I wish my frail, selfish dad was dead

DEAR BEL, MY MOTHER died in 2006 and since then I’ve been heavily involved helping my disabled father.

My sister lives many miles away, but has him stay for a month in the summer. He never wants to go, but she knows I need a holiday.

He lives 30 miles away and insists he can’t get out unless I take him. His mobility allowance enables him to take taxis to the doctors etc, but he won’t use it.

I’ve been taking him out three times a week and doing all his shopping and cleaning because he refuses a cleaner or carer, even though he has money to pay.

Now my husband’s cancer has returned he’ll need daily treatment at the regional cancer centre at the other side of our county. This will take us four hours out of every weekday for eight to ten weeks.

I’ve told my father I’ll visit on Saturday or Sunday, order his shopping online and he must take a taxi to the doctors. I’ve arranged his hospital appointment using their transport. Every evening he phones up feeling sorry for himself. We also have my husband’s mother in a care home nearby and visit three times a week.

Both my father and motherin-law are 85 and think the world revolves around them. Now I need to concentrate on my husband without being made to feel guilty.

I know our time together is going to be shorter than either of us imagined.

It’s terrible I know, but if the care home rings or my father fails to call, I hope they’ve died. I have no children, so will have to look after myself in old age. Neither of them had to take care of parents. How do I make them see that I have a right to a life and my husband’s health comes first? JEAN

Your painfully honest letter is a reminder that responsibilities within a family are often tough and that elderly people can be selfish. It’s a difficult truth which needs to be acknowledged. My own parents (in their 90s now) are quite the opposite — yet all of us must realise that when most people reach old age their horizons shrink, they suffer from myriad ailments, like to talk about themselves and want attention. We shall be the same.

The very sense of time slipping by that you are feeling right now because of your husband’s cancer afflicts the old, too. They know they may not have long and so sometimes those pleas for sympathy are another way of hiding sadness and fear.

After your mother’s death, your father became used to having you at his beck and call, ignoring the fact that a 60mile round trip is onerous. unfortunately, you both settled into a habit back then, which you have grown to resent.

It sounds as though he takes you for granted — and there’s no reason whatsoever why he should refuse to employ a cleaner.

Now that your husband’s cancer has returned there’s no doubt where your priorities should lie. You have done the right thing in making all those arrangements — so I’m afraid you will just have to make yourself immune to that note of selfpity on the phone.

Is there anybody local you could contact about a midweek visit for him? A neighbour? A cleaner is a must and I would see if you can’t pay him or her a tad over the going rate for the sake of doing some errands, too.

You have no choice but to be strong, for your husband’s sake. In your uncut letter, you say you had fulltime care of your motherinlaw until last year, until you could no longer cope. It’s likely she resents being in a care home, but what are you supposed to do? You have too much on your plate and must be sick with anxiety over your husband. In your 60s now, you will become worn out unless you make changes to give yourself less stress.

There will be those who are shocked at your admission that sometimes you wish these demanding old people dead. But I am glad you have been brave and honest enough to say the unsayable (because many people have similar thoughts sometimes) and understand that these words are prompted by stress and terror over your husband’s illness.

Talk to him about how often you both visit his mother, and be ready to spell out to her the stages of his illness. I wish you both strength and the best of luck for the coming months.