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Around 3 years back my mother passed away and I was very close to my mother, my father since then feels lonely and he is 75+ years but physically fit, he sometimes sits in his room and keeps staring at my mother’s photo and starts crying after sometime..while that shows how much he misses my mother but its equally concerning as it might have deteriorating effect on his health as well as he has a prolonged history of BP and Diabetes, so somehow I want to give him a comfort or someone whom he can talk to, be around him all time and be a good friend and partner to him so that he doesn’t feel lonely.. Now we being kids to him, I feel he doesn’t openly talk to us due to the age gap i guess, so I was thinking that he gets a companion of his own age. Now on other side my mother in law is a widow (younger than my dad by a couple of years), her husband and my father-in-law passed away long back before even me and my wife got married, she lives with her son / my brother-in-law who doesn’t do any work, he just wants easy money in life, so he gambles in stock market and there have been instances where he has lost lot of money in share market, he doesn’t take care about his mother, he got married 2 years back to a girl who does job but she shares her earnings with her mother and doesn’t bear my brother-in-law expenses, so my brother-in-law keeps borrowing money from my mother-in-law for his expenses..my father-in-law was in a government job so my mother-in-law gets pension and instead of earning money and giving to his mother, my brother-in-law expects his mother to bear his expenses..now seeing all this my wife is always worried about her mother but she is hesitant to ask her mother to come and stay with us because of the society, basically her concern is that if she has elder brother then that brother is suppose to take care of her mother and as a daughter its not her responsibility as per the view of the society, so this made me think that what if my mother-in-law gets married to my father, in that way it would be a win win situation as my father will get a companion and my mother-in-law can stay with us with all rights as my own mother with no guilt and no one in the society can also point fingers at her because she would be legally my father’s wife and my mother so she can stay with us with no issues whatsoever plus my wife will also be very happy with this since she no longer has to worry about her mother’s health or needs as I would become legally her son and I would take good care of her in the same way as I was taking care of my mother. I was very hesitant with this thinking earlier but I thought about it for a long time and i feel this would be a right thing to do and really want this to happen as I feel in the form of my mother-in-law even i would get my mother back, so I wholeheartedly want her to come and stay with us not just trying to pity on her. but I have a dilemma now that how should i approach my wife and my father and convince them for accepting this idea and moving ahead with it.. I feel that this discussion is going to be very awkward.. so i really need some good guidance and suggestions to make this happen..to start with I was thinking to invite my mother-in-law to stay over at my place for couple of days on some festive occasion first, so that both my father and mother-in-law get some time to interact with each other and then slowly we take things forward but to be honest I don’t think this will honestly work as this might take very long time for a bonding to happen between them.. I just want to make it happen as quickly as possible so please help with some ideas and suggestions
Shelflife it's not bizarre at all.
The OP has explained that he is Indian and that in his culture they take responsibility for their eleders.
The OP seems to be a very kind, thoughtful person.
This is bizarre!
I don't think this is the right group for you. To westerners your idea seems to be bordering on obscene and insulting.
Why not search the w.w.web for an Asian group who would be better able to advise you?
Witzend
Another very long post with no paragraphs!
I don’t know about anybody else, but I really CBA to wade through it.
Same here. TLDR.
Agree, Witzend but I always feel vaguely guilty about it.
Another very long post with no paragraphs!
I don’t know about anybody else, but I really CBA to wade through it.
Bea65
How did your now lady wife ‘lovebombed you?’
I know someone who started the love-bombing at the man's first wife's funeral.
Readers - they married in a lovely, romantic ceremony (we were there) but, sadly, they have now separated. ☹
How did your now lady wife ‘lovebombed you?’
Message deleted by Gransnet. Here's a link to our Talk guidelines.
abhaydinkar thank you for clearing that up and you are right caring for your elders is done very differently in your own culture and again you are right it’s not a bad thing in fact it’s an admirable thing and something that has been lost in the Western society
We can only see it from our Western eyes and as an elderly person myself and living on my my own I would completely hate anyone to marry me off so that I m ‘looked after’ it would be my worst nightmare So we are coming at this from totally different perspective and we may not be much help to you in our advice
I think your idea of having you mum in law to stay over for a holiday and meet your father and see if they get on is the best way forward and also I think your idea of wanting to help is wonderful but it would NEVER EVER work in the Western culture so I m presuming you are living in Asia not Europe
Here’s some questions
Does your mother in law want to be ‘looked after’ ?
Does your father want a substitute for his wife ?
It would certainly be very neat for you and your wife to know they are both ok and under your care but is that what they both want ?
One of my close friends is from Madras but lived in UK for many many years she is divorced aged 76 with no children she lives alone is very very active has many friends and would be totally mortified if anyone tried to marry her off or feel sorry for her She is a very strong minded woman Could you encourage your Dad to be more outgoing now 3 years on from his bereavement Is marrying him off the only way to go ? Would he have no say in it ? Is it something he would want to contemplate?
Life isn’t always neat and tidy
I hope you find your answers you sound a good son
Aldom is correct, i am from india and i believe caring for our elders is not a bad thing
we have a widower living near us, after moving here this time last year, wife died suddenly four weeks later, when he was devastated and inconsolable, crying and saying how wonderful she was.
Six months later, he has joined everything there is to join, always out, always dresses dapper, well groomed, sociable, because, he is looking for another woman as he ‘shouldn’t be
on his own’ , preferably a rich widow, he is 86,
desperate to be fixed up, as he is apparently, still vigorous.
At what age do they settle down and behave, anyone know ?
When I say care for elderly relatives I mean in the sense that they take on responsibility for them.
I agree Blue Belle I think the poster is from a culture where the adult children care for their elderly relatives.
That was my feeling Aldom it sounds like it is much of a normal arrangement than it would be in this country
I don't think this is a wind up. I think the OP is from a different culture to the majority of us on here.
My advice is to invite the widowed parents to spend as much time as possible together at your home/family gatherings and let them make up their own minds. It may or may not happen that they decide to make a life together. Only they can decide. You sound like a very caring person. Try not to worry about it too much. Many of us cope very well as widows or widowers.
abhaydinkar
that's not the case as I mentioned my mother-in-law is not wealthy, she manages her expenses with the pension money. I am not sure how else to explain I am just trying to help her as marrying my father will make me her son legally so I can take good care of her and my wife doesn't need worry about her anymore and neither she doesn't need to keep going to her mother's place to see her if she is doing well or not.
You are not MILs legal son in the UK.
If MIL married your father, that would not make you her legal son.
Therefore her marriage to Dad creates zero financial advantage to you. Rather the opposite.
In UK, marriage automatically cancels any previous Will the spouses had. Both would be intestate, until they wrote new Wills. And a newly married person writing a new Will is likely to leave property /assets to their new spouse.
If they don't write new Wills on marriage then die, their assets would be distributed according to Intestacy rules which protect the surviving spouse.
As you've got a rich elderly widowed father, you should consider the financial loss to yourself if he marries again and younger wife outlives him,
Sorry but this does seem like a wind up
Are you from Asian descent ? because maybe arranged marriages which is what you’re trying to do are more familiar to you than to us
Ashcombe
I struggled with the lack of punctation. Sorry.
And lack of paragraphs.
Is this propsal incestuous?
Can't work it out.
Ok, i get perhaps what you are saying....My parents looked after their mothers togethers. My fathers mother did not want to be looked after in her in laws house, in which yard my father already built a second house, so she would be just with us but anyway. She said she cannot be looked in a house built on the property of her in laws. So my father bought a 4th house and she left her own house to be looked after and my poor mother was between 3 houses just to please the crazy old lot, looking after her own parents, managing her own old bungalo and then going to the 4th house to look after her mother in law. This is how we ended with 4 houses altogether. Now my brother bought a 5th house with a granny flat where he looks after my parents.
if the elderly care is your issue, you just take your mother in law as she is, provide her with a room and they live with you, your wife and father like a family , not necessarily like spouses.
Where I come from, we do it sometimes. If it is needed, we just do.
It would also make your wife your step-sister…
All you can do is invite both of them to family get togethers and leave them to it, either they have the attraction or they don’t.
If either think you are matchmaking it likely to have the opposite effect
that's not the case as I mentioned my mother-in-law is not wealthy, she manages her expenses with the pension money. I am not sure how else to explain I am just trying to help her as marrying my father will make me her son legally so I can take good care of her and my wife doesn't need worry about her anymore and neither she doesn't need to keep going to her mother's place to see her if she is doing well or not.
Age is irrelevant when it comes to people’s feelings. You cannot expect people to live with somebody else they don’t have feelings for just because it would be convenient. I think you have to ask yourself why would your apparently fit, financially independent mother in law give up the life she has, to look after an older, unwell man she doesn’t love?
Sago
I really hope this is a wind up n
Agree it sounds like it!
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