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How far away are they? Could you go back and forth and hire someone for the days you aren't there? How much care do they need?
I think he's being insensitive a bit, but need to know more about the situation to really form an opinion.
Impossible situation; insight wanted...
Here it is, try to keep it short~
I am an only child, with aging parents in another state. One is a cancer survivor; the other has early signs of Alzheimers. Dh & I are happily married, BUT, a year ago he said he would move to where they are. Now he says flat out he's not going, that he doesn't want to leave the small town we are in and he hates where we would have to move to. (He can get a job transfer)
I absolutely hate where we live but could manage. What I can't handle is the guilt of not helping my parents. So the situation I find myself in is either abandoning my parents or abandoning my husband. The one parent is willing to move to where we are, but the other, who is still lucid, adamently refuses.
If dh were to go, I know he would always resent me. If he doesn't go, I feel like I will end up resenting him because ofhis broken promise. His concerns and feelings are valid. The reality is that my parents need care and there is no one else to provide it. Am I going to be forced to choose? I know my first priority is my own family, but I feel that if we don't move, I am throwing them to the wolves and saying, "You're on your own." Is that what I should do? Has anyone else been in this situation?
How far away are they? Could you go back and forth and hire someone for the days you aren't there? How much care do they need?
I think he's being insensitive a bit, but need to know more about the situation to really form an opinion.
Another alternative could be an assisted living facility. Many of them now include individusl apartments where they live on their own but have at their disposal services that could supplement their needs.
May not be the best solution, but given the issues they're both going through, it may something to consider.
And if you do your research, there are a great many places that are top quality. Also, these are not (and I repeat not) nursing homes.
There will always be boundries, but making love is so different, than having sex, let's face it. CW
Pretzel has a great point. There are a lot that are like "communities" - my grandparents moved there, and as their health declined, there were nurses and doctors on site to help them out while they lived on their own in their own condo/apartment... it had 2 bedrooms and 2 bathrooms so that they could have family stay with them just as they had when they owned their house.
What was great was that as my grandfather's health declined and he needed to be transferred into a "nursing home" - it was right there on-site - and my grandmother could maintain her residence too.
It was a beautiful place, lots of grounds, they had their own garden plot, there were dining rooms if they didn't want to cook, there were lots of friends that they made, activities that they could do if they wanted....
It's certainly not the end of the road as people think!
Finances could be an issue with assisted living. My parents are financially comfortable, but it's my understanding those assisted living places are pretty spendy.
I feel betrayed by dh. If he had said flat out that he wasn't willing to move, from the beginning, at least that would have been honest and I would have known where I stood.
My mother is stilll able to travel, but soon will get to the point where she can't leave my dad alone. That means she won't see the kids again, if at all, because we are a one-income family ( I stay at home to raise our kids)
Sourpuss~They are fifteen hundred miles away and I have small kiddos so the back and forth thing is not really doable. In-home care could be an option.
Truthfully, at this point in time it is more a question of either dh or I being forced to do something that one or the other doesn't want...and that's going to cause resentment no matter what.
His mom in in the same area as my parents, but he has siblings and a large family so it is easy for him to not deal with it. My parents have no one else.
Can you hire someone for the time being to come by a couple of times a week until you and your husband can come to an agreement? Would his family be willing to help out?
Concerning the finances, one way to look at it is to think of it as a rental house with other amenities. Alot of times people tend to just think of them as "expensive nursing homes". More times than not, they aren't.
I'm not advocating way or the other. It just so happens that the agency I work for deals with the elderly so I hear these conversations from time to time.
There will always be boundries, but making love is so different, than having sex, let's face it. CW
He doesn't have any contact with his family, not even his mom for some time now. And they have no contact with mine.
My parents are ok for right now. The real issue is whether or not I will be where they are when they get to the point they do need daily care. So I probably should have posted this in the husband/fiance forum. It is going to come down to who ends up doing something they really don't want to do. I don't want to end up going our separate ways.
It's not the easiest decision, but when push comes to shove, despite what your husband may be saying now, when the time comes that the decision has to be made, I'm pretty sure he'll be in your corner.Originally Posted by AnneHathaway
It's so much easier to say one thing when the situation doesn't dictate it, but totally another when the situation changes.
I don't think you two will split because of this.
There will always be boundries, but making love is so different, than having sex, let's face it. CW
I hope you're right, because we've been together a long time and really don't have any problems other than typical couples stuff.
I guess worst case scenario is that I go and he stays and then we see who follows who.
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