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- Oct 21, 2011
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Sorry, but I gotta get some of this stress off my chest about my MIL.
MIL is in her late sixties, but acts much older than that. She has health problems and is on many different medications. Hubby thinks that some of the irresponsible things she does/says are because of all the medication she's on.
She has a job caring for the elderly/mentally incapacitated, but truthfully, she needs a caregiver herself. She won't quit because she needs health insurance to keep paying for her medications. She drives to her work but got in multiple fender-benders last year. The people she cares for sometimes have mental issues and are sometimes aggressive/verbally abusive towards her.
At her work, she cleans house and drives her clients where they need to go (dr appts, grocery shopping, the casino
) and makes sure they take their medications. When she comes home, she doesn't have energy to clean her own house or cook, so she eats fast food for almost every meal. She buys groceries, but doesn't use them, so they go bad. She buys and eats lots of candy, but is pre-diabetic. She thinks her diet is fine because her doctors haven't told her to change it. My hubby goes over to her house almost once a week and cleans her house for her, washes dishes, does laundry, vacuums, takes out her garbage, helps her with her bills. Sometimes his sister helps too.
She doesn't have proper boundaries with people. She'll let her grandkids be rude to her, but will yell and swear at strangers, such as a waitress who doesn't get her order right. Or she'll tell people she's just met about her financial problems. She'll interupt conversations to tell people about little random things that she had on her mind.
The financial problems are the biggest issue. As far as I can tell, she's never been good with money. She gets enough from her job and Social Security that she can pay all her bills, and have a little left over. But every month she goes overdue on bills, claiming that she doesn't have enough money. She makes cash withdrawls and wont say what she's spending it on. Sometimes she straight-out lies and says she's spending it on a bill, but then doesn't. She has a retirement account that she takes out of but doesn't put in to. Last week she borrowed money from us because she didn't have any and she needed to buy some things. Hubby made it clear that this was a one-time thing. But then this week we found out that her car insurance coverage is about to end because she hasn't paid it for so long. So we ended up paying for that too because it's illegal here to drive without insurance. If we had let the insurance lapse then she would've lost her job because she couldn't have driven.
She has a "boyfriend", a man that she's never met in person but talked to on the phone for over a year. I think she sends him money, or prescription drugs
My poor husband is so stressed out, both by the issues his mom has and her unwillingness to address any of them. We want to improve some of these situations. We're going to have a senior care company do an evaluation on her health (mental, physcial, emotional) and living conditions, and they'll give us an outline of what she needs, such as hiring a part-time caregiver or us taking over payment of all her bills or something. I am particularly anxious to schedule this evaluation, even though it will cost us $500 or more, I want things to get better, not stay as they are.
Sorry this is so long. I need support. None of my friends are dealing with elderly parents in their lives yet, even my parents aren't dealing with this in their lives yet, so I don't have anyone I can really talk to about it...
MIL is in her late sixties, but acts much older than that. She has health problems and is on many different medications. Hubby thinks that some of the irresponsible things she does/says are because of all the medication she's on.
She has a job caring for the elderly/mentally incapacitated, but truthfully, she needs a caregiver herself. She won't quit because she needs health insurance to keep paying for her medications. She drives to her work but got in multiple fender-benders last year. The people she cares for sometimes have mental issues and are sometimes aggressive/verbally abusive towards her.
At her work, she cleans house and drives her clients where they need to go (dr appts, grocery shopping, the casino
) and makes sure they take their medications. When she comes home, she doesn't have energy to clean her own house or cook, so she eats fast food for almost every meal. She buys groceries, but doesn't use them, so they go bad. She buys and eats lots of candy, but is pre-diabetic. She thinks her diet is fine because her doctors haven't told her to change it. My hubby goes over to her house almost once a week and cleans her house for her, washes dishes, does laundry, vacuums, takes out her garbage, helps her with her bills. Sometimes his sister helps too. She doesn't have proper boundaries with people. She'll let her grandkids be rude to her, but will yell and swear at strangers, such as a waitress who doesn't get her order right. Or she'll tell people she's just met about her financial problems. She'll interupt conversations to tell people about little random things that she had on her mind.
The financial problems are the biggest issue. As far as I can tell, she's never been good with money. She gets enough from her job and Social Security that she can pay all her bills, and have a little left over. But every month she goes overdue on bills, claiming that she doesn't have enough money. She makes cash withdrawls and wont say what she's spending it on. Sometimes she straight-out lies and says she's spending it on a bill, but then doesn't. She has a retirement account that she takes out of but doesn't put in to. Last week she borrowed money from us because she didn't have any and she needed to buy some things. Hubby made it clear that this was a one-time thing. But then this week we found out that her car insurance coverage is about to end because she hasn't paid it for so long. So we ended up paying for that too because it's illegal here to drive without insurance. If we had let the insurance lapse then she would've lost her job because she couldn't have driven.
She has a "boyfriend", a man that she's never met in person but talked to on the phone for over a year. I think she sends him money, or prescription drugs
My poor husband is so stressed out, both by the issues his mom has and her unwillingness to address any of them. We want to improve some of these situations. We're going to have a senior care company do an evaluation on her health (mental, physcial, emotional) and living conditions, and they'll give us an outline of what she needs, such as hiring a part-time caregiver or us taking over payment of all her bills or something. I am particularly anxious to schedule this evaluation, even though it will cost us $500 or more, I want things to get better, not stay as they are.
Sorry this is so long. I need support. None of my friends are dealing with elderly parents in their lives yet, even my parents aren't dealing with this in their lives yet, so I don't have anyone I can really talk to about it...
