How do I get my mother-in-law out of my house?

Your local Council on Aging can provide what’s called a needs assessment to help determine what next placement would be appropriate for her needs. Try to have, if you haven’t already, an honest conversation with your husband, minus the frustration and anger, about how exactly this is impacting your home and personal lives. Tell him it’s untenable to continue. If he won’t act, you’ll have to decide your next step, whether that’s to stop providing all assistance to MIL, leaving it to him, leaving the home entirely for a period of time so he can see how hard it is, or making peace with living with it as is. If you’re not clear of an exact diagnosis, she needs an updated medical and likely mental evaluation. I’m sorry you were ever put in this position, it so rarely works well.

First, you need to tell us how “her health has declined” so that it is clearer about whether she is Nursing Home material.

Second, you don’t have to “make her leave”. You just stop what you and the kids do for her, and leave it to your husband. OK, cook enough for him to dish her up a meal, include her sheets in the wash and leave clean ones out for him, but that’s it. If your husband wants her in his home, he does all the care. He will then make up his own mind about her staying in his house. It's your home, but you are not running a private care home for his mother.

As you don’t seem too clear about care options, educate yourself here. If you click on ‘care topics’ a the top right of the screen, you can then click on A for Assisted Living (which you need to enter on a paid basis) and M for Medicaid (which can be the entry for free nursing home care).

Are you & your Husband on the same page?

Sometimes that first step is the hardest.

Nikki45, welcome to the forum. Can you tell us how has your Mom-in-law's health declined? Is it physical and/or memory issues? What is it that she is unable to do?


Assisted Living is out of the question if your Mom-in-law can't budget for the cost. She can sign up for Medicaid [which is different from Medicare] that would help find her a nursing home. But note, in order to get into a nursing home, she would need to qualify health wise. Contact your State Medicaid office.

What she wants and what she needs are two different things. Who is physically caring for her? Ask the relatives who think she needs to stay at home when they will be taking her in to ease your burden. Time for a serious sit down with you husband on how he envisions this going forward.