My retired Dad refuses to hire help for my sick Mom, and insists I quit my job to be caregiver. How can I deal with this situation?

When you raise children, you give them choices, which allows them to begin to assert some independence. The trick is to offer only the choices you are willing to accept. I would suggest you use the same approach with your father. "I will do this, or I will do that." (Through this process you are also establishing your boundary lines.) If he refuses to work within those choices or boundaries, the consequences are on him. Call his bluff. Do not allow him to manipulate you. Do not quit your job.

Barb
Author, "What to Do about Mama?"

The reason you are being asked so many times about mom's diagnosis and prognosis is just that you might not want to miss sharing her last days with her - not out of guilt but out of love. You should not really have to move or quit your job to become an unpaid caregiver, but you might want to if you know that's the only alternative. If its a big bad glioblastoma multiforme, these are her last days...if it is a benign meningioma they completely excised, she might need some rehab but these are NOT her last days. Some people have been happier that they made that choice under the right circumstances, despite the magnitude of the sacrifices involved.

So, are you between a rock and a hard place as in, my dad is going to domineer and suck the very life out of me if I choose option A, and my mom will die without me at her side if I choose option B? Or are you more free to imagine other possible compromises?

Dad might need to take a caregiver course - they have these in a lot of cities. He could learn to be a caregiver if you say no. I know of men who have done just that, even one right now who is retiring a little early to do more for and with his wife who has MS. Or he could just go on being a complete chauvinistic jerk, of course...so it might seem sneaky, but maybe a family meeting first WITHOUT him would make sense, so he can't play you off each other when you do meet with him having a decent plan of support, which he rejects because YOU and only YOU should quit your job and do it all for him. And if a family meeting is not agreeable to the siblings even once they know what is going on, then you pre-meet with a good social worker or guide to the home care system instead. Failing that, bring your mom to come "visit" with you and maybe just don't bring her back. One of my regrets in life is that I thought too late about bringing my dad to live, probably in skilled care, in Little Rock instead of Pittsburgh, because it was like I was breaking up a marriage. He became ill and died just before the spring break where I was planning to try it - I was researching transportation options and everything. My mom had all but abandoned him and convinced herself that he didn't ever really love her anyways, which I think was just to assuage her guilt and justify the way she used to yell at him all the time as he developed worsening dementia; she even had someone convinced that she was an abused wife, though it certainly looked like she did more of the abusing verbally and emotionally. As far as Dad not caring about her, it was patently not true and it broke my heart but it was no use to argue. I used to just bring pictures back and forth between them, and update them on each other's well-being and progress when there was any. But that said, my point is just that if Mom needs a happier, less oppressive environment, you would not necessarily be wrong to bring her to one. And of course, mom was the one refusing to move to Little Rock out of her comfort zone when it would have been a "good" move, when they still could have a somewhat active life with us and their grandkids and all, and I ended up moving her here alone later after Dad passed on...arrgh. She said it was because "she didn't want to be a burden" of all things...like the long distance routines we did instead weren't. Arrgh again.

To top that off, I did consider moving to Pittsburgh to be closer to them - had several valid reasons not to, besides just not wanting to leave a city and a career I (mostly) love - and not more than a week or so after Mom died, there was an ad in our journal for a job in PIttsburgh in my specialty. OMG, what self-doubt that brought on! I had to admit to myself how much I WANTED to stay where I was, in addition to all the "valid" reasons. I suppose that was a good thing, though I still tend to focus on the things I *don't* love about my job a bit much sometimes.

I hope and pray you can persuade all involved to do something reasonable and life-enhancing all around, and find the strength to weigh all the pluses and minuses and chart a course, however uncertain, you can live with now and in years to come.

I have nothing to add because others have already given you excellent advice and perspective.

DO not put your life on hold for your parents. Do not be guilted by anyone to care for your parents. They have options and they need to make decisions to care for themselves --

You are not obligated to care for our parents because they raised us. They raised us to be independent loving adults that are to live our lives and raise families just as they did. We don't have children to make them slaves or caregivers at our whim. I'm 57 and would never expect this of my children and I've set boundaries with my own 91 yr old mother that if she needs help, I will help her put assistance in place, but I will not quit my job, take leave, or move in or take her in just because she only wants to deal with me vs a stranger.

Please live your life and call your parents, visit when you can. There are many local resources they can tap into, hospice, in home care assistance a few hours a week, etc.

Ps. I know you want to take care of mom, but a she will need increasing care and you can't have a full time job plus care for mom. You know that you won't be able to concentrate if you are worrying about mom at your home or getting calls from a caregiver etc.

They will manage. Step back and let them work this out.

Call social services. They will come to the house and evaluative the situation, just like with kids. They have the power to force care for them and your father can fight them about it instead of you.

Vaj720 -- yes! This: "Your father can fight them about it instead of you." In caretaking my mom, anything she doesn't like that I can pass off to others, I pass it off. I tell her ENOUGH. Make her do ENOUGH. She hates getting a sponge bath or, heaven forbid! A shower. I just hired a tech to come in to do it once aweek. Let the tech fight with her. (She hardly does.) I'm drill sergeant enough. Intermediaries. Very important in caregiving, in my opinion.

Wonderful answers here. By all means, keep your job and move into your career - with the kind of economy we have today, it is NOT an option to move into and out of the job market to do caregiving (and expect anything beyond poverty once you can no longer work) - those days are gone for sure. An employer, whatever they say, wants an employee who is "serious" about their work, not someone they see as more committed elsewhere. And a college degree tends to go "stale" - you have to keep hustling, so to speak. Keep up with the field. It is your father's responsibility to care for, or arrange care for, his wife - I like the idea of letting him fight social services, or whatever. He probably does not want to spend money because he thinks he will live forever, so he figures if he can get anything for free, he is justified. Best not to let him think this is your problem - it definitely is his! As for siblings, they may have good reasons for keeping their distance - you might want to talk to them (NOT including your father or mother) to see what they think. They might help you form a united front against your dad, which you may need if he is the controlling or divide and conquer type of person.