Declining FIL

[Anonymous]

My husband's parents were divorced in 1985, and his father remarried in the early 1990's to a woman with no children. They had no children together. My husband was an adult at that time so never considered this woman a step mother. Father-in-law (FIL) is declining cognitively which we noticed significantly at a family gathering in 2021. At that time, I told my husband he should talk with his father's wife and make sure all the paperwork (will, power of attorneys for financial and healthcare, and living will) were complete and reflected his wishes. My husband and the wife talked about talking for two years, but took no action. About a month ago, my husband got an email from FIL's wife saying she was overwhelmed with his care, he was missing bills, had credit card debt, and she thought he might need to move into assisted living. My husband tried five times to schedule times with her, but she always cancelled saying her dog was sick or she was busy or whatever. When he finally got in touch she stated he did have papers but would not produce them nor tell us who prepared them. I looked up some lawyers so he could get papers drawn up (~$2,000) but she said that was too much money.

Again, this has been going on for years and he's getting worse. At this point, we do not believe my husband has either power of attorney. Without this and since FIL is married, we have no legal authority to get involved. My husband does not want to assert himself but I'm telling him things will only get worse if nothing is done. His perspective is "he doesn't care" but he also didn't step away when the wife asked for help a month ago. I offered to be the bad guy and get her attention by saying this isn't optional and she needs to cooperate. I told my husband we should offer to pay to have the documents prepared.

Or I can just give it up and swear not to help these clowns even though I'm an experienced financial POA and then executor for my aunt and father. I'm struggling to know how much to push my husband on this or to let it go. We have zero idea how much FIL is worth nor do we need his money, but letting this go until he's really incapacitated is simply going to make everything far worse. He is forgetting to pay his bills, his wife yells at him all the time, he is driving even though he gets lost often.

UGH--what do I do?

[Anonymous]

Your DH has to go there. Go into the house and deal with it. Look at the papers. Ask the questions. He shouldn't leave it up to two elderly people to handle this.

[Anonymous]

I agree! My husband went to the house, took FIL to lunch, was pleasant and helpful. The wife will not produce the papers for him nor tell him where they are. He asked his father if he wanted for him to help out with the finances. FIL said, "yes." At this point, the only tactic I can come up with is to make an appointment with an attorney, drive his father over to him, and remake the papers at our expense. It is a question if the lawyer will deem FIL capable or not at this point. He's pleasant enough but gets confused easily. He doesn't know what accounts he has or where they are. My husband does not like to make waves and is kind of spineless. He reverts to "I just don't know if I care enough." It's not my family so maybe I need to let it go. The only complication is that I am the only source of financial support for my family. I am not willing to help FIL financially if my husband will not address these issues.

[Anonymous]

Your DH is unemployed? Or SAHD?

I would be crystal clear with him that you have zero willingness to pay for anything, and plan on a huge blowout fight the first time he asks. Then stay out of it. Your DH is in a bad situation, the wife is clearly trying to box him out and if he pressures her, he'll probably have even less time with FIL and even less access to information.

[Anonymous]

DH is disabled with chronic pain accompanied by nearly crippling depression. We have one child who is a junior in high school. We share parenting duties but I probably do more than he does. I don’t expect much. I’ve asked him for years if he plans to provide financial support to his parents and he always says no. I’m not sure what to believe. When push comes to shove, he may not have the courage to say no. We are married so I consider my money his. I just think that if no one is willing to actually make a plan for this then it shouldn’t be my responsibility to finance it.I don’t understand people who behave this way.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:I agree! My husband went to the house, took FIL to lunch, was pleasant and helpful. The wife will not produce the papers for him nor tell him where they are. He asked his father if he wanted for him to help out with the finances. FIL said, "yes." At this point, the only tactic I can come up with is to make an appointment with an attorney, drive his father over to him, and remake the papers at our expense. It is a question if the lawyer will deem FIL capable or not at this point. He's pleasant enough but gets confused easily. He doesn't know what accounts he has or where they are. My husband does not like to make waves and is kind of spineless. He reverts to "I just don't know if I care enough." It's not my family so maybe I need to let it go. The only complication is that I am the only source of financial support for my family. I am not willing to help FIL financially if my husband will not address these issues.

What? Ok. You said yourself you have no legal authority here. She is the wife. If you try to commandeer your FIL and drive him somewhere to do -- what, exactly?--, she would be well within her rights to tell you to step off. His accounts are her accounts too and you can't just seize control.
I'm sympathetic that you don't want the money wasted and FIL to end up broke, and the wife is being evasive (probably because she feels bullied), but what exactly are you asking your DH to do? No attorney will re-do the papers because they are married so their assets are likely joint. If the wife doesn't agree to it, and FIL can't accomplish it himself, this isn't happening.

Don't wreck your marriage expecting your DH to achieve the impossible.

[Anonymous]

They kept their finances completely separate all these years. They both acknowledge that. Estate documents are individual and not joint. But I am well aware that I have limited options here. That’s why I’m asking for advice. Are you saying just to let everything be? I guess that’s what I am leaning to anyway because my husband won’t take any action.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:They kept their finances completely separate all these years. They both acknowledge that. Estate documents are individual and not joint. But I am well aware that I have limited options here. That’s why I’m asking for advice. Are you saying just to let everything be? I guess that’s what I am leaning to anyway because my husband won’t take any action.

Ok, but the lawyers gonna want to see those papers. A lawyer is not going to just take control away from a soon-to-be elderly widow on your say-so, especially if FIL is still kinda with it and wife isn't cooperating with the process.

Your situation is bad and you have no good options. I'm sorry.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:I agree! My husband went to the house, took FIL to lunch, was pleasant and helpful. The wife will not produce the papers for him nor tell him where they are. He asked his father if he wanted for him to help out with the finances. FIL said, "yes." At this point, the only tactic I can come up with is to make an appointment with an attorney, drive his father over to him, and remake the papers at our expense. It is a question if the lawyer will deem FIL capable or not at this point. He's pleasant enough but gets confused easily. He doesn't know what accounts he has or where they are. My husband does not like to make waves and is kind of spineless. He reverts to "I just don't know if I care enough." It's not my family so maybe I need to let it go. The only complication is that I am the only source of financial support for my family. I am not willing to help FIL financially if my husband will not address these issues.

Can you go to the house and physically get ahold of the bills and such? You don’t have to be a POA to do that. Do you think FIL has accounts online that you could get the passwords for? How old are FIL and the wife? Do you have a sense of what their assets might be?

[Anonymous]

That's the problem. It's illegal to log in as someone else. You absolutely need financial POA and your own log in with access to the accounts. I know this from caring for my elderly aunt until her death. No one has any idea how old the wife is. The father in law is 83. We have no idea what his assets are like. They have a house in Silver Spring that's likely worth $700k or so. Hard to imagine that it's not paid off since they bought in in the mid 90's, but who can say? We don't know how the house is titled. From the short visit a few weeks ago, there are "multiple" credit cards, but no one knows what's on them. He's apparently got late fees because he can't keep track and his wife is angry and overwhelmed at his decline. Frankly, it doesn't seem she wants to deal with it, but she also won't accept help.

Maddening.

[Anonymous]

Approach his wife with concerns about his health care proxy/wishes (is he DNR or full code? That type of thing) and convince her all the
paperwork - financial and health related need to be addressed.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Approach his wife with concerns about his health care proxy/wishes (is he DNR or full code? That type of thing) and convince her all the
paperwork - financial and health related need to be addressed.

Wife agrees. First she told DH that she didn't know where the paperwork was and could not remember who prepared it. Then we found three lawyers she could pick from to prepare new paperwork knowing FIL wanted to change POA to DH, one hourly, two flat fee ($2000-2500). She said that was too expensive. Then she "remembered" where the papers were and supposedly the lawyer who prepared them but won't tell us where they are or who the lawyer is.

[Anonymous]

It seems like she's unwilling to cooperate and you have no legal standing at all. So I'm unclear why you think your DH is to blame for not making something out of nothing.

She's probably worried about losing her spousal role and her own independence. The more he pressures her, the more she will stonewall him.

[Anonymous]

OP, I think you are in the gray zone where you can see the trajectory this story is on, but those involved either can't all see it, or won't.

There is a way of your DH very calmly and non-judgmentally making it clear that he wants to help, but he can't help unless he has access to information about what's going on. When they are both ready to share that ( at least, any of them that can still make decisions), then he can try to help. Not sooner.

And then you have to sit back and watch it get worse. You have to know that the long-term financial outcome might have been much better if different decisions were made earlier. You have to find a way to be okay with this.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:OP, I think you are in the gray zone where you can see the trajectory this story is on, but those involved either can't all see it, or won't.

There is a way of your DH very calmly and non-judgmentally making it clear that he wants to help, but he can't help unless he has access to information about what's going on. When they are both ready to share that ( at least, any of them that can still make decisions), then he can try to help. Not sooner.

And then you have to sit back and watch it get worse. You have to know that the long-term financial outcome might have been much better if different decisions were made earlier. You have to find a way to be okay with this.

Thank you. This is great advice. You are right. Appreciate it.

—OP