Dear Prudence,
My mother-in-law has always been difficult, but right now she is driving me to drink. She is in her 80s and could no longer live alone after two bad falls. She needed round-the-clock care that her family couldn’t provide (we collectively have been paying for outside help for years). The retirement home is very nice with lots of activities. It is located 15 minutes from our home so our family could visit. Now I am wishing we went with the ones near my sisters-in-law.
My wife visits twice a week with our 5-year-old and calls her mother every day. And all my mother-in-law can do is inflect misery all around. She wants to die. They should have left her on the floor of the house to rot. She could be in heaven with her husband, and instead, she is here. She hates it here. She just wants to die. She has gone on these rants in front of our 5-year-old. My wife has come home crying and our child is hysterical because they don’t want grandma to die. All of this is taking a serious toll on my wife’s mental and physical health. She feels so guilty but there was nothing to be done. The doctors say my mother-in-law is mentally astute and has been put on antidepressants. My sisters-in-law visit and call when they can but my mother-in-law doesn’t feel the need to inflict all this misery on them. My wife is just the lucky one.
I have already put my foot down about taking our child on these visits. Two hysterical visits are too many. My wife tells me I need to support her here. I am trying to but I can’t stand to see her in such pain. Help!
—Misery