Reply to Requests from a Sibing who is there for Elderly Parents

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[quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous]My MIL recently died from a chronic illness that she had for 3 years, it was terminal and we all knew it.  She was single, living along, thousands of miles away.  She refused, adamantly and repeatedly, to our requests to move in with us here in DC.  I don’t know how people can force people to move without having them declared incompetent and becoming power of attorney and guardian.  She just wouldn’t budge.  Maybe because she knew she would die and this was her control, who knows.

Anyway, her only kids are my DH and SIL.  SIL lives in sunny Southern California, she doesn’t work, has no kids, is fairly young, nice husband, nice life.  She refuses to help, she won’t visit, and she won’t try to convince her mom to move in with us.  We hired help but MIL wouldn’t let them in th door. So my DH has to basically move in with her to care for her for the last 3 years, going back and forth between here and there.  He’s missed the last 3 years of everything for the kids, every game, every recital, every teacher conference, every play, every first day, every last day, every birthday, everything.

My MIL decides recently she wants her suffering over and enters a hospice facility where they gradually sedate and drug her until she passes (it’s in another country). SIL just shows up suddenly, she’s arrived to hold her mother’s hand and take over.  Because the last 3 years she couldn’t be bothered.  SIL takes all the credit for MIL’s care, her funeral, her wake, everything.  And bad mouthed DH for flying back for a few days to be in town for the first day of school in September.

So I get you OP, people can be disappointing.[/quote]

Your DH and SIL have different views, no more than that. I understand when people want to end suffering, I can't support prolonging it.[/quote]

I don’t think you understand or maybe my writing isn’t clear (I’m not the best writer). We did all the work, all of it, for years, time, hands on,money, sacrifice, all of it.  She came in for the last few weeks and pretended she had been around all these years for support, when she hadn’t done anything.  I was glad at least she showed up to see her mother before she died, but if you’re going to be the sibling who cannot physically be present for the caring of a dying parent, don’t pull some charade and lie about it when they die.  Have the decency to be grateful to the sibling who was there through it all so that your life could go on as usual.  It was so distasteful, and really REALLY hurt my DH.  We didn’t try to stop my MIL from making any of her medical decisions, she had full autonomy over all her life decisions.  We may have begged her to live with us, but we never stopped her from hospice (DH took her there) or forced her to do ANYTHING against her will.  We took care of her to the end.  [/quote]

What do you think that your SIL got out of lying about her level of involvement in her mother's care?   Seems to me that your dh's mom would have wanted both of her kids there with her.  Do you believe that your SIL was trying to make herself look good or something?  If so, for what purpose?[/quote]

I don’t think we are on the same page here, and again I am not a very good writer.  I don’t have any problem with my SIL showing up at the end, in fact I wrote how grateful I was, because before that I was worried my MIL would die without seeing her daughter in years.  My SIL lied to several people about how involved she had been with my MIL’s care over the years, yelled at my DH over and over again about how he shouldn’t come back to DC to see his kids but stay there 24/7, behind our backs changed the funeral plans and disinvited people to the services even though we had already had conversations with my MIL about what she wanted done with her remains and even down to the details about what dress she would be wearing in her casket, she changed the wake, it was so upsetting to my DH who didn’t have any more energy left to fight her after all this stress.  And he’s so sad that his sister is all the blood extended family he has left, so he’s afraid of upsetting her.  So yeah, I think SIL was trying to make herself look good, for herself and to everyone else.  I never have seen her like that before and it broke my heart.  Who knows for what purpose.  Does it matter?  Remember the people who were there, day in and day out, who made sure people didn’t spend Christmas alone, who made sure they went to the dr, made sure they had food, made sure they had clean clothes, made sure they were taking their medications, etc.  [/quote]

PP, you're responding to a troll who just wants to rile you up. We understand your family's sacrifice. There are plenty of people like your SIL in the world. Don't worry about them - they are their own worse enemy.
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