Tried to make this short and sweet. My Dad passed away 3 years ago. Car accident. He was 77. Mom had been and continues to be a homebody. She barely gets out. Barely gets dressed. Fortunately they own their house, albeit, it’s an expensive home (taxes alone are $13k a year) and my Dad left her about $300k in retirement savings, but she is burning through it a fair bit. She is a smoker. She barely gets any exercise. She has put on weight, her health is declining.
In an effort to help her through a tough time, my wife and I sold our house and moved in upstairs (it’s a big house, almost 3600 ft) to take over her bills and help clean out the house (Dad was a bit of a pack rat) to eventually sell it and help Mom find a home that makes more sense for her. She hasn’t helped things at all, and due to the strain on our marriage, after 3 years of trying to help and numerous issues, finally had enough and wife and I moved out, bought another home.
Mom, despite saying “I don’t want to be a burden” in actuality, has NO problem being a burden. I don’t know what to do about her. She has become a mother from hell, and I want to throw in the towel and say you are on your own, but don’t want to abandon her to her devices. She is basically devolving into a child, and can’t even do simple, adult things. She doesn’t let her dogs out enough and they make a mess all the time. She has decided to address the issue with just putting down “pee pee pads” and leaving them for days at a time. She has gotten in three accidents with her car, she ran into my car, it was a battle to get her not to smoke in the house, it was a battle to get her to clean up after her two dogs, it was a battle to get her to not leave the windows open (smoking in her bathroom) with the heat or AC constantly on. $800 heat and electric bills. She ran into the garage door, which I paid to replace. Massive blowout when she asked my wife to buy her cigarettes, massive blowout when she asked my wife’s friend to buy her cigarettes.
She routinely cancels important appointments because getting showered and dressed is a massive chore for her, despite no disabilities. I don’t know what to do anymore and my only other sibling is little to no help. He “has his own issues to deal with” with his family as his marriage is in a bad place. My wife is fed up and has told me that my mother needs to take care of herself and I’ve done more than enough and she doesn’t appreciate it. Wife feels my mother has taken advantage of me and tries to emotionally manipulate me. Every time she needs something, she calls me, wheezing, out of breath, and gives me the sob story. Needs me to pick something up, or take her trash out, or take her dogs to the vet/groomer, etc. My wife says she’s emotionally manipulating me. She’s not wrong, but at the same time, she’s still my mother, and I don’t want to abandon her out of guilt and also don’t want the rest of my family thinking I abandoned her either since they don’t really “get it”. Her health is failing, and she doesn’t do anything to stop it. If anything, she’s accelerating it. I can’t keep telling her that she is causing this and I can’t make her change. I also can’t keep doing this for another 10+ years. Any and all advice would be greatly appreciated.
TL/DR; Mom has become an intolerable burden and don’t know what more, if anything, I can/should do.
Submitted November 04, 2019 at 08:46AM by zeporscheguy https://ift.tt/34sxsVn
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