This weekend i got the surprise of my life. MY FIL and MIL were here for a short visit - they live 1000 miles away. My husband has always had a stressful relationship with them - no matter that we are in our 50's - they come, feel like they can criticize all that we do, that we don't know anything - expect us to change when we eat, what we eat, wait on them hand and foot - completely take over. We have full time professional careers that they criticize, opinions that they criticize, parenting skill that they criticize. We have set boundaries but they still try to get us to knuckle under each and every visit "We are your parents, you should......" I am usually wild by the time they leave after 48 hours.
ANYWAY - the last day of their visit over lunch - before DH took them to the airport - they mentioned that they want us to consider buying a larger house (with their financial help) and that we move in together. They want to see more of our son as they age and then as they age, we can help them.
I was stunned. DH said "we'd think about it" and then we got into a huge fight when he came back from the airport. He has absolutely no experience with caregiving. when my dad was at home and i did respite care - my DH was not there. Not to see the decline, the combativeness, the incontinence, the meals thrown on the floor - the constant doctor appointments for hours at a time, the constant getting up a night. The stress and exhaustion that you all know so well. I was wrung out after just a weekend - imagine my step mom who did this for five years!
I feel they should buy into a continuing care community - where they start out with independent living, gradually add services for assisted living, then finally skilled nursing and memory care. They won't consider this because they expect their children to care for them (even though FIL's own mom went into a continuing care facility).
My DH is in his own fantasy world - picturing the Walton's existence, three generations around the dinner table enjoying each other & him finally having the good relationship with them that he never has. In reality - they complain about what we cook and use the dinner table to criticize what we do, how we live, how we raise our son, our opinions, etc. I can't believe he is seriously wanting us to do this.
We can't get along now with them. What about as they age and need more hands on help? it will be ME they expect to drop my job to take them on round after round of doctor appointments, clean for them, cook for them, etc. because i am a woman. My DH disappears when they get on his nerves and i have to deal with them.
Yet - we have fought about this several times since Sunday. He feels I'm "abandoning" his parents by not wanting to consider living with them. He won't look at this website to gain experience, or talk to co-workers going through this, or counseling about this, or listen to my step mom's experience with my dad.
I am going to see a counselor on my own. I have told DH that this is a deal breaker - i WILL NOT live with them. Have any of you dealt with a spouse with his head in the clouds? How do i get him to at least start asking about the experience of others? He wants me to try. My counter point is that this is awfully expensive and disruptive to "try" as we will never be able to unwind this fiasco - so research now. We are at an impasse. Thank you!
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Yesterday (Sunday) was the weekly call with my DH and his parents. They want to come out at Thanksgiving to visit but also to look at houses - something with a separate space for them. They mentioned to DH that DH should be getting together with a realtor and someone who can give us advice on staging our house for sale.
When the call was over, I came into the kitchen and said "I will welcome your mom and dad for Thanksgiving and we will enjoy a great meal and a great day together. However; I will NOT be looking at houses. If you want to move in with your parents - fine, but I will not sell this house and move into a house with you and your parents. They are independent now but as they age we will be expected to provide care that we do not have the training or time to do. Don't you remember how quickly my dad went from independence to needing his diaper changed? He is younger than your dad. If you want to sit down and talk with me, I am ready. I just wanted you to know my position. By the way, I'm meeting the therapist on Wednesday - you are welcome to come with me."
He did not say much and we didn't fight. I think he was surprised that the idea his parents floated last Sunday seemed to be an agreed upon plan in their minds and i think it rattled him a lot. He is someone who takes time to make major decisions.
We had a soccer tournament yesterday and didn't talk about this at all, but I noticed that when I woke up around 2am - he was not in bed. He was downstairs thinking and was up the rest of the night. To me, that is a good sign.
I so appreciate having you guys in my cheering section!
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He needs to choose between you and his parents. I would never, ever expect my wife to live with my parents and they are pretty sweet folks.
You husband is a lot like my father, he used me and my mom as a buffer. And she did move in with them for awhile.
I suggest you have your husband spend a week at their home with them....trapped. He might see what it will be like. My father had to spend a weekend with his mother in her place and he came home in shock. He wanted to know when she had gotten so 'bad'. We told him she was always like that but he was too zoned out in front of the TV to notice and we got stuck dealing with her.
My DH has had alot of time to think since the blow ups previously and he stated politely and quietly "we have paid off our house, it is in a great location for our work commutes, and we like it. We are not moving"
Then I asked them what they were assuming would happen when we lived together. We found out that since I'm early 50's - that once i reached 55 I'd likely stop working and then would be available if they needed help - to the dr, etc. So i politely told them that i had no intention of stopping working at 55 - that i loved my career, that we needed to save for retirement and our son's college. In short - i could not afford to leave.
They expressed a lot of disappointment but it was not vitriolic. Later i found out my FIL had pulled my husband aside and asked him to promise to take care of MIL and "never put her in the nursing home". Bless my DH - he told his dad that that was a promise he couldn't make, that he saw how grandma needed nursing home care and how my dad needed nursing home care - that we were not full time nursing / hospital in our house.
My DH told my dad straight out - "you have made your own decisions all of your lives. Now you need to make plans for your aging - and loss of mobility especially and eventually loss of ability for ADL and mental capacity" what are your plans when you can no longer drive? etc.
Dad's response was "well that's why we expected you to step up" and my DH reminded his dad about his dad's mom - who chose to move to senior housing when she was 75 - then to assisted living - then to nursing home where she died at 99 1/2.
MIL and FIL were not happy - we got alot of snippy comments about the "young people of today" and self centeredness etc. which we ignored.
But, now it looks like living with us is put to bed. Hopefully they start planning for their future. They are 78 and 80 - no long term care insurance, house with stairs, yard to maintain and no plans for declining years.
DH was visiting them for four days this summer (i had to work) and came home completely frazzled. They get on each others' nerves.
The above is why this is such a shock to me - DH and i have always been on the same page with his parents - have the relationship we can, but don't get trampled. His mom is from a poor country where the kids took care of the parents and served them (or so she thinks). Yet she did not do this for her in laws here or her mum in the old country.
My DH is, i think, saddened that as his parents hit their 80's - their mobility is going downhill, their friends have mostly died, and they are getting lonely. He is mourning the lack of good relationship with them. He somehow pictures this ideal of larger house = individual space would work. Yet, no amount of space will change their feeling that we should do as they wish because they are the elders, bossing and nagging us, and the constant patter of criticism. His mom still complains about his hair and he is 53. Ramp it up from their to his posture, his job, etc etc etc
I mentioned in my first post that they floated the idea only. It is in the initial stages. Yet, knowing my DH, he won't want to confront the fact that we all get along if we are not under the same roof and only for a few days at a time. He is a very logical man in every other area of his life, a wonderful husband, and father.
Hopefully since my IN LAWS are just in the beginning stage and nothing is rushing - i have time to get him to take the emotion/wishful thinking out and realistically look at this. Right now he sees their suggestion as them wanting to have a good relationship with him in their last few years and he wants that too.
BUT, i have read too much here, experienced too much myself, seen too many women co-workers stressed, angry, guilty, and the whole gamut to think naively that we can achieve the Waltons. This will be the hill i die on.
Thank you, thank you, thank you - for all of the support.
-undermining and interference in parenting, often with the kid present
-teenage kids and older will become scarce due to stressful environment
-hearing conversations between spouses and insert themselves into the conversation, creating discord
-power struggle over the running of the household - expectation that household should run as theirs did
-because they're living with their kids, they may tell people they don't really have a home ("I'm a nomad")
-expectation of inclusion in all social activities. If the activity is not suitable or of interest to parent, changes are to be made to accommodate. This includes vacations.
-huge conflicts between parents and adult children, as parents will expect to continue their idea that you are to do as they wish you to.
-money will probably come into play
And this is not even touching on the whole caregiving aspect .....
I think that for each caregiver who looks back at "how in the world did I get HERE?", there's that one pivotal point where we zigged when we should've zagged.
This is yours. Hold fast. Re-read your first paragraph and amplify it thousands of times.
I was shuddering a bit though as I thought of how the family developed the scenario and just expected you and your husband to accept it.
I'm so happy for both of you that the attempt to change your lives and force you into home care was thwarted, and that you made a stand against the assumptive and overbearing relatives.
Congratulations!
The only way that it can work to move the elderly into the home is if BOTH the husband and wife are so committed to what it will take to see it through.
It's a "decent" suggestion that someone else made, perhaps they'd like to move to IL nearby with graduation from there to AL, and NH. That too, will have it's pitfalls .. but at least it's not right under your roof.
He is being unreasonable and I would dig in my heels!
My husband too, thought the "yellow bedroom" (guest bedroom in our home) would be a suitable setting for his mother to take up residence. Mind you, I think he's taken her to maybe 1 or 2 of the hundreds, if not thousands, of doc appointments she's had through the years as she has aged and become more frail. No, no and no!
Stand firm.
Interesting - my FIL initiated a conversation with us about aging and what he was considering (assisted living etc) but as soon as my FIL started talking about this, my MIL shut him down "I'm not ready to talk about this!!!" almost screamed it out. It seems he is willing to consider some kind of senior living arrangement for more help when they need it for laundry, cooking, bathing etc. but my MIL is NOT.
My MIL had a private conversation with me that was a bit sad - she wanted me to say that she could live with us if she survives FIL. She refuses to consider any type of living other than their current house or ours. "I'm not going to some old people's home where they have stupid craft activities". She mentioned that she knows nothing of their finances except the bank name on the checks she writes for groceries and therefore I imagine she is afraid.
During the visit she kept harping on us about how small our house was and that our son needed more room (the kid has a bed room and a year round porch off his room and the run of the house and yard and he needs more room??) or that we need to host an exchange student sometime (WTF??) and she kept on my about retiring at 50 - so many children of her friends are retiring at 50 and they spend all kinds of time together and live together.
It came out during the private meeting that she is hoping (expecting) to live with us if she survives FIL. While i listened and empathized I told her as gently as i could that i was planning to work until 67 - the new retirement age - and that is almost 20 years, especially to get son through college and save for retirement. I also told her that while DH and I would help her find some place if she no longer could live in their house - that we were not planning on having anyone live with us.
Our house is paid off, the commute for all three of us is reasonable, and we plan on using any extra money for son's school and our retirement, not buying a larger house anywhere else.
I mentioned that our financial planner has people that could help her manage her funds if she survives FIL. That while we would not abandon her - we would not be taking over for FIL to make the decisions and have her live with us.
Overall she took it pretty well - THEN. She thinks i'm a softer touch than DH. She cried and said that we all (two sons and two DIL) going to throw her to the curb. I let her cry it out and reminded her that we would certainly help her. I also suggested that she start to picture surviving FIL and what that might mean for learning about their finances and thinking about living arrangements. That we would be happy to talk with her any time about her fears and concerns and what we might jointly find for her locally for senior services. She wouldn't talk about it any more. Then.
So she pulled DH aside the next day when DS and I were sent on an errand - and ripped into him. DH is smart - he called FIL into the room and told them they need to get on the same page for their elder planning as they obviously were not. THEN, they need to plan survivorship in each case, both FIL and MIL each as the surviving spouse. That while we would be around and would help -that we were not in a position to take someone in. This diverted FIL and MIL who started to have a fight with each other. He accusing her of always wanting someone to take care of her and she accusing him of making all the decisions without consulting her. Their same battle as long as i have known them.
The next day we came home. Aunt from old country called this morning to chew out DH but he politely said "MIL and FIL are not on same page - this is for them to resolve, not me" and hung up.
Interesting developments. I do think it is scary that they are over 80 and have not talked to each other about aging. Do they want to live at home and bring in care? Have they researched what is available locally for seniors? Would they consider assisted living at some point? etc. We will offer help researching or getting them into contact with local social workers, in fact - other DL is a social worker for the elderly in their area - she is a source of information but they are not talking to her.
More as the world turns in the next few months i am sure.
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