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Life update for the past two years
2 years ago
Commissions link; https://www.furaffinity.net/journal/10645175/
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Right, long time followers might have noticed a drop in commissions, personal art, and a general mood as well. Truth be told, it hasn't been all that great. The following is a long read and fairly personal, so fair warning if you're just here for fanservice.
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Right, I think it's time I talk about what the f@#$ has been going on over here. I"ve kinda skimmed details in the past at my mom's request, but I think that since were moving, it's free game. (Warning, this is a wall of text...)
So for the past two years I moved into my grandma's place. I did this to assist my own mother in taking care of my grandmother. When this started, grandma was in the middle of trying to divorce from an awful man who abused church influence and tried to rob her via inheritance legal bullcrap. (For the record, my mom also survived a divorce from someone money-focused who also abused his standing in the church for personal gain, so this assistance had some personal motivation behind it) The process almost took the entire first year of my stay, with the divorce being finalized at the end of May, right before grandma's 90th bday.
During this time however, there was some severe contention about inheritances. Specifically about who would get the house. My mother is the youngest of 6 children, and the prime candidates for the house were the oldest of the 6, and the one boy out of the 6, whom I will simply refer to Aunt and Uncle so as to not use names. My aunt is well versed in legal jargon and presents herself as the authority on anything she's involved with. My uncle is a blue-collar playboy personality who clearly wasn't told no as a child. Both seem to have loved money more than family from my perspective, and both had a split "Power of attorney" between medical, and financial.
From the start, we were told not to "move in," as Jerry said the house was his, the only merit to his claim was an undocumented statement of Grandpa on his death bed, saying the house was all his, with no witnesses present. He made it abundantly clear that we were only permitted to live there because grandma invited us, and once she was gone, so were we. He pressured us at every opportunity to get on waiting lists for housing to get us to move out sooner if possible.
Our tasks were to make sure grandma was well taken care of. Mom attended to her 24/7, giving assigned medication, helping her in the bathroom, etc. I did all the cooking, various yardworks, and whatever else was needed at the moment.
Oh, and we were required to pay rent, on top of all this service. $750 a mo. for my mother, and $300 a mo. for me. Mine was lower because I also now bought all the groceries and supplies for the entire household, some months racking up to $1200 in grocery bills.
It should be noted that, while we had basic utilities, and some decent wifi, the house was old. Like earlier than the 1950's. Beams were bent, lineolium was stained, and some of the sinks had black something-or-other in them. We were meant to keep the entire house as clean as we could, but all of our stuff for me, my mother, and my sister, were restricted to two small bedrooms, about 12 x 14 ft each. My mother had just come from a rented out basement flat. She had furniture and storage boxes, there was no way all of it would fit in those dinky rooms, so she rented out one of those storage units, which also ran another $200 a month on top of everything else.
One additional thing about the house; there were security cameras installed. They were allegedly put there to make sure grandma could be monitored should anything happen to her under her ex's watch, but by the time we got there, they were never removed, and are still there today. Neither we, nor grandma can access the footage on those cameras, but my aunt and uncle can. It made my mom paranoid about making plans or even talking out loud, which easily made heated situations more aggravated and contentious, especially when she did blurt out plans, only to have my aunt or uncle conveniently stop by for a visit just as we were about to leave. This was troubling because it's become apparent that my uncle has taken an interest in some of my mom's stuff, wanting to use it for his own purposes, or sell it. Constant comments about how my mom is a hoarder and how she should let him organize a garage sale were pretty common at the start.
Throughout the first year we dealt with all sorts of disagreements. My aunt would forbid grandma getting any type of Covid-19 shot, present my mother with several questionable "documents" she insisted on having her sign (which she didn't thankfully) and pressured my mother to leave the house to pursue finding a job, on top of her care of my grandma. My uncle would often arrive unannounced to do anything from just visiting, to installing upgrades to "his" house, looking through any stuff of ours that wasn't in our assigned rooms, and constantly make dark jokes to my grandma about death. Jokes such as;
-(While taking her to a funeral) "Now remember, this is rehersal right?"
-(grandma coughs once) "Oh! Should I call the morgue?"
During this first year, grandma also had two strokes and a TIA. The first time my mother called an ambulance, only to be reprimanded from my uncle for not calling him first. The second stroke they were a little more accepting of the ambulance. Soon after my grandma was diagnosed with alzheimers, but being the firecracker she is, she would insist that she doesn't have alzheimers and get mad at anyone who said otherwise. This became especially problematic when she wanted to drive or go anywhere. One time she lost her car keys and my uncle made the suggestion that my mother stole the keys. My grandma never let go of that claim even after the keys were found behind the bed.
Eventually we managed to get grandma alive and well to her 90th birthday, and while celebrated, the following year would prove when other family members expected to throw in the towel and consider their contributions to be done. We had hoped to finally have some time off to address some much needed surgery for my mother. Namely a knee joint that had a whopping 5 bone spurs, and a "Baker's Cyst" in one of her legs. But no one was willing to spare any time sufficient for this.
Grandma's medical situation worsened, mainly with her anger regarding appointments, not remembering events, and not having more energy. She started demanding more caffeine via coke and dietary pills. Thing is, if you're on blood thinners, you should NOT be having caffeine, yet she raises all hell should you refuse her, and of course my aunt and uncle have no concerns whatsoever. On that note, regarding medical appointments, it would be assumed that entrusting medical appointment dates and information should be given to the person who DOESN'T have alzheimers, right? And yet, every medical date, every change in perscription, every important fact was relayed to my grandma; the one most likely to forget that information. Yet another gesture to show how unwelcome we were.
This all continued throught the year, increasing in degrees in antagonizing my mother until recently, when to say frankly, we finally found some alternative housing. However we had assumed my aunt and uncle were all too eager to pick us out asap. Now they're wanting time to sort something out, and their plan is merely to have relatives go on rotation. Already my aunt has bailed on one of the rotations, and it's become clear that they don't want to be locked into an obligation to their own mother, since she's still alive and kicking. So while were in the home stretch, this might be the month, or even the week, when the worst of it all comes crashing down. I"m jsut hoping my mom's sanity survives all this.
-
Right, long time followers might have noticed a drop in commissions, personal art, and a general mood as well. Truth be told, it hasn't been all that great. The following is a long read and fairly personal, so fair warning if you're just here for fanservice.
-
Right, I think it's time I talk about what the f@#$ has been going on over here. I"ve kinda skimmed details in the past at my mom's request, but I think that since were moving, it's free game. (Warning, this is a wall of text...)
So for the past two years I moved into my grandma's place. I did this to assist my own mother in taking care of my grandmother. When this started, grandma was in the middle of trying to divorce from an awful man who abused church influence and tried to rob her via inheritance legal bullcrap. (For the record, my mom also survived a divorce from someone money-focused who also abused his standing in the church for personal gain, so this assistance had some personal motivation behind it) The process almost took the entire first year of my stay, with the divorce being finalized at the end of May, right before grandma's 90th bday.
During this time however, there was some severe contention about inheritances. Specifically about who would get the house. My mother is the youngest of 6 children, and the prime candidates for the house were the oldest of the 6, and the one boy out of the 6, whom I will simply refer to Aunt and Uncle so as to not use names. My aunt is well versed in legal jargon and presents herself as the authority on anything she's involved with. My uncle is a blue-collar playboy personality who clearly wasn't told no as a child. Both seem to have loved money more than family from my perspective, and both had a split "Power of attorney" between medical, and financial.
From the start, we were told not to "move in," as Jerry said the house was his, the only merit to his claim was an undocumented statement of Grandpa on his death bed, saying the house was all his, with no witnesses present. He made it abundantly clear that we were only permitted to live there because grandma invited us, and once she was gone, so were we. He pressured us at every opportunity to get on waiting lists for housing to get us to move out sooner if possible.
Our tasks were to make sure grandma was well taken care of. Mom attended to her 24/7, giving assigned medication, helping her in the bathroom, etc. I did all the cooking, various yardworks, and whatever else was needed at the moment.
Oh, and we were required to pay rent, on top of all this service. $750 a mo. for my mother, and $300 a mo. for me. Mine was lower because I also now bought all the groceries and supplies for the entire household, some months racking up to $1200 in grocery bills.
It should be noted that, while we had basic utilities, and some decent wifi, the house was old. Like earlier than the 1950's. Beams were bent, lineolium was stained, and some of the sinks had black something-or-other in them. We were meant to keep the entire house as clean as we could, but all of our stuff for me, my mother, and my sister, were restricted to two small bedrooms, about 12 x 14 ft each. My mother had just come from a rented out basement flat. She had furniture and storage boxes, there was no way all of it would fit in those dinky rooms, so she rented out one of those storage units, which also ran another $200 a month on top of everything else.
One additional thing about the house; there were security cameras installed. They were allegedly put there to make sure grandma could be monitored should anything happen to her under her ex's watch, but by the time we got there, they were never removed, and are still there today. Neither we, nor grandma can access the footage on those cameras, but my aunt and uncle can. It made my mom paranoid about making plans or even talking out loud, which easily made heated situations more aggravated and contentious, especially when she did blurt out plans, only to have my aunt or uncle conveniently stop by for a visit just as we were about to leave. This was troubling because it's become apparent that my uncle has taken an interest in some of my mom's stuff, wanting to use it for his own purposes, or sell it. Constant comments about how my mom is a hoarder and how she should let him organize a garage sale were pretty common at the start.
Throughout the first year we dealt with all sorts of disagreements. My aunt would forbid grandma getting any type of Covid-19 shot, present my mother with several questionable "documents" she insisted on having her sign (which she didn't thankfully) and pressured my mother to leave the house to pursue finding a job, on top of her care of my grandma. My uncle would often arrive unannounced to do anything from just visiting, to installing upgrades to "his" house, looking through any stuff of ours that wasn't in our assigned rooms, and constantly make dark jokes to my grandma about death. Jokes such as;
-(While taking her to a funeral) "Now remember, this is rehersal right?"
-(grandma coughs once) "Oh! Should I call the morgue?"
During this first year, grandma also had two strokes and a TIA. The first time my mother called an ambulance, only to be reprimanded from my uncle for not calling him first. The second stroke they were a little more accepting of the ambulance. Soon after my grandma was diagnosed with alzheimers, but being the firecracker she is, she would insist that she doesn't have alzheimers and get mad at anyone who said otherwise. This became especially problematic when she wanted to drive or go anywhere. One time she lost her car keys and my uncle made the suggestion that my mother stole the keys. My grandma never let go of that claim even after the keys were found behind the bed.
Eventually we managed to get grandma alive and well to her 90th birthday, and while celebrated, the following year would prove when other family members expected to throw in the towel and consider their contributions to be done. We had hoped to finally have some time off to address some much needed surgery for my mother. Namely a knee joint that had a whopping 5 bone spurs, and a "Baker's Cyst" in one of her legs. But no one was willing to spare any time sufficient for this.
Grandma's medical situation worsened, mainly with her anger regarding appointments, not remembering events, and not having more energy. She started demanding more caffeine via coke and dietary pills. Thing is, if you're on blood thinners, you should NOT be having caffeine, yet she raises all hell should you refuse her, and of course my aunt and uncle have no concerns whatsoever. On that note, regarding medical appointments, it would be assumed that entrusting medical appointment dates and information should be given to the person who DOESN'T have alzheimers, right? And yet, every medical date, every change in perscription, every important fact was relayed to my grandma; the one most likely to forget that information. Yet another gesture to show how unwelcome we were.
This all continued throught the year, increasing in degrees in antagonizing my mother until recently, when to say frankly, we finally found some alternative housing. However we had assumed my aunt and uncle were all too eager to pick us out asap. Now they're wanting time to sort something out, and their plan is merely to have relatives go on rotation. Already my aunt has bailed on one of the rotations, and it's become clear that they don't want to be locked into an obligation to their own mother, since she's still alive and kicking. So while were in the home stretch, this might be the month, or even the week, when the worst of it all comes crashing down. I"m jsut hoping my mom's sanity survives all this.
Stay strong as you can. *Winghugs*
regarding your absolute [ahem] of an uncle, i have nothing for that, except get everything important in writing. take notes about what they've been doing. it could be useful later on down the road.
other than that, my deepest condolences to you and your family. a family member suffering is never pretty, especially when there's valuable assets involved. hopefully it gets resolved in your favor
Another friend had the Barbie doll collection (originals going back to 1959 first issue) sold at a garage sale just so she could not inherit them.
Either your grandmother needs to see an attorney immediately and set up a new will, or your uncle/aunt will get everything. Tell the attorney about the voyeurism cameras.
My wife, unbeknownst to me, went with her sister to draw up a will as she was dieing of cancer. made up a will that handed her jewelry (that I spent my life savings on) to her sister.
Please take care man