We never had a son. Am very thankful I dont have a d.i.l.
We have been so kindly looked after by s.i.l. due to daughter not allowed to come even to the gate because she is working in Covid potential hospital. If your m.i.l. has enough money, why not find her a local handyman who can come in to move furniture and fix small things? Our elderly widow neighbour (childless) has that. As do our other neighbours as father not into that sort of thing.
It is always worth looking at any constant grumble in life and seeing if a change can be made. I also take a different view of m.i.l. hoarding clothes. Women of our generation did it (me too) be cause we were afraid that at some future date with no husband and no pension we might not be able to afford clothes.
I know you are such a nice person but isnt there an astonishing difference between the lovely way you treat your horses and dog and the view of your m.i.l.
I dont know if she has other company than you? Or a computer to access the web? But if she had a simple tablet she could be in touch or if no computer even have someone phone her each day for a chat. Here o.a.p.s on their own can do that via our local Covid help hub (its Facebook group has info) or if your local support has nothing, there is possible wider provision via Help the Aged and Gran's net. Just give them a ring, say she has moved pout and is now on her own and leave some of the caring to them.
She is my mother not my mother in law. If you wait for a local handyman to come and fix stuff you will be waiting for months. She cannot use a computer as her eyesight is not good and she is 93 and would not handle the technology. She rejected all aids that we provided at huge expense and which had to be returned which would have enabled her to improve her ability to read things and have more access to stimulation but she refused to try any of them. My husband spent a week on this. She rejects all suggestions that would improve her health, like get off her fat arse and walk and not eat a huge packet of sugary sweets a day and have a huff if we don't buy them for her. Her blood tests show that she could develop diabetes but she will take no action to avoid it.
There is no local support to go in at the moment due to covid-19. She has carers coming in 4 times a day and moaned about them all the time she was in her own house, and all this week since she moved into this flat on Monday. I have arranged for a cleaner to come in once a week to clean and also to keep her company. As to her clothes, she buys things and never uses them and then they don't fit her. When she shops she goes into a retail feeding frenzy and just buys and buys and buys then forgets where she has put stuff and accuses me of losing it. She has been living rent free in a house I bought for her for 30 years and has more money coming in than i do. I really resent it when she spends £300 sending flowers to all and sundry but would never think of paying a vet bill for me.
We have spent over 200 hours in the last month doing up the flat, sorting out the old house, clearing it, moving all her stuff. The flat is beautiful but it is smaller than the old house and so things have to be cut down.
We will go down today and move the chest of drawers out of the bedroom area and see if that works better anything to avoid a major conflict. I will do all that is physically possible to solve the logistics in the flat but i cannot solve her unhappiness, her bad temper and her abuse of us.
I treat my animals with the best care i provide because they are my responsibility and it is down to me to do everything i can in my power and budget to care for them. I do not have the same responsibility for my mother who is free to be as obnoxious as she chooses to be and as miserable as she wants, or she can choose to be happy.
This is the mother who in xmas day had a blazing row with my father and walked out and i ran after her, age 6, in my nightdress and bare feet, in the snow, crying mummy don't leave me. She has forgotten that but i haven't. She has been a nightmare all my life and i am just sick of it. i have tried for 64 years to please her, and failed, and now I will ensure that she is safe, fed, pays her bills etc, and i will do what modifications i can to the flat to make it as good as i can but after that it is up to her. We will continue to take her out as she cannot go out alone due to her eyesight and has not gone out solo for over 5 years, but we have to get our lives back. Our house is a tip at the moment, full of her stuff, filthy, i need time to look after us. So i will continue to do the best i can for her, but every day i dislike her just a bit more. I have every sympathy for the fact that she can't see, that she has lived too long, that she is bored, that she is whatever, but i am not Mary Poppins. I cannot make her see again, and anyway even when she was able to see and do more stuff, she was still the same, always moaning, always a pain in the butt. If you can't fix something get used to it. My athritis is really bad at the moment, i have had to start taking medication for high blood pressure which i have avoided doing for years but she has sent my blood pressure beyond where it is safe for me not to medicate. I really resent that as i am extremely anti medication but here i am having to take drugs due to the stress she causes me
If we still lived closer she'd have him there at ten o'clock at night to make her a cup of tea. She's been playing the old woman card since she hit 70! Sometimes I'm glad that there is distance between all our relatives
