t step up more. They rented during a long stretch; she home schooled the two sons until this final place when the brothers were in 8th and 9th grades. Some of the storage stuff was her home-schooling stuff - why keep it? My sister who worked in education, thinned through stuff before they moved when her H retired (she accepted a new work assignment and they purchased a smaller home), and as a 70 YO, she is still getting rid of stuff 17 years later out of their basement - she is pretty active with grandchildren with visits, but not really involved in their day-to-day educational pursuits.
I am getting our home in better shape (home has always been maintained excellently, but dealing with clutter and going through storage), but the key thing here is that we have money to pay for help when we need it. SIL’s parents have enough of a pension and savings to live near their son in LA (and be 6 hours from their son/our SIL), and just have to have the ball rolling on that transition. They know what furniture to keep, but just getting rid of more and having the house be ready to sell. DH has activities that has us remaining in our current location, and we are healthy. We will see DD/SIL/Gkids at Thanksgiving at our niece’s location, and we will be at DD/SIL at Christmas - New Year’s to see how much DD/SIL want me to come in 2025. I have a short trip planned, and other than that, will have their desires with being available for the older grandkids’ activities (and supportive of educational time - reading and music).
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I hope you don’t mean that in an insulting way.
My husband’s family is literally spread all over the world. It’s not reasonable to ask someone who lives a 26 hour plane ride away to come and help. Ditto the person who lives across the country. So that leaves a couple of others, and believe me, they DO step up.
MIL has caregivers 7 days a week…but local sibling insists that someone needs to be in her town when local sibling goes out of town. All they have to do is sit at her house just in case there is an emergency. So…these three other siblings take turns. But now that local sibling has retired, she is traveling a lot more. And the others don’t get asked…they are told what her plans are with the expectation that they will be there.
All we ask is that before they make their plans, they ask when we are available. I don’t personally think that’s asking too much when you want someone to drive 6 hours from home , or take time off work and fly there…to help out…which they have always done.
And these siblings actually get along. And like each other.
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I do mean it in a good way, but sometimes it challenges families a lot.
There is a saying about ‘fair weather friends’ - things get tested when times get rough.
People are what they are, related or not.
I am happy @deb922 - her DH said ‘no’ when his wife’s siblings wanted her to drive 28 hours round trip because “mom was driving them crazy”. Then for her siblings to call her child - wow. That is stepping over boundaries and honestly those siblings are not behaving in an adult manner.
Sometimes things do change when parents are gone. Some siblings don’t make efforts anymore, or harbor issues from the past - and don’t live in the present and the future. My mentally ill (bi-polar sister) says and does things, cuts ties, etc. It is what it is. Our mother was bi-polar – she accepted the medication but was a personality. One brother is a convicted felon (white collar crime).
Some people have close friends that they consider are their family.
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I think many people don’t realize the level of care that can be given in a facility vs. at home. Many people feel that staying in their home is their most important goal. Unfortunately, this ends up with many older couples in the situation mentioned above. Living on their own, with one or both needing care that the other cannot provide.
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FIL went to skilled care and MIL stayed home until she needed to go to skilled care. But MIL fought it all the way, and with some aspects of dementia came up with her solution that DH stay to be her caregiver 24/7! She actually adjusted nicely to the facility for the first week or so, but then her medications stopped working for her hypertensive heart disease, and she passed away quickly.
My mother had the resources to live at home with live in help, and she died (as she desired) at home; had hospice for a short time (less than a week).
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@SOSConcern thank you for that. I appreciate the support.
It’s hard when a sibling doesn’t respect boundaries and how to handle that.
My child had been siding with my sibling, this last time my husband had a talk about boundaries. Unfortunately he had to step in and our child listens when he talks.
To be clear my sibling wanted me to drive to mom, take her to my house, where I would have given up my bedroom because mom can no longer climb stairs, drive mom back a week later because mom had a doctors appointment, that sibling insisted on not changing and drive home.
Since there were issues with another sick relative I would have had to stay in a hotel. My husband had conflicts of his own so he couldn’t accompany me.
Husband agreed at the last moment to accompany me to mom’s this weekend. I am very grateful. Wish me luck lol!
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And neighborly help sometimes gets heavily relied upon unfairly.
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I feel like we could be fast friends IRL. So many parallels, including a ds who always wanted me to be the “big” one with my sibling. Whenever there was conflict, he felt so sorry for her and every time wanted me to acquiesce because my life was so “much better than hers.” Finally, on his last visit to my mom (she died the day that he flew out), I told him that I am happy to pick him up at the airport and get him to my mother but that he needed to be Team Me while here. He got the message.
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I have said this before, but my ILs are so profoundly in denial about aging. They continue to maintain that they’ll stay in their multi-level house forever, and will just hire help.
I made FIL mad by sending them an article about average costs and pointed out they’ll need to budget for that, not just trips to Florida and new furniture. My BiL is their fav child and he is very “we have plenty of time and it’s not that hard” which makes us look unreasonable even though we have just been through alk this with my mom and dad, and DiLs mom.
My dad was adamant, even in hospice, raving, that he had to be at home. It might have been possible, but it would have destroyed my mom, and we backed her up on hospice. She decided on AL herself and it was so brave of her. It isn’t perfect, but it was the CHANGE that scared her, not actually being there. She has company, food, daily help – and discovered having someone do the laundry is really handy!
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Agree with everything everyone has written about the elderly being in denial about the help they need. For them it’s too late to do anything but muddle through with varying degrees of success, with varying degrees of help.
But the real question is: what are WE going to do, so WE don’t become those unreasonable stubborn elderly parents???
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The only thing I have been doing to not be that parent, is to repeatedly tell my daughter to slap me if I start to act like my parents. This method will probably not be effective.
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We are already emptying the house of stuff we imagined someone would want (which was dumb to think). We have had all the major work on the house done and the house is paid for. We are learning each others’ house - jobs; I’m doing maintenance, he’s learning to cook. We agreed at preset ages to examine our situation and consult our offspring about it.
and we have agreed that at a specific age, we will relocate to one of the local AL facilities, of which we have excellent choices. That age is hopefully well below one that will leave our kids managing a crisis.
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I continue to think about the grandchildren - and if we can be involved with their lives by living close to them as they grow up. We would be downsizing and moving, so will not have a lot of the problems hopefully on our DDs having to do a lot of chores and remotely.
DH is very active with a community here in his hobby (which also is a club activity that he mentors HS students at several HSs - including a national competition/rocketry) - and we are in a city which has a high percentage of concentration in engineering R & D, aerospace engineering. His local club has also helped NASA put on the student launch competition for colleges that is held here. DH says he is doing more engineering work now than he had been doing at his job in contract electronics manufacturing (which he retired from 4 years ago) - he is actually talking bench work and electronics design (like he designed and built a wireless launch system, which his article was published as one of the lead stories in their National publication on Rocketry). He had done a lot of programming work in various languages up until retirement; he always drew from his work experiences and electrical engineering knowledge base on obtaining solutions to tough problems.
Wow, kudos to you! We are all different ages and at different places but I would have never thought about doing this. Honestly I don’t think H would be open to having that conversation.
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Well, don’t give us too much credit, we haven’t done it yet! I’ve seen lots of my elders go from sensible plans to complete denial.
Seriously, we have been through a lot and wouldn’t wish it on anyone, most especially our kids.
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Next week we are moving my 94 year old mother into an independent living place (her choice!), and it’s over $7k/month for one person.
The attached AL facility is over $10k/month.
What age did you decide to make this move? It’s seriously expensive, to do this before it’s necessary could bankrupt you unless you are very wealthy.
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We expect to examine our health at 70, and move at 75. And are planning accordingly, as much as you can plan that sort of thing. We are fortunate in the plethora of local options – from a serious downsize to senior living to Alzheimer’s care (it runs in my family as cancer does in DH). There are at least three places that (sorry I don’t know the term) you go from a small patio home to an assisted apartment to skilled nursing to hospice all under the same umbrella. And yes, there’s no way to know what the choices will be then. But I think it’s important to frame the future and our aging process not just as what happens when we die, but what happens right before that.
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