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Timgt5 · Feb 28, 2012, 04:03 AM

Normally I am not one to ask for advice (one of my personal downfalls) but I wanted to tap into the massive brain trust that is Pysch Central and see if you guys can give me a bit of consultation, this is regarding my mother in law. Worry not, this is not one of those lengthy rants to complain, she is in fact a very kind soul, whom I want to actually help.

This is going to be a bit long winded (sorry guys) but I think the background is important in order to understand her mindset and issues with life changes.

My mom in law and her husband were married roughly forty years. Although he was a good prospect on paper (well educated, with good job prospects etc) she quickly realized a short time after they were married that they were not compatible. She had become pregnant with her first child and he was a good provider. After having a second child, she began to develop a separate life from him. As far as I can understand he was never abusive physically but was emotionally distant and neglectful. He was a rather conservative fellow, who wanted a very traditional family. She on the other hand wanted to make her own decisions and live life on her terms.

By the time I met my then future wife, her parents hardly spoke to each other. Her mom and dad stayed married despite her growing resentment of him. She adamantly did not want to give up the house (the mortgage was in his name) and neither did he. So despite their negative feelings for each other they stayed together. My mom in law had planned on getting a divorce after both kids had graduated college, but his health began to decline. His decreasing mobility (most likely MS, although he refused to get a proper diagnosis) rendered him more and more dependent on her. His family all lived in the Midwest, so she went from wife to primary caregiver.

To deal with the stress of the bad marriage, she took up what I like to term as “sport shopping” Shopping without a particular need, just to stay out of the house. She would often buy large quantities of clothes on sale. This later turned into hanging out at thrift stores and buying dish sets, trinkets and other discarded items. She began what I would call the early stages of hoarding (after seeing the TV shows on this subject, she adamantly denies this and insists she is just a “pack rat”) Although she kept the house very clean, the walls began to pile up with various nick knacks. She spent most of the time outside working in her various flower gardens.

Her basement became filled with stuffed animals, plants and some old furniture. She had carved out a small area to sit, eat and watch a small TV, while her husband basically camped out in the living room, ultimately becoming housebound (his leg and back pained him intently and he had to use a cane to walk across the room) She slept in a spare bedroom in the basement.

My wife became concerned about mold and mildew affecting her mom’s health (a problem especially in houses with crawlspaces). After my mom in law retired (2004) my wife began pushing her to begin cleaning out the house, donating useful items to hospice or selling them to a local thrift store. Other things had deteriorated and needed to be tossed out altogether. In order to help her take stuff out of the house, my wife’s dad purchased his son’s 1998 Toyota 4 runner SUV. She did stop acquiring things from the thrift stores and began the very painful process of cleaning out her house. We have been assisting with various items. She has a difficult time with parting with items, but slowly she has moved things on. I believe we have at least stopped the problem before it became physically dangerous to her to have so much clutter. One thing that made it difficult was his presence in the house as he slept odd hours making it difficult for her to work on cleaning things out.

In May of 2011 my father in law passed away from long term health issues. I think he had become depressed and miserable, ultimately losing the will to live. My mom in law is now a widow. She lives alone with one cat. She has begun rearranging the house and increasing her efforts to remove items, starting with some of her husband’s clothes. I have been helping by posting his old videogames on ebay and giving her the proceeds to help with her household expenses. My wife has moved some of her old items out of the house and is storing a few small things and getting rid of the rest.

Her son has asked her to give away most of his old toys, as many have become dirty with mold. As an asthma sufferer it would not be in his interest to take any of those home with him. This was a good thing as she was holding on to this stuff for him. She came from a poor rural Iowa farm family, so every possession was precious and had to be preserved and passed down.

So there are some issues left to address:

Nearly 10 Months after her husband’s passing she is still sleeping in the down stairs spare room in the basement. The master bedroom upstairs has a fairly new mattress is much more spacious. She has redecorated it some, which is an encouraging sign, but she is sleeping where it is colder, damper and more prone to be unhealthy. The whole house belongs to her now, she should not continue living in the basement, like a cave troll. It seems she derives some comfort closed up in the dark surrounded by “stuff”. She is rather sensitive on this subject so I have not tried to broach it yet.
She has a lot of trouble making changes in her life even those that have obvious benefits. It took us nearly six months for us to convince her to stop using our old computer (which was slowly dying) and buy a new one so she could switch to broadband internet (she had been on dial up since 2000). The entry level broadband plan was actually cheaper than AOL for 10X the speed. She only was willing to do this because her current phone company had switched her to a more expensive per minute long distance plan without her consent. The current internet provider offered a fixed rate long distance plan. In the end she will get better internet and unlimited calling for less than she had been paying in long distance charges (her mom still lives in Iowa and she calls her 2X a week) and slow internet service.
She is finally starting to watch TV in the living room. My wife and I are trying to encourage her to spend more time there as the TV is fairly nice LCD and has the better cable service attached. Also she is not sitting down in said basement surrounded by piles of old objects as much. She still goes down to watch TV from time to time.
We are trying to make her understand that we (neither my wife or I nor her son and his wife) do not want most of her old things. We do not have large homes nor any excess capacity for storing things (I for one cannot stand clutter) my wife’s brother is about to add a new addition to his family (baby coming in May) so they do not have excess room for much to come in to their home. This is difficult for my Mom in law, because she is very sentimental about material things often addressing inanimate objects as if they were people and has this desire to pass them down.
She owns too many automobiles and needs to consolidate. She currently holds three cars. One a 1998 Accord she bought new 14 years ago, a 1998 Toyota 4 Runner bought from her son, and a 2008 Accord that her husband bought (mainly for her to have a safe car drive to see her son 150 miles away). The 2008 is a V6 and much larger than her 1998. The car is a comfortable highway cruiser but it is really too big for her. She has difficulty seeing around the car. She feels it is big and awkward to park and being an upscale model has a massive amount of confusing controls that she does not fully understand. The 4 Runner has been a useful workhorse but it has over 160K miles. The vehicle is a bit crude and difficult to climb into and out of. She loves the rugged image it projects, but it guzzles gas (17 MPG city,21 Hwy) We want her to look at the 2012 Subaru Impreza Hatchback, which has standard all wheel drive, is a tidy size, but still has 52 cubic feet of cargo space with the seats folding down. The Impreza gets 36 mpg on the hwy and 27 in town (nearly what the 2008 Accord gets on the hwy). My wife saw one at a car show and was very impressed with quality of the fit and finish and it was her idea to gently push her mom to look at the car. The local Subaru dealer is also much closer to her house for servicing. With the money should get from selling the 2008 Accord (which she is not fond of) and the 4 Runner, she could buy the 2012 Impreza for almost no money out of pocket. This would give her a car that could carry extra large items, cruise comfortably on long drives, use much less gas and have the added security of all wheel drive. The long term benefit here is less expenses in terms of gas, insurance, servicing, and property taxes. Of course if she does look at it and does not like it, we would not pressure her any further.
There some things that needs to be repaired in her home. The house is 40 years old and some of the wallpaper should be removed, the wall cleaned and then painted. Again all of this will be a traumatic change for her, but we will slowly convince her it is for her benefit.
The last concern is that she is falling into depression. Although she has not withdrawn from her activities, she seems to sleep a lot more during the middle of the day. She confided in me that in part its stems from having so much still in front of her to accomplish she becomes overwhelmed and shuts down, also there is a growing bitterness to her over life and she cannot seem to see the positive side of her recent changes.

I am sorry for this long vent. As I said at the beginning my mom in law is really a very sweet and kind hearted person. She has been very giving all of her life, which is a great quality, but she needs to learn to live for herself now.

Her children have good jobs and are married to spouses which are stable and make good money as well. She does not have to look out for us financially and any of us would be willing to help her out in that capacity if needed.

I was looking for any insight, opinions, thoughts that might be of help, I would simply like her to enjoy the rest of her years happy and in continued good health.

Thank you all for listening.

Timgt5