My mother lives independently and is 90 years old. She needs outside help but refuses to accept it from anyone but me. I live an hour away which means that any trip for any purpose involves at least two hours on the road. She lives near a major metropolitan area which means traffic congestion and accidents on a regular basis. I work full time and would like to spend some of my free time with my husband and children. I call my mother every day and sometimes a couple times a day. I visit her weekly and do her grocery shopping, household chores, bills and take her to doctors. She visits me at least six times a year and stays for 5-7 days each time. She has been an anxious and obsessive person her whole life. She is very demanding and controlling and wants everything her own way. Until my father died she had him to boss around. Now its me. So she will constantly buy and return things, complain about trivial things in her house, complain about minor health issues, etc. Most of the time I try to redirect her or solve the problem for her. But I have finally realized she doesn't really want the problem solved. She wants to manipulate me into spending my time with her. I realize she is lonely but she has refused every attempt that I've made to get her out and about with others. She even refuses lunch outings with my aunts and cousins. She says she only wants to be with me. I'm really burned out. REALLY REALLY burned out. I have been putting up with this for 9 years now. I've come to the end of my rope.
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Time for Mom to start spending the inheritance.
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Kimber is right, you will not change her you can only change yourself. First decide what you can and cannot do and live with that. If she doesn't like it, too bad. I found this great lady that would help my father and take him to appointments for $15 an hour. The problem was he refused to pay for more than one 3 hour day YET he wanted her to be 'on call' for whenever he needed her. One memorable time was when he called me at 6am asking if I would call her to see if she would take him to the doctor and he expected me to call her right then at 6am! I refused.
You 'home' family needs you too. Your mom has the ability to pay for services, not your problem that she doesn't want to. Saying she wants to keep her money to leave to you is pure manipulation, my father does that too. Don't fall for it.