I have enormous empathy for your sil: she is in for many many years of being the primary caregiver to your fil. She needs just this one break right now, and it feels like it should be the priority. I would have dh take the 6yo, and just have the 12yo either 1. stay with a great friend for the week 2. miss a week of school. My kids around that age missed a week due to family reasons, and the school was very understanding and excused the absence.

You need to keep your job, the answer is only the days he can.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:In hindsight, DH should have been the first responder in this situation.

How is someone who lives three hours away a first responder?

Because he doesn’t have a job. He should have done the first week when his wife was still at home.

Bring FIL to your house and your DH takes care of him and the kids while you travel.

Ultimately, you need to find assisted living/nursing care for your FIL. At that age, he's likely to continue needing care. And family cannot just take multiple days off work whenever the next "medical emergency" issue is.

Long term your husband cannot do it either---it's hard to job search and arrange interviews if you are not in hometown.

So choices long term are put him in Assistedliving/nursing care or hire full time nursing to take care of him (which is more expensive). It's Jan and SIL is out of days to help.

Is there someone from your side of the family that can come and stay at your house while your DH stays with his dad?

Anonymous wrote:You need to take fmla leave

That’s probably not realistic if the DH is out of work. FMLA is unpaid.

This was poor planning from the start - SIL should have asked for availability of help, your husband should have asked what help would be needed, and they should have planned for your husband to be there before SIL ran of SL.

BUT - you can't go back in time. So. You tell SIL that your husband can be there for X days, and you can figure out paying for a caregiver for the days he can't cover while you're traveling.

Anonymous wrote:You need to take fmla leave

Terrible suggestion for the breadwinner. Do not put your career at risk, patch together child care however you can. This is a marathon, not a sprint, and the family will need to be financially secure. Send the kids with their dad if you must.

Anonymous wrote:
That's very stressful for you!

The 6 year old could go with his father, but the 12 year old really can't miss school for weeks.

I would bring FIL to you temporarily, even though his doctors are 3 hours away (for some stuff he could have video appointments, or see a local doctor)... but the problem is, you really need to figure out long-term care because having him live with you past a few weeks is probably going to lead to extra stress and conflict.

SIL isn't asking for weeks. She's asking for one week, during a period when OP is going to be traveling intermittently (a/k/a: not gone the whole week). OP won't even answer how many days she'll actually be traveling during that one week. She's clouding the issue with the fact that her intermittent travel will continue for a couple of weeks *after* the week SIL is asking for help.

That's very stressful for you!

The 6 year old could go with his father, but the 12 year old really can't miss school for weeks.

I would bring FIL to you temporarily, even though his doctors are 3 hours away (for some stuff he could have video appointments, or see a local doctor)... but the problem is, you really need to figure out long-term care because having him live with you past a few weeks is probably going to lead to extra stress and conflict.

You need to take fmla leave

You can hire someone to care for him while his sister is at work during the week you are traveling.

How immobile is the dad and how much care does he need? I would see if it is possible to move him to your home. Although it is ideal that he has continued care with his doctor, you can use a doctor here in the interim. His doctor should be able to coordinate care with another doctor especially if it isn’t very complicated.

Your SIL needs a break. She is asking for help, why are you not trying to find a compromise here? You can easily move some trips so that there is ONE single week free for DH to go help his father.

I'd even suggest your DH start going up more regularly, for longer than a day. Maybe he goes up wed-fri and comes back for the weekend, or the opposite if you have business travel, he goes up fri-sun and can care for the kids the rest of the week.

This is not an unreasonable ask for someone out of a job - how did you do biz travel when he was working?