u/the_sylince

Erod and Jesper off to NJ, what’s our primary lineup for that fourth line?

To get right to it, wife and I live with her mother - have done so since 2021 when she had a massive stroke followed by a heart attack. She walked away from the ordeal with Warnicke’s Aphasia and brain damage and later needed a triple bypass.

To her name she had $20k in retirement after she’d been scammed out of the rest of it (prior to our living with her), a Money Market Account we liquidated for her early on, and a car we sold because she was no longer able to drive. Her assets amount to nothing at this point - no savings, no retirement, no home, etc. She receives a little Social Security benefits monthly around $2,400.

She’s dependent on us for everything except bathing, cleaning, clothing, and microwaving/preparing raw foods - she has since forgotten how to use the stove and oven. Due to some financial reasons and because my wife stays at home, she has been denied Medicaid (we’re in Florida).

The present issue is this: we cannot continue to care for this woman. We both lack the emotional energy - she’s not terribly kind, she’s selfish, and she had isolated herself from the few friends and family she had before the stroke, so there are no additional parties willing to help us - and we are both burned out from the burden these last five years, during which we got married and have yet to have been able to live a married life together since the tension of living with her sequesters us to our side of the condo snd she to hers. Finally, I’m not able to continue financially aiding her; I’m a public school teacher in the bottom paying state in the country and my wife has been out of work for personal reasons since her mother got ill.

My question for advice is simple: what do we do? How on earth are we supposed to get out from under this? We’ve sunk five good years into this woman and we’re at the end of our rope due to how straining it is to have a relationship with her and how burdening it is to be solely straddled with her care. She has refused adult daycare activities or social options. We are having trouble navigating the web of options to get her out and into long term care - she’s dealing with two monitored aneurisms, a failing heart, and the lingering neurological issues from the stroke. But without monetary help or Medicaid, that is an impossibility. And if we leave, she’ll be alone in a rented condo where she can barely take care of herself - despite everything, we can’t live with the guilt of abandoning her.

So I suppose this was also a vent session. Thanks in advance

Just want to take a moment to thank u/vondrr and u/verneu for this great niche sub!

That’s all, thanks guys!