[lovethesun]

We have a family member getting married in two months. We are not real close with the engaged person due to her toxic mother. This family member we only see once a year or less and only for things like graduations. The wedding is 5 hours away from where we live. The problem is that we are being required to bring her 82 year old grandmother who can barely walk, can not control her bladder and bowels and frequently messes herself and makes constant demands of people as well as loses her patience easily when she gets tired or hungry. I respect the elderly, but I do not feel this woman should be sitting in a car for a 5 hour drive,, sitting through a wedding, then 5 hours back home. I feel it will ruin it for everyone and the grandmother will most likely not enjoy herself. I'd like to tell the family of the engaged woman that we will not be bringing the grandmother. However, they will probably not take it well and the grandmother has a child-like mentality and does not understand her limited mobility and incontinence issues. She just thinks its a fun time out for her. To make matters worse, the wedding is located in an extremely rural area without many support services such as wheelchairs or mobility devices, very few restaurants, nearest hospital is 45 minutes away and no grocery stores to buy incontinence products or medications. This whole thing is a disaster waiting to happen, in my opinion. Thanks for any advice.

[unaluna]

Who usually takes care of the grandmother? This is not just "giving someone a ride." This requires nursing skills and 2 overnight accomodations for everyone in the car, imo. If the bride can afford a rural venue 5 hours away AND they want granny there, that is their responsibility, not anyone else's.

[Tart Cherry Jam]

I concur. The demands placed on you are totally unreasonable

[lovethesun]

Originally Posted by unaluna

Who usually takes care of the grandmother? This is not just "giving someone a ride." This requires nursing skills and 2 overnight accomodations for everyone in the car, imo. If the bride can afford a rural venue 5 hours away AND they want granny there, that is their responsibility, not anyone else's.

Thanks Unaluna. To answer your question the grandmother lives closest to us. She's about 20 minutes away in a care home. I think that's why the bride and her family are expecting us to bring the grandmother. It's my husband that does all the doctor appointments, prescriptions, groceries, laundry, etc. His brother (grandmother's son, bride's father) does very little and when they came to town for one of our kids graduations recently, the expectation was the grandmother would come to the graduation, but the do-nothing brother (bride's father) told grandmother he was not taking her to graduation and followed through on that. So with that I think we're even more justified to tell grandmother we're not bringing her to wedding. However I think there's a secondary problem here and that is that my husband is afraid of his brother and is going to put himself (and all of us) through the unbearable task of taking grandmother 5 hours away to wedding simply because he does not have the guts to stand up for common sense. I'd personally like to level that whole family with the inconvenient truth that grandmother is not going to be brought by us. But I've been told to stay out of family issues that are not mine. Sadly, this is complicated.

[unaluna]

I hear you. Maybe you can ask the care home or her doctors what would be the procedure for doing this in a way that wouldnt unalive the poor old lady? Maybe by letter or email?

Or can you and your kids hitch a ride with someone else? I agree, this is aiming to be "1 Wedding and A Funeral", but without Hugh Grant to pretty it up!

[Molinit]

I'd nope right out of that and tell them if they want her to attend, they need to arrange for a nurse and transportation and pay for it. If your husband chooses to involve himself in this debacle, then I'd let him know he will be going without his wife. I wouldn't even want to attend this event for someone who is not close family.

[Tart Cherry Jam]

When you say "grandmother," it is because she is the bride's grandmother, and I understand that. But who is she vis-à-vis you? How is she related to you or your family?

[lovethesun]

Originally Posted by Tart Cherry Jam

When you say "grandmother," it is because she is the bride's grandmother, and I understand that. But who is she vis-à-vis you? How is she related to you or your family?

The grandmother is my husband’s mother. She’s my mother in law.

[poshgirl]

lovethesun, having read this I can relate.

Until about 2 years ago, I was taking my late mother to medical appointments, sorting prescriptions, food shopping, etc. Brother was conspicuous by his absence. With failing health, she could then have house calls from doctor, nurse, etc. Also taking her out became a problem due to mobility and incontinence. Brother then became more involved, partly due to mother's attitude towards me.

When social services became involved, they expected my brother and I to provide care that we were not trained for. Bathing, lifting, etc. We both stressed this lack of training and that resulted in a care home place.

Thankfully, we never had the situation you describe. If we had, we would have sought advice from medical professionals on whether any trip out could be managed by us.

I feel for you. Your husband feels a duty towards his mother and doesn't see the detrimental affect it can have on your relationship. Sadly, I think the only outcome is either his mother doesn't attend the wedding or you don't.

[lovethesun]

Originally Posted by poshgirl

lovethesun, having read this I can relate.

Until about 2 years ago, I was taking my late mother to medical appointments, sorting prescriptions, food shopping, etc. Brother was conspicuous by his absence. With failing health, she could then have house calls from doctor, nurse, etc. Also taking her out became a problem due to mobility and incontinence. Brother then became more involved, partly due to mother's attitude towards me.

When social services became involved, they expected my brother and I to provide care that we were not trained for. Bathing, lifting, etc. We both stressed this lack of training and that resulted in a care home place.

Thankfully, we never had the situation you describe. If we had, we would have sought advice from medical professionals on whether any trip out could be managed by us.

I feel for you. Your husband feels a duty towards his mother and doesn't see the detrimental affect it can have on your relationship. Sadly, I think the only outcome is either his mother doesn't attend the wedding or you don't.

Thank you so much poshgirl. I appreciate your empathy on this. It’s such a hard situation. And I was thinking the same thing you suggested. Either grandmother does not go or I do not go. But even that has a consequence if I don’t go as my husband will bear the full weight of the grandmothers problems. And something else he has not thought of is that he can not be going into public women’s restrooms if grandma needs help getting off toilet. Grandma just should not go. It seems cruel to say, but it just does not seem doable. I’ll also add that grandma is over 250 pounds. So extremely difficult to lift. My husband needs to grow some guts and tell her the truth.

[Deejay14]

Could you tell the bride and groom they will need to hire an aide to assist and take care of her needs and make sure she is safe during transport and party. If they really want her there....she still has these big needs.

[lovethesun]

Originally Posted by Deejay14

Could you tell the bride and groom they will need to hire an aide to assist and take care of her needs and make sure she is safe during transport and party. If they really want her there....she still has these big needs.

That’s a great idea and I feel we should tell the bride and groom that. I’m going to mention it. My hunch tells me however that they won’t spend the money and are just expecting family to do it. Curiously the bride’s father has been silent on this. I think it’s on purpose. They do t want to offer solutions because it might require them to pay for something. Because surely it has crossed the bride’s father’s mind several times how difficult of an undertaking this will be. He knows exactly how difficult his mother’s needs are.

[ArmorPlate108]

You mention that the grandmother has a child-like mentality and lives in some type of care facility? It sounds as though she might possibly be in dementia?

If that's the case, and you have not done outings like this with her regularly (and especially recently), it may be ill-advised to do that to her. People with dementia, even those who seem more easy-going, can get very upset and agitated when they're out of their comfort zone. An overnight trip to a strange place has the potential for very real and scary problems. Have you talked to her day to day caregivers? Her doctor? They may advise you against the scenario you've described.

[lovethesun]

Originally Posted by ArmorPlate108

You mention that the grandmother has a child-like mentality and lives in some type of care facility? It sounds as though she might possibly be in dementia?

If that's the case, and you have not done outings like this with her regularly (and especially recently), it may be ill-advised to do that to her. People with dementia, even those who seem more easy-going, can get very upset and agitated when they're out of their comfort zone. An overnight trip to a strange place has the potential for very real and scary problems. Have you talked to her day to day caregivers? Her doctor? They may advise you against the scenario you've described.

That’s a great point. She does seem to have some cognitive decline and she has gotten agitated to the point of having to be sent home early on previous trips. I think letting the doctor weigh in is a good idea. And if the doctor says no that lets us off the hook.