I have seen this so many times OP. I used to work with carers and it was usually the family member who lived closest who copped for it all. And we aren't even talking about living on a different continent! Resentment was expressed many times by those doing the caring and I totally understand yours.
But what's done is done. Your Mum has a new life on the other side of the world and making her feel guilty about it won't help. Actually she probably does feel guilty and visits probably make it worse.
I think the dog issue is a bit of a red herring.
Thanks for the replies. I certainly don't need her any more, i can look after myself. If it was just me here i would have no issues with her going off to Oz. It just makes me sad her grandchildren never see her, My son had a very good relationship with her before she left and now he barely knows who she is.
Regarding skype - we do skype, but the time difference and the age of the children make timing a bit awkward. To be he honest we did it a lot more when she first left, but now it is mainly just Christmases and birthdays.
What grates is there were so many years when she lived here when her family didn't need her. My grandparents always did a great deal for her, decorating her house and suchlike. But essentially as soon we really could do with some help she isn't here.
The reason i mention the dog is she is fricking obsessed with this dog. We send her pictures of the children and she sends us pictures of the dog. Its is made into calendars and Christmas cards and every day there are several posts on facebook about what the dog is up to. She spends a lot more time thinking about this dog than her parents and grandchildren.
Wow! You 'certainly don't need her anymore'?
You're beginning to sound like you only want her around for taking the kids off your hands etc.
You don't feel it would be nice to see her so YOU can spend time with her?
I would be mad with her. Your grandad was her dad not yours she should be looking after him not you. I know quite a few people who do this running off to another country they are all quite selfish and their responsibilities fall on other people.
Wow! You 'certainly don't need her anymore'?
You're beginning to sound like you only want her around for taking the kids off your hands etc.
You don't feel it would be nice to see her so YOU can spend time with her?
I lived with my grandparents from the age of 4 to 17. I moved back in with her at 17 but I went off to uni at 19 and never lived with her again for any extended period after that. She has been largely out of my life for the last 6 years. Honestly, i am not fussed about spending time with her myself, but i do want my children to have a relationship with her and i do want my granddad not to feel abandoned by her.
I lived with my grandparents from the age of 4 to 17. I moved back in with her at 17 but I went off to uni at 19 and never lived with her again for any extended period after that. She has been largely out of my life for the last 6 years. Honestly, i am not fussed about spending time with her myself, but i do want my children to have a relationship with her and i do want my granddad not to feel abandoned by her.
No disrespect but the bond was tenuous with your mother ? Was she close to her parents?
I would be shocked and upset if my children felt they had to take care of me in my later years. . I worked my arse of as a single parent to make them I dependant , have worthwhile careers and to forge their own lives. I also paid enough NI and made very little claim on NHS so I expect that money paid in over an entire working life to at least see to my end of life care. My children owe me nothing and I would be appalled if they felt they did. Having said that I have a huge well of love from them and I'm blessed. But the idea of any of them putting suppositories up my bottom or changing incontinence pads for me is as abhorrent for me as it would be for them . I nursed my own mum and she hated it. It's not all it's cracked up to be.
I would suggest that you avoid getting annoyed with her at all costs, particularly direct to her. You never know when you might find that it is no longer possible to make it up because she has gone, and you could really regret that.
It happened to someone I knew quite well who had a row with his wife and a few days later she died rather unexpectedly.
Do you interact with everyone on the basis they may die within a few days?
I lived with my grandparents from the age of 4 to 17. I moved back in with her at 17 but I went off to uni at 19 and never lived with her again for any extended period after that. She has been largely out of my life for the last 6 years. Honestly, i am not fussed about spending time with her myself, but i do want my children to have a relationship with her and i do want my granddad not to feel abandoned by her.
My parents emigrated, as I said, before we married. It didn't stop my kids getting a very close bond, and with my Dad in particular. And they actually only met him probably 6 times in all in the 23 and 21 years of their lives. They adored him and are heartbroken about his passing last week.
And tbh your Grandad's relationship with your Mum is entirely between them. Has he actually said that he feels abandoned?
Do you interact with everyone on the basis they may die within a few days?
No, of course not. However it is always possible and if you are in dispute with someone you love (though from later posts by the OP, I am not so sure in this case) you might regret it if they did.
Thanks for the replies. I certainly don't need her any more, i can look after myself. If it was just me here i would have no issues with her going off to Oz. It just makes me sad her grandchildren never see her, My son had a very good relationship with her before she left and now he barely knows who she is.
Regarding skype - we do skype, but the time difference and the age of the children make timing a bit awkward. To be he honest we did it a lot more when she first left, but now it is mainly just Christmases and birthdays.
What grates is there were so many years when she lived here when her family didn't need her. My grandparents always did a great deal for her, decorating her house and suchlike. But essentially as soon we really could do with some help she isn't here.
The reason i mention the dog is she is fricking obsessed with this dog. We send her pictures of the children and she sends us pictures of the dog. Its is made into calendars and Christmas cards and every day there are several posts on facebook about what the dog is up to. She spends a lot more time thinking about this dog than her parents and grandchildren.
I'm guessing she might be doting on the dog because she has no one else to fuss over, a sort of surrogate grandchild? I know several people who adore their cats / dogs and treat them almost as though they were children; and in most cases their children have moved away and / or they live alone. They like the company of a pet.
Could your mum be fixated with this dog because she's lonely?
In short, your mother has pissed off to Australia to live in the sun and left you to care for her father. Don't really see how anyone here can defend her. Even if she was never that close to her father, you are her child and she's left you to look after her parent, and as a result your own life is pretty much stagnant while she lives it up in the sun. Sounds like a lovely woman.
Who was the more selfish - me and my husband for moving to the coast when I retired so we could afford to buy a house instead of renting, have a better quality of life and both have better health? Or his mother who screamed hysterically at me that we owed it to her to stay in a city we had both begun to hate, where we could never have afforded to buy our own place and were both being made ill by the stress of city life and the amount of travelling we had to do to have a social life, just so we could be on hand to do her shoppping and cleaning?
You feel your MIL is selfish for expecting you to stay put.
Your MIL feels you are selfish for leaving her.
It's subjective - that's all I was pointing out.
(Personally I think your MIL is being selfish, but then I have a selfish MIL who won't let us leave , so my perspective is biased:( )
I'm guessing she might be doting on the dog because she has no one else to fuss over, a sort of surrogate grandchild? I know several people who adore their cats / dogs and treat them almost as though they were children; and in most cases their children have moved away and / or they live alone. They like the company of a pet. Could your mum be fixated with this dog because she's lonely?
OP - what I get from your posts is that you want your mother to visit more for your kids' sake than anyone else's. You say you want them to have a relationship with their grandmother, but have you asked them if they're especially bothered about it? My wife and I only have one parent each (father and mother respectively), so my kids are effectively one 'set' of grandparents down. AFAIA, it doesn't bother them in the slightest because they don't know any different. Similarly, they have various aunts, uncles and cousins they rarely to never see. Again, it doesn't bother them because they've never got to know them.
My point is, yes, the grandparent/ grandchild relationship can be a lovely one, but if your kids have never had it, they won't miss it, so you shouldn't force it by insisting your mother returns for a visit she clearly doesn't want to make. In any case, she could visit for two-weeks every year, but that still won't forge the relationship you seem to want for your kids. In the absence of any other contact, to them your mother will always be that old lady they see once a year. Is it, perhaps, fair to say that it's not that she hasn't visited that bothers you, but more that she doesn't want to? A case of, you don't necessarily want her to visit, you just want her to want to?
I think your kids will have a much better relationship by regular Skype and e-mail (with photos) contact, than a short, one-off visit, so FWIW, you should be encouraging your kids to initiate contact and see how that goes. If it turns out they're not really bothered about it either, then you'll have nothing to worry about.
My son who I was very very close to, left England when he was 18.. He has four children who although I see a couple of times a year . I dont know them. I send money for birthdays and Christmas as I would have no idea what they like. I fully understand his choice to leave and have never begrudged that in anyway..
My daughter has said a few times if she could persuade her partner to go live near her brother, she would be gone in a heartbeat.. I would be devastated if she did that, and she said it without any thought to how I would feel. She has two children that I have looked after while she worked since they were 6 weeks old. Me and the children have a very strong bond and spend a lot of time together.. TBH if once the children are both in full-time school and she didn't need me any more and went to live near her brother, I would feel very used and would not be happy about it and skypeing really would not cut the mustard after being with them so much for both their lives.
I am not a selfish person and would try not to show how hurt I am.. But I know the bond will be broken and that will be another two grandchildren I wont see enough to know who they are.
In short, your mother has pissed off to Australia to live in the sun and left you to care for her father. Don't really see how anyone here can defend her. Even if she was never that close to her father, you are her child and she's left you to look after her parent, and as a result your own life is pretty much stagnant while she lives it up in the sun. Sounds like a lovely woman.
I can.
If we all had the mindset that we had to stay close to home in case our parents and / or children needed us then we'd live and die a few miles from the town in which we were born. It's not a crime to want a life of your own, to want to travel and see different parts of the world. Sometimes people go on a gap year, fall in love with a country and decide to move there, like my friends did with New Zealand. Sometimes you might meet a person from another place, fall in love with them and have to make a decision as to whether you move to live with them. You can't spend your whole life thinking, 'I can't do what I want in life in case my family need me at some point in the future.'
My Nan had no life of her own. She looked after her ailing father in law for five years, and then when grandchildren came along she looked after all of us too. Once I learned to drive I used to visit her every week. And she was always so glad to be visited. I'd drop by every time I drove past her house, and she was always at home. Always. Because once the ungrateful father in law and her husband died, once the kids and grandkids stopped needing childcare... she was alone. And because she'd devoted herself to family 100% she had very few friends or hobbies.
I loved the days spent together, but I wish I'd called more often and found her out for lunch with friends, or gone on a coach holiday or something. I wish she'd had more of a life outside of her children and grandchildren, because then she would have been less lonely.
My Mum is the polar opposite. Every time I ring her she's playing golf or volunteering or on holiday or meeting a friend. She's often too busy to do more than pop round for a cup of tea. But I don't mind that. If she wanted to move abroad I would miss her terribly, and like the OP I would probably feel slightly resentful on behalf of my daughter. But she did her job in raising me and my sister, and looking after my Nan when she had cancer. Now I'm an adult with a family of my own I can't and don't expect to be her number one priority in life.
In the OP's situation my response would be much the same - I would feel resentful that she didn't visit more often. It would bother me that she'd never met one of her grandchildren. But like Vast Girth I wouldn't say anything, because I would hate to make her feel guilty.
I lived with my grandparents from the age of 4 to 17. I moved back in with her at 17 but I went off to uni at 19 and never lived with her again for any extended period after that. She has been largely out of my life for the last 6 years. Honestly, i am not fussed about spending time with her myself, but i do want my children to have a relationship with her and i do want my granddad not to feel abandoned by her.
I can understand her moving with a new husband and for that I don't think she is selfish. I do think she is selfish for leaving all your Granddad's care down to you especially after they took you in and raised you-where was she and what was she doing that she couldn't look after you? If your Grandad needs anything approaching full-time care she should make the effort to come home for as long as is necessary to arrange a long-term care package but I guess that even if you paid for the flight she wouldn't be a great help anyway
My Mother is an incredibly selfish woman too and frequently offloads care that she feels should be provided to relatives onto me like wanting me to host a mentally ill cousin who emotionally and verbally abused me in childhood for Christmas dinner was the latest, a cousin who hasn't set foot in mother's house for decades as she's "too difficult".
I could go on and on about it but suffice to say I didn't have a good childhood with her and in the past she has successfully used sentimental memories and emotional blackmail to manipulate me all the while overlooking her severe maternal shortcomings with the phrase "I was very young having children". Everything is always about what's in it for her. Now I automatically refuse any request she makes, think about it, and if it suits me and there is no opportunity for her to make mischief I'll call back later and agree.
Its very sad but some Mothers are just destructive and don't change. She has calculated how much you feel for your Grandad and knows you will carry the burden for her.
I fully admit my bias here but if your Mother is anything like mine don't let her away with it with a clear conscience, I wish I'd spoken up sooner. I find it very liberating now to tell her "No, I wont be doing it. its your responsibility, not mine". Your kids will do just fine without her.
My mum emigrated to Austraila in 2010 with her Australian husband. He had previously been living here and they met, married and lived here before moving. My mum loves the sunshine so I know moving somewhere hot has always been a dream of hers.
In the 6 years since she left she has only been back once for my nans funeral in 2013. My grandad is in increasingly poor health and the burden of looking after him falls on me, Mrs Girth and some friends of the family. She calls him once a week, but cannot do anything at all to help practically.
She hasn’t seen her grandson since 2013 and has never seen her 2yr old granddaughter.
There are always excuses why she cannot come back, she always says I will visit some when in the next 6 months, but she never does. I know they are a bit tight for money, but I have offered to pay towards the flights.
I think it’s really selfish how she has buggered exactly when her family need her the most. I know a brief visit wouldn’t really help, but she should at least visit my grandad and see her grandchildren. She seems to spend all her time and energy on her incredibly fat and spoilt dog.
Am I right to be annoyed at her? Im not sure I could ever bring myself to confront her about it, and even if I did I don’t think it would help matters in any way.
｛ Leaving one’s parents and beginning in earnest to play one’s role in the theater of life
When one reaches maturity, one is able to leave one’s parents and “strike out on one’s own,” and it is at this point that one truly begins to play one’s own role, that one’s mission in life ceases to be foggy and gradually becomes clear. Nominally one still stays closely tied to one’s parents, but because one’s mission and the role one plays in life have nothing to do with one’s mother and father, in actuality this intimate tie slowly breaks down as a person gradually becomes independent. From a biological perspective, people still cannot help being dependent upon parents in subconscious ways, but objectively speaking, once they are grown they have entirely separate lives from their parents, and will perform the roles they assume independently. Besides birth and childrearing, the parents’ responsibility in a child’s life is simply to provide him or her with a formal environment to grow up in, for nothing except the predestination of the Creator has a bearing on a person’s fate. No one can control what kind of future a person will have; it is predetermined long in advance, and not even one’s parents can change one’s fate. As far as fate is concerned, everyone is independent, and everyone has his or her own fate. So no one’s parents can stave off one’s fate in life or exert the slightest influence on the role one plays in life. It could be said that the family into which one is destined to be born, and the environment in which one grows up, are nothing more than the preconditions for fulfilling one’s mission in life. They do not in any way determine a person’s fate in life or the kind of destiny amidst which a person fulfills his or her mission. And so no one’s parents can assist one in accomplishing one’s mission in life, no one’s relatives can help one assume one’s role in life. How one accomplishes one’s mission and in what kind of living environment one performs one’s role are entirely determined by one’s fate in life. In other words, no other objective conditions can influence the mission of a person, which is predestined by the Creator. All people become mature in their own particular growing-up environments, then gradually, step by step, set off down their own roads in life, fulfill the destinies planned for them by the Creator, naturally, involuntarily entering the vast sea of humanity and assuming their own posts in life, where they begin to fulfill their responsibilities as created beings for the sake of the Creator’s predestination, for the sake of His sovereignty. ｝
I will share a movie with you. I would like you to enjoy it when you are convenient. Then take it easy! Everybody has his own life, what we can do is try to understand her. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ed25DUXijGg
I have slightly similar issues with my parents (though not to the same degree) and basically, I think it comes down to the fact that they are the baby boomer generation, had life a lot easier that any generation before, or to come, have gone into retirement with more more than anyone before, or to come, and are doing what they like with it. They are the generation that has had the real break from 'family duty' that was there before and we are the first generation to really miss out on it (I say 'we', that is assuming you are around 30-40-50s)
What a load of tosh. As a baby boomer, I object to that analysis. Yes, I had free education up to degree level (if I wanted it), yes, I had a free NHS all my life and mostly I've lived in an Europe free from war. And I retired on an end of salary pension. I've been very, very lucky. But in no way does that make me put my needs above those of my family, or society in general. I did not have a "real break" from family duty. If anything, my good fortune made my view of family duty even more pointed. I am a little peed of with the lazy journalism that portrays baby boomers as just lucky with a feeling of entitlement. I know I have been lucky and I also know that it is now my responsibility to do what I can for the next generation, who don't have it so lucky. Just as I knew it was my responsibility to care for the generation before me who sacrificed so much to ensure we baby boomers had things as good as we had.
Sorry for the rant, but I get really peed off when the baby boomers generation gets blamed for the ills of society
I lived with my grandparents from the age of 4 to 17. I moved back in with her at 17 but I went off to uni at 19 and never lived with her again for any extended period after that. She has been largely out of my life for the last 6 years. Honestly, i am not fussed about spending time with her myself, but i do want my children to have a relationship with her and i do want my granddad not to feel abandoned by her.
The more we learn, it seems that she was never a real proper mother to you and looked after you. Why would you want your kids to try and establish a relationship with this unreliable person??. Just let her be and since your grandparents did take care of you from 4-17, it's only fair that you do look after him. Any grandparents from your partner's side???.
My parents emigrated, as I said, before we married. It didn't stop my kids getting a very close bond, and with my Dad in particular. And they actually only met him probably 6 times in all in the 23 and 21 years of their lives. They adored him and are heartbroken about his passing last week.
And tbh your Grandad's relationship with your Mum is entirely between them. Has he actually said that he feels abandoned?
I agree with the above - it's quality, not quantity. My husband moved here from abroad.
We went to see his parents when we could afford it and they came here when they could too. It's a long way and an expensive flight but, we all did what we could. When my husbands Father died my children were inconsolable. The reason was that the time he did spend with our children was total quality and they loved him, as well as playing with them, he would talk to them about serious, and not so serious stuff.
On the alternative my mum lived here and my children had a much less quality time with her. Especially when the middle was born and had Asthma and Eczema. My mum would never leave the room she smoked and drank coffee in which meant when we went I would keep the kids in a different room. I actually asked her to come in to the living room and talk to the kids once - I never asked again.
She passed recently. The children were sad but, unaffected. Not a tear was shed at her funeral by them. Unlike when my FiL died, in which some of the heartbreak they felt will stay with me, and them, forever.
I guess, sometimes, distance is irrelevant.
It doesn't sound to me like you had much of a close bond with your Mum - have you thought that she may have possibly felt pushed out of things by you and her parents? As they raised you, maybe she see's that it's not really her place to be looking after them. I'm just throwing that out there as a possibility.
She doesn't actually have to live in the country to get her Dad help. She could deal with Social Services over the 'phone/email. If he needs carers or shopping help or other practical stuff she could arrange that with them. You could just drop her an email telling her what the difficulties are and who to contact and leave it with her but, as you are the one with the relationship I'm wondering if that's really the appropriate way to go.
You could see the up-side to this. You are looking after your Grandfather - chances are you won't have to look after her in her older years...
Anyone who has children with the expectation that they will look after you in old age is the selfish one in my book,
I would absolutely forbid my children from giving up their lives, homes, hopes and dreams to take care of me.
You cannot choose your family and are under no obligation to care for them, if you WANT to, then that is a different matter.
And it is nobody's right to judge as we never know the whole story - usually just one side of it.
What a load of tosh. As a baby boomer, I object to that analysis. Yes, I had free education up to degree level (if I wanted it), yes, I had a free NHS all my life and mostly I've lived in an Europe free from war. And I retired on an end of salary pension. I've been very, very lucky. But in no way does that make me put my needs above those of my family, or society in general. I did not have a "real break" from family duty. If anything, my good fortune made my view of family duty even more pointed. I am a little peed of with the lazy journalism that portrays baby boomers as just lucky with a feeling of entitlement. I know I have been lucky and I also know that it is now my responsibility to do what I can for the next generation, who don't have it so lucky. Just as I knew it was my responsibility to care for the generation before me who sacrificed so much to ensure we baby boomers had things as good as we had.
Sorry for the rant, but I get really peed off when the baby boomers generation gets blamed for the ills of society
Me too - I was going to comment earlier but did not want to turn it into a boomers forum but now the OP has had enough replies I will agree with you.
As far as family is concerned we live about 130 miles away from MIL but are the ones who visit more often than the others who live within 15 minutes of her house. Have almost had to beg 1 of them to do her weekly shop after she stopped having home delivered meals..
Comments
But what's done is done. Your Mum has a new life on the other side of the world and making her feel guilty about it won't help. Actually she probably does feel guilty and visits probably make it worse.
I think the dog issue is a bit of a red herring.
Regarding skype - we do skype, but the time difference and the age of the children make timing a bit awkward. To be he honest we did it a lot more when she first left, but now it is mainly just Christmases and birthdays.
What grates is there were so many years when she lived here when her family didn't need her. My grandparents always did a great deal for her, decorating her house and suchlike. But essentially as soon we really could do with some help she isn't here.
The reason i mention the dog is she is fricking obsessed with this dog. We send her pictures of the children and she sends us pictures of the dog. Its is made into calendars and Christmas cards and every day there are several posts on facebook about what the dog is up to. She spends a lot more time thinking about this dog than her parents and grandchildren.
You're beginning to sound like you only want her around for taking the kids off your hands etc.
You don't feel it would be nice to see her so YOU can spend time with her?
I lived with my grandparents from the age of 4 to 17. I moved back in with her at 17 but I went off to uni at 19 and never lived with her again for any extended period after that. She has been largely out of my life for the last 6 years. Honestly, i am not fussed about spending time with her myself, but i do want my children to have a relationship with her and i do want my granddad not to feel abandoned by her.
No disrespect but the bond was tenuous with your mother ? Was she close to her parents?
I would be shocked and upset if my children felt they had to take care of me in my later years. . I worked my arse of as a single parent to make them I dependant , have worthwhile careers and to forge their own lives. I also paid enough NI and made very little claim on NHS so I expect that money paid in over an entire working life to at least see to my end of life care. My children owe me nothing and I would be appalled if they felt they did. Having said that I have a huge well of love from them and I'm blessed. But the idea of any of them putting suppositories up my bottom or changing incontinence pads for me is as abhorrent for me as it would be for them . I nursed my own mum and she hated it. It's not all it's cracked up to be.
Do you interact with everyone on the basis they may die within a few days?
And tbh your Grandad's relationship with your Mum is entirely between them. Has he actually said that he feels abandoned?
I'm guessing she might be doting on the dog because she has no one else to fuss over, a sort of surrogate grandchild? I know several people who adore their cats / dogs and treat them almost as though they were children; and in most cases their children have moved away and / or they live alone. They like the company of a pet.
Could your mum be fixated with this dog because she's lonely?
You feel your MIL is selfish for expecting you to stay put.
Your MIL feels you are selfish for leaving her.
It's subjective - that's all I was pointing out.
(Personally I think your MIL is being selfish, but then I have a selfish MIL who won't let us leave , so my perspective is biased:( )
I agree with this.
The mum doesn't sound very happy to me.
My point is, yes, the grandparent/ grandchild relationship can be a lovely one, but if your kids have never had it, they won't miss it, so you shouldn't force it by insisting your mother returns for a visit she clearly doesn't want to make. In any case, she could visit for two-weeks every year, but that still won't forge the relationship you seem to want for your kids. In the absence of any other contact, to them your mother will always be that old lady they see once a year. Is it, perhaps, fair to say that it's not that she hasn't visited that bothers you, but more that she doesn't want to? A case of, you don't necessarily want her to visit, you just want her to want to?
I think your kids will have a much better relationship by regular Skype and e-mail (with photos) contact, than a short, one-off visit, so FWIW, you should be encouraging your kids to initiate contact and see how that goes. If it turns out they're not really bothered about it either, then you'll have nothing to worry about.
My daughter has said a few times if she could persuade her partner to go live near her brother, she would be gone in a heartbeat.. I would be devastated if she did that, and she said it without any thought to how I would feel. She has two children that I have looked after while she worked since they were 6 weeks old. Me and the children have a very strong bond and spend a lot of time together.. TBH if once the children are both in full-time school and she didn't need me any more and went to live near her brother, I would feel very used and would not be happy about it and skypeing really would not cut the mustard after being with them so much for both their lives.
I am not a selfish person and would try not to show how hurt I am.. But I know the bond will be broken and that will be another two grandchildren I wont see enough to know who they are.
I can.
If we all had the mindset that we had to stay close to home in case our parents and / or children needed us then we'd live and die a few miles from the town in which we were born. It's not a crime to want a life of your own, to want to travel and see different parts of the world. Sometimes people go on a gap year, fall in love with a country and decide to move there, like my friends did with New Zealand. Sometimes you might meet a person from another place, fall in love with them and have to make a decision as to whether you move to live with them. You can't spend your whole life thinking, 'I can't do what I want in life in case my family need me at some point in the future.'
My Nan had no life of her own. She looked after her ailing father in law for five years, and then when grandchildren came along she looked after all of us too. Once I learned to drive I used to visit her every week. And she was always so glad to be visited. I'd drop by every time I drove past her house, and she was always at home. Always. Because once the ungrateful father in law and her husband died, once the kids and grandkids stopped needing childcare... she was alone. And because she'd devoted herself to family 100% she had very few friends or hobbies.
I loved the days spent together, but I wish I'd called more often and found her out for lunch with friends, or gone on a coach holiday or something. I wish she'd had more of a life outside of her children and grandchildren, because then she would have been less lonely.
My Mum is the polar opposite. Every time I ring her she's playing golf or volunteering or on holiday or meeting a friend. She's often too busy to do more than pop round for a cup of tea. But I don't mind that. If she wanted to move abroad I would miss her terribly, and like the OP I would probably feel slightly resentful on behalf of my daughter. But she did her job in raising me and my sister, and looking after my Nan when she had cancer. Now I'm an adult with a family of my own I can't and don't expect to be her number one priority in life.
In the OP's situation my response would be much the same - I would feel resentful that she didn't visit more often. It would bother me that she'd never met one of her grandchildren. But like Vast Girth I wouldn't say anything, because I would hate to make her feel guilty.
I can understand her moving with a new husband and for that I don't think she is selfish. I do think she is selfish for leaving all your Granddad's care down to you especially after they took you in and raised you-where was she and what was she doing that she couldn't look after you? If your Grandad needs anything approaching full-time care she should make the effort to come home for as long as is necessary to arrange a long-term care package but I guess that even if you paid for the flight she wouldn't be a great help anyway
My Mother is an incredibly selfish woman too and frequently offloads care that she feels should be provided to relatives onto me like wanting me to host a mentally ill cousin who emotionally and verbally abused me in childhood for Christmas dinner was the latest, a cousin who hasn't set foot in mother's house for decades as she's "too difficult".
I could go on and on about it but suffice to say I didn't have a good childhood with her and in the past she has successfully used sentimental memories and emotional blackmail to manipulate me all the while overlooking her severe maternal shortcomings with the phrase "I was very young having children". Everything is always about what's in it for her. Now I automatically refuse any request she makes, think about it, and if it suits me and there is no opportunity for her to make mischief I'll call back later and agree.
Its very sad but some Mothers are just destructive and don't change. She has calculated how much you feel for your Grandad and knows you will carry the burden for her.
I fully admit my bias here but if your Mother is anything like mine don't let her away with it with a clear conscience, I wish I'd spoken up sooner. I find it very liberating now to tell her "No, I wont be doing it. its your responsibility, not mine". Your kids will do just fine without her.
When one reaches maturity, one is able to leave one’s parents and “strike out on one’s own,” and it is at this point that one truly begins to play one’s own role, that one’s mission in life ceases to be foggy and gradually becomes clear. Nominally one still stays closely tied to one’s parents, but because one’s mission and the role one plays in life have nothing to do with one’s mother and father, in actuality this intimate tie slowly breaks down as a person gradually becomes independent. From a biological perspective, people still cannot help being dependent upon parents in subconscious ways, but objectively speaking, once they are grown they have entirely separate lives from their parents, and will perform the roles they assume independently. Besides birth and childrearing, the parents’ responsibility in a child’s life is simply to provide him or her with a formal environment to grow up in, for nothing except the predestination of the Creator has a bearing on a person’s fate. No one can control what kind of future a person will have; it is predetermined long in advance, and not even one’s parents can change one’s fate. As far as fate is concerned, everyone is independent, and everyone has his or her own fate. So no one’s parents can stave off one’s fate in life or exert the slightest influence on the role one plays in life. It could be said that the family into which one is destined to be born, and the environment in which one grows up, are nothing more than the preconditions for fulfilling one’s mission in life. They do not in any way determine a person’s fate in life or the kind of destiny amidst which a person fulfills his or her mission. And so no one’s parents can assist one in accomplishing one’s mission in life, no one’s relatives can help one assume one’s role in life. How one accomplishes one’s mission and in what kind of living environment one performs one’s role are entirely determined by one’s fate in life. In other words, no other objective conditions can influence the mission of a person, which is predestined by the Creator. All people become mature in their own particular growing-up environments, then gradually, step by step, set off down their own roads in life, fulfill the destinies planned for them by the Creator, naturally, involuntarily entering the vast sea of humanity and assuming their own posts in life, where they begin to fulfill their responsibilities as created beings for the sake of the Creator’s predestination, for the sake of His sovereignty. ｝
I will share a movie with you. I would like you to enjoy it when you are convenient. Then take it easy! Everybody has his own life, what we can do is try to understand her. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ed25DUXijGg
What a load of tosh. As a baby boomer, I object to that analysis. Yes, I had free education up to degree level (if I wanted it), yes, I had a free NHS all my life and mostly I've lived in an Europe free from war. And I retired on an end of salary pension. I've been very, very lucky. But in no way does that make me put my needs above those of my family, or society in general. I did not have a "real break" from family duty. If anything, my good fortune made my view of family duty even more pointed. I am a little peed of with the lazy journalism that portrays baby boomers as just lucky with a feeling of entitlement. I know I have been lucky and I also know that it is now my responsibility to do what I can for the next generation, who don't have it so lucky. Just as I knew it was my responsibility to care for the generation before me who sacrificed so much to ensure we baby boomers had things as good as we had.
Sorry for the rant, but I get really peed off when the baby boomers generation gets blamed for the ills of society
The more we learn, it seems that she was never a real proper mother to you and looked after you. Why would you want your kids to try and establish a relationship with this unreliable person??. Just let her be and since your grandparents did take care of you from 4-17, it's only fair that you do look after him. Any grandparents from your partner's side???.
I agree with the above - it's quality, not quantity. My husband moved here from abroad.
We went to see his parents when we could afford it and they came here when they could too. It's a long way and an expensive flight but, we all did what we could. When my husbands Father died my children were inconsolable. The reason was that the time he did spend with our children was total quality and they loved him, as well as playing with them, he would talk to them about serious, and not so serious stuff.
On the alternative my mum lived here and my children had a much less quality time with her. Especially when the middle was born and had Asthma and Eczema. My mum would never leave the room she smoked and drank coffee in which meant when we went I would keep the kids in a different room. I actually asked her to come in to the living room and talk to the kids once - I never asked again.
She passed recently. The children were sad but, unaffected. Not a tear was shed at her funeral by them. Unlike when my FiL died, in which some of the heartbreak they felt will stay with me, and them, forever.
I guess, sometimes, distance is irrelevant.
It doesn't sound to me like you had much of a close bond with your Mum - have you thought that she may have possibly felt pushed out of things by you and her parents? As they raised you, maybe she see's that it's not really her place to be looking after them. I'm just throwing that out there as a possibility.
She doesn't actually have to live in the country to get her Dad help. She could deal with Social Services over the 'phone/email. If he needs carers or shopping help or other practical stuff she could arrange that with them. You could just drop her an email telling her what the difficulties are and who to contact and leave it with her but, as you are the one with the relationship I'm wondering if that's really the appropriate way to go.
You could see the up-side to this. You are looking after your Grandfather - chances are you won't have to look after her in her older years...
I would absolutely forbid my children from giving up their lives, homes, hopes and dreams to take care of me.
You cannot choose your family and are under no obligation to care for them, if you WANT to, then that is a different matter.
And it is nobody's right to judge as we never know the whole story - usually just one side of it.
Me too - I was going to comment earlier but did not want to turn it into a boomers forum but now the OP has had enough replies I will agree with you.
As far as family is concerned we live about 130 miles away from MIL but are the ones who visit more often than the others who live within 15 minutes of her house. Have almost had to beg 1 of them to do her weekly shop after she stopped having home delivered meals..