What Is Your Take On The Issue Of Leaving Elderly Parents In Old Age Homes?

I firmly believe that an abused dil should not be expected to do 'seva' to the abuser.Nor should she be judged or made to feel guilty.

I also believe that in laws/parents should not be expected to provide child care or nanny services ....and they should not be judged or made to feel guilty for it.

I believe children should not expect parents to leave them property /money that they earned. And parents should not make property for children and then expect to be taken care of financially by the children.

Don't force your children to have big fat weddings and don't marry your children into 'good prospects' by giving big dowry....then become financially dependent on children.

 

YM, these are not the only scenarios that lead parents to be financially dependent on children. For many middle class parents, just the burden of living pushes them into this cycle of having to make constant choices and compromises. I am so thankful today that my parents/in-laws had government jobs that pays them a pension. But I have other family members who did not have that security and were stuck in this middle class rut of wanting to provide what was best for their kids at that point, so saving for their retirement/old-age was the last thing on their minds. I do not believe they did it with the expectation that their kids will take care of them later on.

SGBV, to answer your original question... like many have said... there can't be a one size fits all approach to this issue at all. It depends on each person's experience, values and a whole bunch of other things on each person's take. For me personally, I can never imagine my parents or in-laws living in an old-age home. My parents instilled in me a pretty strong belief that such a situation is never justified, no matter what. All the elder people in my family have been fortunate to spend their last days in the care of family members (and this has not been without financial compromises and other kinds of adjustments every had to take on), so this is what I have grown up seeing.

 

True....
but those other scenarios are also a part of the problem.

 

I have always maintained that i have been and always will take care of MILs physical needs. what constitutes emotional needs is debatable. i will make sure she has enough food, home, medical treatment, clothes at least as good as we have if not better. but we keep emotionally away from her. she has consistently been the trouble maker. my daughter is growing up and now she understands things and is at an impressionable age. A woman who could drive me to contemplating suicide is not the poor weak woman you are talking of. and yes after marriage i figured out other women who were in the same condition. believe me it takes monumental self control and forgiveness to keep any relationship in these circumstances. women in your country live with their mothers and yes you had a tough time. but once you live with the same MIL in the same house and can mantain sanity, you would be able to comment in the cruelty of the DILs. if my MIL lives as my neighbor i have no problem. but she wants to live with us and rule over us. SIL will make sure that this happens. now tell me a solution. i really want to go back to india and live in peace. i will be eternally obliged.

 

1. work also can be addictive, especially ones which are which needs concentration/brain work like IT, finance. We have to know and be trained to draw a line to separate work timings and family timings.

It starts really early like all the time studying and going to tutions and family members not disturbing in the name of he/she is studying (applies to boys mostly when we grew up), and telling oh he studies all the time, let him take rest or watch TV. so they are used to that type already, life is not studies/job, and we can't change them now.

2. And some conveniently escape the family side stuff in the name of job. my dad and H come into to this category.(H doing 3 jobs now, which shouldn't be at this time, as kid is small (we waited for a baby several serval years), and no financial crisis to stop living life and earn and in his case it is not earning, it became pride for him and in social circles he can't talk anything other than this, he has some spending issues too)

 

I don't think most of our parents/in laws are open to old age homes,for most it amounts to abandoning by children.

Our generation is open and may explore it in future.

The question should be to children not spouses , if children want to take care of parents they will do that irrespective of spousal objection.

 

Based on the few decades of experience and wisdom that I have accumulated, and seen many real life examples from close quarters, including my own family, this is my take:

a) It is not possible to care for elderly population by their children who are simultaneously aging. The emotional angle aside, the care of aging population is becoming very complicated as diagnoses and diseases are getting complicated. People are living longer with complex diseases and not dying peacefully in their 60s as it was 2 generations back. Even the most skilled nursing and other staff struggle to care for this population with all the amenities and technology in a nursing home or assisted living facility. It is very difficult to have this set up at home (handicapped bathrooms, special feeding, 24 hour monitoring for falls, concussions, etc.)

b) Keeping a 24 hour caregiver is an option but very expensive all over the world and the care is not consistent or reliable. Caregivers come and go if hiring in a home from Red Cross. If they are caregivers in a facility, if one leaves, there is always another one.

c) For as long as the parents do not have special needs or require skilled care, an option is to live close by so we can maintain our privacy and lifestyle yet visit them everyday and share life with them. I know many families who live this way. Rent upstairs and downstairs flats, adjacent flats, etc. so they have 2 kitchens, two lifestyles but still just a door knock away.

d) Lastly we should not compare how someone took care of us 50 years back or how someone took care of their parents and in-laws 50-100 years back. Times were different, life was simpler. Now life is a lot more complicated, a lot more expensive, jobs are insecure unlike those days where our parents and grandparents worked and retired in same company all their life. Today every day we wonder if we will have a job or be fired. Cost of living is exorbitant that we can barely feed our own family.

e) Intelligent parents who read the paper, watch TV, and expose themselves to these changes should already be prepared to plan their retirement and old age and sickness wisely irrespective of whether children can care for them or not. If they fail to perceive the changes in their surroundings unfortunately they may be in for a shock if their children are genuinely not able to care for them tomorrow.

 

Dear, If this is true than you inlaws are monster and they have no right to be taken care of. They should be in old age home only, not with their DiL n son.
leave alone old age home ,In india such inlaws place is in jail . torturing DIL mentally is a crime in India.
After abuse , if DIL chooses to forgive her inlaws, its her personal choice. It shouldnt be expected from all the DILs as if forgiving abusing inlaws is the right and moral thing to do. if abused DIL choose to send her PIL in old age home, nobody should have any right to call her names. Here in laws will reap what they have sown.
If we do wrong things, we have to face consequences, this should be true for old age people also.
JMO..