Boomer parents/realities of aging in place

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:
Nope. The sick old people made decisions as adults to not take care of their health and not plan for their future. If they expect OP to now take care of them, that is selfish.

Must be nice to be omniscient.

I was diagnosed with Parkinson's last year at age 48. What should I do, Oh Great DCUM One? Three kids in college. Do I ask them where they plan to live for the rest of their lives so I can plan to buy a house there?

Must be nice to have all the answers.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:
Nope. The sick old people made decisions as adults to not take care of their health and not plan for their future. If they expect OP to now take care of them, that is selfish.

Must be nice to be omniscient.

I was diagnosed with Parkinson's last year at age 48. What should I do, Oh Great DCUM One? Three kids in college. Do I ask them where they plan to live for the rest of their lives so I can plan to buy a house there?

Must be nice to have all the answers.

Nope. Make a plan for yourself that doesn’t depend on the children taking care of you. Be self sufficient. Take care of yourself first - best gift you can give to your kids.

[Anonymous]

OP - They are creating their own problems. It is not your job to fix it.

Lots of great advice but this is about boundaries and being kind too. They will have to live with the consequences of their actions. You do your best under the circumstances you are in, they are not your or your DH's responsibilities. I am not saying do not help when emergencies arise, but let them know it is not a given and make decisions as they come in. Do not overly sacrifice from your immediate family to take care of the parents that made their own choices.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:OP I know you are under stress, but try not to take it out on the sick old people.

How would you feel if people looked at your situation and started second-guessing the decisions that got you here.

Remember their contributions and try to muster up some compassion for their current reality. To only think of how you are being effected is selfish.

Nope. The sick old people made decisions as adults to not take care of their health and not plan for their future. If they expect OP to now take care of them, that is selfish. You can have compassion for anyone living with undesirable results of poor decisions but also recognize those were selfish decisions.

How blissfully unaware you sound.

People in their eighties don’t get sick and frail because they did not take care of their health.

It is called mortality. It is what the end of the human experience looks like.

Too bad you were not around in the middle ages because they also believed misfortune was a punishment for your sins.

I hope karma does not decide you need to be educated on that point!

[Anonymous]

But people in their 80s were once in their 60s and 70s and could have made better decisions then instead of leaving a mess for others to deal with. Really, around 65 is the time we should make decisions, downsize, decide what where we will go when independent living is not an option.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:But people in their 80s were once in their 60s and 70s and could have made better decisions then instead of leaving a mess for others to deal with. Really, around 65 is the time we should make decisions, downsize, decide what where we will go when independent living is not an option.

This is accurate

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:But people in their 80s were once in their 60s and 70s and could have made better decisions then instead of leaving a mess for others to deal with. Really, around 65 is the time we should make decisions, downsize, decide what where we will go when independent living is not an option.

+1. It's especially puzzling because I remember my parents' total relief when one set of my grandparents sold their SFH and moved into an assisted living place in their late-60s before the serious health problems started. My other set of grandparents refused to do this and it caused a lot of stress for my parents when my grandmother had a fall and there were no bedrooms or full baths on the main floor of their home. My parents are in their 80s and have no plans to downsize and refuse to even discuss it.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Your in-laws aren't Boomers, they are Silent Generation.

Exactly what I was going to post.
The oldest boomers were born in '46 (I've even seen it specified as the second half of '46.) So the oldest boomers are currently 77 (or maybe just turned 78 in the last month, if you're not be so specific as to only count the second half of '46.)

NP here. This is what you’re focused on? Sweet Jesus. FFS.

A person focused on Boomer bashing with this manufactured generational angst isn't to be taken seriously. These are in-laws, not even her parents. Let the spouse deal.

Far away aging parents in need of care is a strain on a whole marriage, not just the spouse whose parents it is. It's money, it's time away, and it's worry weighing on your spouse.

I don't know what kind of marriage PP has, but it affects the decisions a family makes. The stress on the spouse makes their bandwidth limited which imacts their ability to engage fully in their own nuclear family.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:
Nope. The sick old people made decisions as adults to not take care of their health and not plan for their future. If they expect OP to now take care of them, that is selfish.

Must be nice to be omniscient.

I was diagnosed with Parkinson's last year at age 48. What should I do, Oh Great DCUM One? Three kids in college. Do I ask them where they plan to live for the rest of their lives so I can plan to buy a house there?

Must be nice to have all the answers.

I hope you have told them. It would make a difference to me as an adult child of wonderful parents

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:
Nope. The sick old people made decisions as adults to not take care of their health and not plan for their future. If they expect OP to now take care of them, that is selfish.

Must be nice to be omniscient.

I was diagnosed with Parkinson's last year at age 48. What should I do, Oh Great DCUM One? Three kids in college. Do I ask them where they plan to live for the rest of their lives so I can plan to buy a house there?

Must be nice to have all the answers.

I hope you have told them. It would make a difference to me as an adult child of wonderful parents

Why bother telling them? It is quite clear from the posters here that I have to plan for my own quality of life degradation, including making my own arrangements for care. As long as they know where my will is, all should be good to go.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:
Nope. The sick old people made decisions as adults to not take care of their health and not plan for their future. If they expect OP to now take care of them, that is selfish.

Must be nice to be omniscient.

I was diagnosed with Parkinson's last year at age 48. What should I do, Oh Great DCUM One? Three kids in college. Do I ask them where they plan to live for the rest of their lives so I can plan to buy a house there?

Must be nice to have all the answers.

I hope you have told them. It would make a difference to me as an adult child of wonderful parents

Why bother telling them? It is quite clear from the posters here that I have to plan for my own quality of life degradation, including making my own arrangements for care. As long as they know where my will is, all should be good to go.

Because they love you. I would want to know if you were my dad. You sound depressed.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:But people in their 80s were once in their 60s and 70s and could have made better decisions then instead of leaving a mess for others to deal with. Really, around 65 is the time we should make decisions, downsize, decide what where we will go when independent living is not an option.

+1. It's especially puzzling because I remember my parents' total relief when one set of my grandparents sold their SFH and moved into an assisted living place in their late-60s before the serious health problems started. My other set of grandparents refused to do this and it caused a lot of stress for my parents when my grandmother had a fall and there were no bedrooms or full baths on the main floor of their home. My parents are in their 80s and have no plans to downsize and refuse to even discuss it.

This is my situation too--my mom went through hell and back with her own mother who refused to make any plans for anything and then it all went to crap in an emergency situation. So after her experience, I though for sure she'd make some longterm plans to avoid the same fate for herself and my father. We even talking about it years ago and she assured me it was on her radar.

But now they're nearing 80, both in decent but declining health, and have no plans to do anything to make their next stage of life easier on themselves or my siblings and I. If anything, they are doing things that undermine their own success, like taking out a mortgage on their long-paid off home to make some unecessary cosmetic changes but blistering at the idea that they also look at making some modifications to make aging place easier (like converting an unused den into a first floor master suite with an accessible bathroom). Or adopting a large breed dog that needs a tremendous amount of exercise when neither of them are really up to that sort of thing. It's maddening.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:But people in their 80s were once in their 60s and 70s and could have made better decisions then instead of leaving a mess for others to deal with. Really, around 65 is the time we should make decisions, downsize, decide what where we will go when independent living is not an option.

+1. It's especially puzzling because I remember my parents' total relief when one set of my grandparents sold their SFH and moved into an assisted living place in their late-60s before the serious health problems started. My other set of grandparents refused to do this and it caused a lot of stress for my parents when my grandmother had a fall and there were no bedrooms or full baths on the main floor of their home. My parents are in their 80s and have no plans to downsize and refuse to even discuss it.

This is my situation too--my mom went through hell and back with her own mother who refused to make any plans for anything and then it all went to crap in an emergency situation. So after her experience, I though for sure she'd make some longterm plans to avoid the same fate for herself and my father. We even talking about it years ago and she assured me it was on her radar.

But now they're nearing 80, both in decent but declining health, and have no plans to do anything to make their next stage of life easier on themselves or my siblings and I. If anything, they are doing things that undermine their own success, like taking out a mortgage on their long-paid off home to make some unecessary cosmetic changes but blistering at the idea that they also look at making some modifications to make aging place easier (like converting an unused den into a first floor master suite with an accessible bathroom). Or adopting a large breed dog that needs a tremendous amount of exercise when neither of them are really up to that sort of thing. It's maddening.

Okay, I would find that frustrating, especially the dang dog. While my ILs did move to an all on one floor arrangement with a finished walk out basement and an en-suite bedroom in case they need live-in help, they did get a dang puppy. I found this move confounding as FiL did all the walking and he is no longer that mobile to do so. My MiL now does but not as robustly as it needs to be for a young dog. There are so many housebroken dogs available to rescue. I don't know if this one will ever fully be so.