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Source: (consider it) Thread: Difficult relatives
Penny S
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I didn't take it as sanctimonious!

What I find difficult particularly is being on the sidelines during an argument, when I am on one side, want to offer support, but can't be part of two against one!

(I was going to send emails to my friend, but she asked me to find her a plumber and an electrician - can't have known what I was up to from where she was, but she's very good at disruptive timing like that.)

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Penny S
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I seem to remember reading somewhere, possibly in Lewis, that God's idea of a reward for doing something difficult is to give you something even more difficult to follow it. So I give up my family Christmas for friend and friend's mother, which grows into New Year's Eve, and then another Saturday, and then last Saturday's showdown, and now Thursday as well.
I am feeling resentful.
I am also thinking of the situation in Superman, where he says to Lois Lane, "Don't worry, I've got you" and she says, "Yes, but who's got you?" My friend feels got by me. I don't feel got. (Which is why I hate that footprints thing - the person did not feel got during their bad patch. Telling them afterwards they were being upheld feels like cheating.)

[ 18. January 2017, 22:48: Message edited by: Penny S ]

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Lamb Chopped
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heheheheh. I know the resentment, yes I do! But I try to hang on to the reminder that I agreed to this (idiot, what was I thinking?!) and go off and read bidenmemes or something to get me out of my snarly mood.

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Er, this is what I've been up to (book).
Oh, that you would rend the heavens and come down!

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Golden Key
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{{{{{Penny}}}}}

Yes, some people say you shouldn't ask God for patience, because you'll be sent a situation where you'll have to learn it.
[Paranoid]

I don't believe that, but life does sometimes seem to work that way.

You don't have to answer this, but do you have someone *you* can go to for support? Friend, confidante, therapist? Is there a local support group for caregivers? Might be good for both you and your friend.

Not telling you to stop talking to us! Just that in-person support can be helpful, if you can get it.

BTW, does your friend live with his mom? Not sure.

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Blessed Gator, pray for us!
--"Oh bat bladders, do you have to bring common sense into this?" (Dragon, "Jane & the Dragon")
--"Oh, Peace Train, save this country!" (Yusuf/Cat Stevens, "Peace Train")

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Huia
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quote:
Originally posted by Penny S:
(Which is why I hate that footprints thing - the person did not feel got during their bad patch. Telling them afterwards they were being upheld feels like cheating.)

Thanks, I've always felt irritated by that, but couldn't quite work out why, (besides that feeling that it's twee IMNSHO).

Huia

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Charity gives food from the table, Justice gives a place at the table.

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Penny S
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The chair of my local neighbourhood committee, of which I am a member, had a foul start in life with a mother with compulsive hoarding, followed by a husband who used coercive control on her. She has certainly been made stronger by this, as it is incredibly difficult to imagine her as a victim. We started talking about things in discussing the series 'The Archers', which she had to stop listening to because of a DV storyline. I don't know how we got on to difficult mothers, but she has offered herself as an ear, which is very helpful.
I listen to her fuming about the society bank, which is being very stupid and obstructive.
I can't, obviously, use her during the events.

I have not asked for patience! I have suggested that giving the power to put up with things is gratefully received, but resolution of things for the main players might be more useful.

After a couple of quiet evenings, I did feel I could get used to it, but last weekend threw a spanner in that. Very difficult when there are things I can't do as I wouldn't want to look like ganging up on her.

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Gee D
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Penny S, I've read most of your posts on various threads. I think that the time has come when you need professional support both for your friend's mother but very importantly for yourself as well - and you don't need to persuade your friend's mother to get that. Usual disclaimers about this not being medical advice - which I'm not competent to give in any event - but in reading just how much of your energy this is taking from you.

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Not every Anglican in Sydney is Sydney Anglican

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Penny S
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Thank you. I am, conveniently, in a completely different jurisdiction medically from her, so can look for help without compromising anyone else. She refuses it for herself.

I am now trying to not spend the morning before she visits wandering round muttering resentfully about losing agency with regard to my home - I'm not sure if it leaves threads of nastiness to be picked up, but best avoided anyway, I think.

Because of the driving, each day knocks out two as I recover.

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Sparrow
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quote:
Originally posted by Penny S:
I seem to remember reading somewhere, possibly in Lewis, that God's idea of a reward for doing something difficult is to give you something even more difficult to follow it.

Yes I think it was one of the Narnia books - maybe to Jill in the Silver Chair?

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For I am persuaded that neither death, nor life,nor angels, nor principalities, nor things present nor things to come, nor height, nor depth, nor any other creature, will be able to separate us from the love of God, which is in Christ Jesus our Lord.

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Penny S
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Will check that out. The progression is rapid!
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St Deird
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quote:
Originally posted by Sparrow:
quote:
Originally posted by Penny S:
I seem to remember reading somewhere, possibly in Lewis, that God's idea of a reward for doing something difficult is to give you something even more difficult to follow it.

Yes I think it was one of the Narnia books - maybe to Jill in the Silver Chair?
No, I think it's The Horse and His Boy.

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They're not hobbies; they're a robust post-apocalyptic skill-set.

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mdijon
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quote:
Originally posted by Golden Key:
Yes, some people say you shouldn't ask God for patience, because you'll be sent a situation where you'll have to learn it.

Or humility. Never ask God for humility.

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mdijon nojidm uoɿıqɯ ɯqıɿou
ɯqıɿou uoɿıqɯ nojidm mdijon

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Penny S
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Definitely not Silver Chair. And I thought it was something more grown up.
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St Deird
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quote:
Originally posted by Penny S:
Definitely not Silver Chair. And I thought it was something more grown up.

Looked it up. Horse and His Boy, just after Aravis is attacked by the lion.

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They're not hobbies; they're a robust post-apocalyptic skill-set.

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Penny S
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Thanks - haven't been able to do things like that for a day or two. Will now go straight there.
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Penny S
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She's getting very controlling. And I am beginning to be able to read things in what she says. She asked, twice, if she had woken me going to the loo, when I had said not. I had assumed she was going downstairs where she usually went. But I now think she had been the quiet person creeping upstairs, not him, and she wanted to be quite sure I didn't know. Because the other thing she said twice was that when they stayed over, it would be all right for him, because he had a bed here. He spent the night on the bed settee in the same room as her, to make sure she was all right on the stairs, but she would be looking for the futon in the spare room. I suppose. But I hadn't opened it out, so it looked like another bed settee. It's a bit of a performance getting it out, and we didn't have the time, and it wasn't necessary as he was deciding to keep an eye on her with the stairs.
So what is she thinking about beds?
We were going to meet tomorrow without her, and come back here to eat and access the internet and catch up on Sherlock and similar.
But no, on Tuesday, she has a special medical appointment, and it doesn't matter how early he gets back, it won't be early enough. So no meeting now, unless she is there.
I'm going to have to think round this. Cunning as the serpent is called for, I think. Can't do Thursday, because she goes to have her leg dressings done on Friday.
Which is my birthday.

[ 29. January 2017, 20:54: Message edited by: Penny S ]

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Golden Key
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{{{{{Penny and everyone involved}}}}}

Enjoy catching up on "Sherlock". The new season that aired here this month is especially good. Martin Freeman (Watson) said they may be the best 3 episodes yet, and I think he's right. (Not saying any more!)

And an early Happy Birthday! [Yipee]

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Blessed Gator, pray for us!
--"Oh bat bladders, do you have to bring common sense into this?" (Dragon, "Jane & the Dragon")
--"Oh, Peace Train, save this country!" (Yusuf/Cat Stevens, "Peace Train")

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Penny S
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Thank you. We've seen the first 2 episodes of Sherlock, but not the finale.

And I am thinking of going up to town to have a shared meal at the British Museum for Friday. About which she would not need to know, as he goes to use an academic library anyway.

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Penny S
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Cunning plan not going to work - friend mentioned coming here on Friday as a possibility to his mother, and she is now commenting that she isn't invited. She will be getting very ill on Friday after her visit to the nurse. Or during the evening so we have to rush back in a panic.
She used to do this sort of thing when what I was doing was taking him to look at geological deposits in South East England for his thesis, so I'm not inventing. But she also used to change her mind at the last minute back then - I don't think that will happen now.
Christmas messed about, now my birthday will have nasty memories. Whatever happens.

[ 31. January 2017, 14:30: Message edited by: Penny S ]

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Sarasa
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You know Penny S, I think you and your friend just need to let his mother get ill or whatever when you want to do something. You are beginning to sound like you are getting sucked into the same mind games.
I could really rant on this thread about my mother who is driving me nuts at the moment, but I don't think its her fault but rather her age and refusal to give into it.

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'I guess things didn't go so well tonight, but I'm trying. Lord, I'm trying.' Charlie (Harvey Keitel) in Mean Streets.

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Penny S
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I'm sorry your mother is making your life so difficult by her behaviour, but glad it is just age and not her fault. (Not that that will make it easier, I realise.)
As for just getting on with it despite D being ill, we can't really do that. My friend would become extemely worried before we were round the corner, and things would be ruined anyway. In the past, she has had a habit of not ringing when she said she would. So my friend has rung her. Again and again, with increasing anxiety,leaving messages until he has left one saying that if he doesn't hear from her next time at whatever time it is, he will be calling the police. And then, next time, she has answered. And this hasn't only happened once. (Bad move - it does expose the tactic as being that.) That would happen, with the added tension that now she really is ill.

And I don't think planning a meet without her knowing counts as mind games. Not quite honest, but not mind games. I wouldn't know how.

Today's thing turned out to be keeping the household up till about 5 (despite needing her son back early yesterday so she was ready for the volunteer to take her to the hospital), and it then turning out that the lift wasn't going to be until 11.45 or possibly later. I do think the anxiety about appointments is genuine, and that this then keeps her awake past her usual bedtime (though this has been about 2 or 3 since the 80s).

And I try not to think there is calculation going on, but there has been a long history of it, and she is predictable. And I try not to think about her being nasty in intention, but I have faced her in unprovoked rage, and been called names for no reason (in my opinion), so it is hard not to bear that in mind.

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Lyda*Rose

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Penny, I'm beginning to think that your friend is not a particularly nice person for dragging you into every little moment of this drama. He should get some counseling and take any advice he gets seriously. Maybe you should, too. I understand that you feel sorry for him, but I think all that is happening is that you are suffering, too. And I'm not sure that your suffering is giving him any true relief. I'm not saying to abandon him. but I think you need to get a little distance IMHO.

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"Dear God, whose name I do not know - thank you for my life. I forgot how BIG... thank you. Thank you for my life." ~from Joe Vs the Volcano

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Penny S
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Nope. Not a not very nice person. A person very much thrown by sudden changes he has no idea how to deal with, and not used to seeking advice. (I think if his chaplain, who he gets support from, thought he was taking advantage of me, he would say so.)
I've known him a long time, and if I had had any suspicion of the onset of coercive control or anything like it I would have dumped him. And I have seen him with other people, and he is a caring and concerned person. Come to that, I've seen him with his mother being thoughtful and considerate (and, at times, not so because she has wound him up - she can't read the signs of what she is doing*).
I'm not sorry for him, exactly. He needs support, and I'm the one who happens to be in a position to give it. And I do get time out, quite a lot of it, which he doesn't. I just lack places to spill the emotion at times. Hence here.
I think it has been a bit much, the hospital discharging her into her son's care without steering him towards support services or charities or somewhere with the knowledge to help. Or getting them to contact him. There are people in his area. The Red Cross was in the same wing as the ward his mother was in.

*I hope it is that she can't read the signs. But that was what it looked like to me.

[ 31. January 2017, 20:38: Message edited by: Penny S ]

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Lyda*Rose

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I figured you'd pretty much say as much. I don't doubt that he is "nice" really, except that he doesn't seem to mind pulling you into his mom's sad and ugly web. Not coercively, but because he knows that you will not behave any less "nice"ly than he does and will do about anything for him. Your business, if that's what you want. I'll butt out now.

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"Dear God, whose name I do not know - thank you for my life. I forgot how BIG... thank you. Thank you for my life." ~from Joe Vs the Volcano

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Penny S
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It's an interesting analysis. But how would you argue about the person sinking into a Dartmoor mire reaching out and grasping towards the person on firm ground? And about the propriety of walking away and leaving them? At the risk of sounding like John Wayne, there are things one has to do. Scare quotes or no.
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lily pad
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quote:
Originally posted by Penny S:
It's an interesting analysis. But how would you argue about the person sinking into a Dartmoor mire reaching out and grasping towards the person on firm ground? And about the propriety of walking away and leaving them? At the risk of sounding like John Wayne, there are things one has to do. Scare quotes or no.

Having spent much of my life training lifeguards for the beach, the first priority has to be to minimize the risk to yourself - otherwise, you cannot save anyone and may go down yourself.

The lifeguard never leaves the person to drown. The lifeguard reaches out with something buoyant between themselves and the drowning person to use as an aid to tow them to safety. You always protect your own footing - crouching low to change your centre of gravity and make sure you can't be pulled in.

It doesn't take much to apply the lifesaving skills to a personal situation. You say "there are things one has to do" as if the only choice is to allow yourself to risk more than what is reasonable. A lifeguard who did this in a training session would be sent back to the drawing board to find a different way to effect the rescue.

Sorry if this is not a hellish answer. I'll scoot back up to All Saints and Heaven where I belong.

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Sloppiness is not caring. Fussiness is caring about the wrong things. With thanks to Adeodatus!

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Tubbs

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quote:
Originally posted by lily pad:
quote:
Originally posted by Penny S:
It's an interesting analysis. But how would you argue about the person sinking into a Dartmoor mire reaching out and grasping towards the person on firm ground? And about the propriety of walking away and leaving them? At the risk of sounding like John Wayne, there are things one has to do. Scare quotes or no.

Having spent much of my life training lifeguards for the beach, the first priority has to be to minimize the risk to yourself - otherwise, you cannot save anyone and may go down yourself.

The lifeguard never leaves the person to drown. The lifeguard reaches out with something buoyant between themselves and the drowning person to use as an aid to tow them to safety. You always protect your own footing - crouching low to change your centre of gravity and make sure you can't be pulled in.

It doesn't take much to apply the lifesaving skills to a personal situation. You say "there are things one has to do" as if the only choice is to allow yourself to risk more than what is reasonable. A lifeguard who did this in a training session would be sent back to the drawing board to find a different way to effect the rescue.

Sorry if this is not a hellish answer. I'll scoot back up to All Saints and Heaven where I belong.

When they do the safety announcements on planes, the message is that you always sort yourself out first before helping anyone else. He may need support, but that needs to come from a variety of places, not just the one.

Elderly people have agency and rights and stuff. The NHS gets you better but once you’re not hospital sick they want their bed back. Depending on the situation, they’ll try for a place at a rehab centre or offer a care plan at home. Usually there’s a conference between the doctors, social, the patient and the next of kin about next steps. But it looks this didn’t happen because Mummy probably told them she’d be fine and didn’t need / want anything. Which she is allowed to do however wrong-headed everyone else thinks it is. If they’re told that, they don’t push. Particularly if there is someone else at home.

It sounds like mummy is perfectly fine mentally, just a total nightmare and very manipulative … I’d be pushing your friend towards counselling as well as other support.

Tubbs

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"It's better to keep your mouth shut and be thought a fool than open it up and remove all doubt" - Dennis Thatcher. My blog. Decide for yourself which I am

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Lamb Chopped
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Yeah, I've been a bit worried about you too. If nothing else, get professional counseling for yourself, so you can sort through what is and what is not a helpful and safe interaction day by day. You're the one with your feet on solid ground--you owe it to them as well as yourself to also anchor yourself to a tree or something.

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Er, this is what I've been up to (book).
Oh, that you would rend the heavens and come down!

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Lyda*Rose

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What they say.

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"Dear God, whose name I do not know - thank you for my life. I forgot how BIG... thank you. Thank you for my life." ~from Joe Vs the Volcano

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Curiosity killed ...

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A few years ago I lived next-door to an alcoholic who was on a pretty bad way. When I asked how I could support him I was told not to because there was no way I could provide the level of support required. I was advised to keep a safe distance and call for external services if the situation demanded it. I am very glad I took that advice and kept myself safe.

In another online situation, someone I knew was being recommended a course of action by her mental health team that she didn't want to listen to by asking for support from online friends. It became obvious that we were enabling her to continue in unhelpful habits, when she was dealing with serious mental health issues was positively dangerous.

Penny, what you are describing reminds me of being sucked into enabling a deteriorating situation. When something is beyond an individual's support, sometimes the only healthy thing to do is withdraw the enabling support so that the professional teams are forced to act. The little bit of propping up you can manage is not going to solve any of the problems and is masking the real situation.

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Mugs - Keep the Ship afloat

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Jemima the 9th
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quote:
Originally posted by Curiosity killed ...:

In another online situation, someone I knew was being recommended a course of action by her mental health team that she didn't want to listen to by asking for support from online friends. It became obvious that we were enabling her to continue in unhelpful habits, when she was dealing with serious mental health issues was positively dangerous.

This is exactly, exactly what my DR does. Well, with an added side of playing all the professionals off against each other.
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Tubbs

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The other issue that I didn’t cover is the limitations of what is available from social services. Ran out of time!

A care package consists of a x number of visits a day that last about 15 minutes for 6 weeks. This is free. After 6 weeks, if you want the care to continue, you pay. The care is personal care only – washing, dressing etc. Social services won’t sort out your friend’s house. The fact it’s squalid or unsuitable for a frail, elderly person isn’t their problem. They just work around it. (Yes, this is based on personal experience! They might suggest a cleaner, but that’s about it).

As your friend is a full time carer, he can apply for one of the carer’s allowances. This means they may offer things like respite care for him. Depending on what’s available locally that’ll be a few hours at a day care centre or overnight stays at a care home for mummy a few times a year. If she agrees, which from you’ve said sounds highly unlikely.

Based on personal experience, you have to ask for everything and be really pushy. If you don’t ask, you don’t get. And if they think you don’t need it, you won’t get it.

I don’t understand why your friend didn’t arrange an appointment with social services or visit the Red Cross whilst mummy was in hospital himself. And if the answer is he’s scared of mummy’s reaction or doesn’t want to be a bother, he needs to get over that if he really wants things to change.

As his friend, the best thing you can do is support him in that process. You can't do it for him.

Tubbs

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"It's better to keep your mouth shut and be thought a fool than open it up and remove all doubt" - Dennis Thatcher. My blog. Decide for yourself which I am

Posts: 12701 | From: Someplace strange | Registered: Jun 2001  |  IP: Logged
Twilight

Puddleglum's sister
# 2832

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quote:
Originally posted by Penny S:
He needs support, and I'm the one who happens to be in a position to give it.

There it is. Without actually disagreeing with all the good advice here, I think that's the most important bit.

Penny is serving as a wonderful example to me.

She is our friend and we don't want to see her stressed out to the breaking point. On the other hand, a situation has entered her life and she is dealing with it. Taking it as it comes. If we all stop and ask ourselves if we are the person with the most expertise, or fear being taken advantage of, or assess the niceness of the person we're helping, or expect the old and sick to be anything other than self-centered -- then we would rarely help anyone.

I'm not saying we should keep on and keep on under every sort of miserable circumstance, but I know I have bowed out of helping over lack of confidence in myself, or a perceived lack of appreciation from the person I'm helping -- and later wished I'd been more like Penny.

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Drifting Star

Drifting against the wind
# 12799

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Hear, hear.

I think you are a wonderful friend, Penny. I hope you are taking the necessary steps to support yourself as you help your friend, and I hope that we are providing some small measure of that support (even those, like me, who read a lot more than they post).

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The soul is dyed the color of its thoughts. Heraclitus

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neandergirl

Opposing the thumb
# 8916

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What Twilight and Drifting Star said. ((Penny))

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Never will I leave you; never will I forsake you. Hebrews 13:5 NIV
We come from love, we return to love, and all around is love.
Lord, ease our burdens, give us peace and enable us to do your work. Tree Bee

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Gee D
Shipmate
# 13815

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Penny S - apart from seeking support for yourself and your friend, remember that his mother is not doing all this to be difficult but because she herself is not well and not thinking as perhaps she once did. Not medical advice of course.

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Not every Anglican in Sydney is Sydney Anglican

Posts: 7028 | From: Warrawee NSW Australia | Registered: Jun 2008  |  IP: Logged
Penny S
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# 14768

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Thanks all. I kept away a bit because I didn't want to get into a row.

The Red Cross is now involved - sort of. Supposed to be visiting Thursday, supposedly with D's permission, which she now claims they have not got.

Friend's church has offered practical help - which she refuses.

The hospital has advised friend that neither he, nor they, can do anything without her permission, as she passes the competency tests. This is the law. So engaging a care plan isn't going to be possible.

He has now told her that he will go to the Fire Brigade if she does not allow help, because of the risks to neighbours.

Last night, he called me to tell me he thought she was going to die during the night, and asked if he could call me if that happened. Nothing apparently. She is expecting to be picked up by an ambulance (of the minibus variety) to be taken for treatment at about 12 today.

As far as I can make out, she has a cunning plan. When her husband left because he found her too difficult, it was arranged that the two of them would support friend, and, she told me later, it was his function in life to care for her when she was old. In return, the house was to pass to him.

Unfortunately, the area changed and a modest home moved into inheritance tax territory. She is determined to live until the threshold for that changes (she has discussed this with local friends in the same boat). She has also decided to allow the value to deteriorate.

When friend has suggested they sell now, and get somewhere modest and in good shape, and forget the inheritance, she takes this as a wicked insult to her, because she wants the best for him.

She has, by the way, had difficult attitudes at least since the mid eighties, to my knowledge, and from what I am told, for far longer. A lot seems to be about being in control of her own life, which extends to those around her.

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Penny S
Shipmate
# 14768

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Not the relative. The people who she was expecting to pick her up about noon, and who had not turned up by ten to three. Honestly.

Probably because of difficulties picking up the other people concerned, but a phoned update would be helpful.

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Penny S
Shipmate
# 14768

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Today I went over to be moral support in the case of social workers turning up whom she claimed not to have agreed to "as is my right". Which they didn't. This turned into could I drive them to the DIY store to get their new toilet seat. Of course, this has been on the stocks for three or four weeks and I was glad it was being launched into RL. Then I have to walk round with them, which becomes tricky as today is the day my shoes decide to moult their heels and soles. Then it turns into them going to the chemists, and two food stores. And back from the chemists to the surgery (for which I was quite pleased to have been there, despite all the sitting round waiting and the driving round one way systems several times to get to the right places, and the walking around with wet socks to meet up with them after parking). Didn't get home till half past nine, ravenous.
My friend was very grateful for my having been there.
D didn't express any such thoughts. She obviously enjoyed getting out to the shops, though.
She wants to pay me for the food I give them, but despite my careful mentions of filling up with petrol - I burned through 35 miles worth just going round one south London village - has not offered for that.

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Penny S
Shipmate
# 14768

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I am now collecting invisible graffiti - at least three "Mene, mene, tekel upharsin"s.
1. Me not wanting to listen to Nigel Farage on my radio over supper. Which remained on.
2. Refusing to turn off the car radio when it is discussing the photographing of the black hole at the centre of the galaxy. "I hate astronomy." (Would you like to guess what her son lectured at evening classes about? He wasn't in the car at the time.)
3. Not stocking tinned spaghetti. "When is lunch, I'm hungry." "Sainsbury's have good tinned spaghetti." Sainsbury's is 5 miles away. So I get a sachet of spaghetti and a sachet of sauce, heat them in the microwave, cut up the spaghetti, put it in a bowl, make some tea and tell her it is ready. But she has remained sitting in the living room perusing stuff while it gets cold. "Does it look like spaghetti?" (I am not serving food in the living room. I had to shampoo the carpet once this morning already.) But obviously my fault for not having it in the first place.

[ 17. February 2017, 13:45: Message edited by: Penny S ]

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Golden Key
Shipmate
# 1468

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{{{{{Penny}}}}}
{{{{{Everyone else involved}}}}}

I'm sorry she's such a pain. Re eating: I don't suppose you have a TV tray? (Don't know what it's called there. Little folding table that's just big enough to hold a plate and drink.) If you can't get her to eat outside the living room, that might at least cut down on the mess. YMMV.

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Blessed Gator, pray for us!
--"Oh bat bladders, do you have to bring common sense into this?" (Dragon, "Jane & the Dragon")
--"Oh, Peace Train, save this country!" (Yusuf/Cat Stevens, "Peace Train")

Posts: 18601 | From: Chilling out in an undisclosed, sincere pumpkin patch. | Registered: Oct 2001  |  IP: Logged
Penny S
Shipmate
# 14768

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We have them, yes. But she drops off to sleep in the chair and has already spilled tea there, so I'd rather keep the mess in the dining area where the table is stable.
Good suggestion in other circumstances, though.

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North East Quine

Curious beastie
# 13049

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Some light relief.

About 12 years ago, a relative gave up smoking and was so pleased to have done so that she started urging other members of the family to do likewise.I pointed out that as a life-long non-smoker I couldn't give up something I didn't do, but this fell on deaf ears.

Five years ago, after a health scare, she gave up alcohol. Again, she urged other family members, including abstemenious ones, to follow her excellent example.

She is now half-way through an Alpha course and has suggested that the North East Man and I try going to church. Pointing out that we have been regular attenders for decades and are both ordained elders is irrelevent. She doubts that we have had the insights into Christianity which she has had in half an Alpha Course.

[brick wall] [brick wall] [brick wall]

Posts: 6414 | From: North East Scotland | Registered: Oct 2007  |  IP: Logged
Lamb Chopped
Ship's kebab
# 5528

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[Killing me]

What else could you lead her into that she would embrace and urge on you? Something woefully inappropriate. Excuse me, even MORE inappropriate.

Toothbrushing? You could sic a dentist on her, and wait for the inevitable admonitions.

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Er, this is what I've been up to (book).
Oh, that you would rend the heavens and come down!

Posts: 20059 | From: off in left field somewhere | Registered: Feb 2004  |  IP: Logged
Golden Key
Shipmate
# 1468

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Maybe jogging, walk-a-thons for charity, race-walking, marathons, triathlon...which would help her continuing recovery from smoking, with the delightful bonus of getting her ever farther away...
[Two face]

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Blessed Gator, pray for us!
--"Oh bat bladders, do you have to bring common sense into this?" (Dragon, "Jane & the Dragon")
--"Oh, Peace Train, save this country!" (Yusuf/Cat Stevens, "Peace Train")

Posts: 18601 | From: Chilling out in an undisclosed, sincere pumpkin patch. | Registered: Oct 2001  |  IP: Logged
kingsfold

Shipmate
# 1726

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Or see if she can be persuaded to follow the example of the Desert Mothers & Fathers. With the concomitant advantage of eremtical & therefore unable to evangelise about it.

(Though I wonder whether they might not be considered proper Christians.... [Two face] )

Posts: 4473 | From: land of the wee midgie | Registered: Nov 2001  |  IP: Logged
Helen-Eva
Shipmate
# 15025

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quote:
Originally posted by Penny S:
We have them, yes. But she drops off to sleep in the chair and has already spilled tea there, so I'd rather keep the mess in the dining area where the table is stable.
Good suggestion in other circumstances, though.

Sending you best wishes for clinging onto your sanity in difficult times. At very least, I'd have a cup of tea yourself. [Votive]

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I thought the radio 3 announcer said "Weber" but it turned out to be Webern. Story of my life.

Posts: 637 | From: London, hopefully in a theatre or concert hall, more likely at work | Registered: Aug 2009  |  IP: Logged
Penny S
Shipmate
# 14768

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A curious discovery. Many of the people I have mentioned compulsive hoarding to have acknowledged having someone in the family, or knowing someone of that sort. Always a woman, though the organisation which helps such circumstances says that nearly as many men suffer from it. I say many, though the impression I get is of everyone I mention it to. Maybe I only mention it to people who radiate a sort of "relative of CH" signal.
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Brenda Clough
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# 18061

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On the flip side, having a term "compulsive hoarding" available can now be a handy excuse for common or garden laziness and untidiness. Lord knows it is what my husband uses, when he doesn't feel like picking up.

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Science fiction and fantasy writer with a Patreon page

Posts: 6378 | From: Washington DC | Registered: Mar 2014  |  IP: Logged
Penny S
Shipmate
# 14768

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Ah, but it does need the final word, disorder, to be fully effective. There's an academic over here who, I think I picked up, is aiming to have it added to the Monster Book of Mental Disorders - I know that isn't the right term, but it ought to be in it. It includes a furious possessiveness, a "going ballistic" (as a neighbour put it) if the slightest piece of old free newspaper is touched.
I would curse the producers of the free newspapers if I believed in such things. And I see that a couple of bags of them have arrived in my living room with D.

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