My MIL is a narcissistic drama queen. We moved across country to help manage her health care. Her medications were so out of whack that she was acting goofy and she was in the hospital every month for one illness or another. My husband has been taking the brunt of the work and has done an amazing job getting her back on track and keeping her out of the hospital. Last year, we realized that our marriage was suffering a lot due to the stresses that she put on him. She feigned illnesses and always found something "important" for him to do over at her house. We realized that she was creating drama and that helped us a bit with our approach to her. Since her illness, she has had to retire and doesn't have the social outlet she once had. She has no desire to get out of the house to do things other than shop for food on a RARE occasion. She over exaggerates her health issues and has now taken to making herself sick in order to go to the ER for attention. She is now taking advantage of my husband and trying to force him to manage her personal relationship with her abusive husband by saying that she was in the hospital because she was stressed out from her husbands abuses. When my husband attempted approach his dad, she got incredibly angry and said that she never told him to do that. My husband took her comment as a threat to her health. It's not my husband place and told her that he won't do it anymore. Now she is even MORE angry and has taken to hiding dr appts from him, adding medications without dr visits, not eating and then taking opiates. She has even taken to messing up her own medication dosage. This isn't the first time that she has taken advantage of a situation for her own personal attentions. She's manipulative and frustrating. When my husband tries to approach her and have an open and frank discussion with her, she tells him that she has some kind of illness that makes it so she can't handle stress, which includes having heart-to-heart conversations about relationships. When we DO try to talk to her, she zones out like a freakin' teenager! She has NO problem handling the stress that comes with traveling for a 2 week cruise! We are at our wits end trying to figure out how to talk to this woman. She can NEVER admit that she has done anything wrong. She falls into the "I'm the victim", but she has created the environment herself and refuses to see her part in it. How can we tell her that she's being horrible and that we know she's being manipulative? How can we tell her that she is ruining the last good relationship she has by being manipulative? How does one handle their sanity with a person who believes that they can do no wrong? MIL is 75.
she has some kind of illness....
Are you taking advantage of going to a support group?
If your in laws were able to be such vacationers, might they be in a position to pay for assisted living? No doubt they are completely against it, but if you cut back on solving their problems they will have to meet themselves and make some real decisions. It is a hair ripper though, my husband is very manipulative, threatening to call elder abuse whenever he is thwarted - wanting car keys when he uses a walker, etc. I lately offer to call for him which shuts that topic down. I hate reminding him that I am his last bastion before a nursing home; It is so tricky dealing with personality disordered people who are weakening with age. Maybe give your MIL a phone number of a handy man to call when she needs things done, or the number of her "real" son; (roar! my blood is beginning to boil.) Then step back and wait for the storm to pass. Easier said than done, I know.