Casting up

[zoob]

I hope not to have the casting up experience!
I have a friend who is a neighbour who helps me once a week with the housework. She started doing this about a year after I moved in with mum as her carer and I was having a hard time mentally and emotionally. She is a carer herself for her 40year old son. I don't find housework high on my list...can't help it...my mum never had housework high on her list.....some people are just like that. My friend is the opposite, Spick and Span Plus. She likes to help and I really appreciate her help. And it gets me moving knowing that she's coming in. Now it's quite normal for me (feeling better mentally and emotionally) to do most of it before she gets here (wouldn't want to take the ****) Then we finish up together, have a natter about our caring experiences of the week, how we're all feeling and I think we have a nice, mutually supportive relationship. If she turned round and threw in my face 'how much she'd done for me' I'd be shocked and know I'd missed something. Either there was a condition attached that I wasn't aware of.....or that I was taking the ****...Either way, I'd want to talk to her and find out the cause of the upset. And try and sort it out. After all, sometimes we don't realise when we're taking people for granted because we're just doing our lives in the way we think best, and it's hard to know what's in someone's head who's trying to help us. I hope you sort it out worriedson or, if you're anything like me, the house would look neglected!

 

[worriedson1]

I'm glad I'm not the only one who didn't know the expression. I googled it and found that it is an expression mainly used in Scotland. I'm a southerner so I guess it hasn't travelled down here.

Worriedson1, it seems to me that it is difficult for us to understand what might have caused the person to say what she did without knowing what the argument was about. It sounds as if the helper was angry about something else then used the "after all I've done" line in the heat of the argument.

I have certainly been in situations when two people have had completely opposite interpretations of the same events. For example, when I got engaged, it unfortunately co-incided with the time when the girl I shared an office with had just had a very painful break-up with the man she thought she was going to marry. (Everyone else could tell that was never going to happen, but that's another story.) I was very aware that my news would be "rubbing salt into the wounds" for her, and after the initial announcement, I was very careful never to bring up the subject of my forthcoming wedding. However, I couldn't stop other people asking me about it so inevitably she did sometimes hear conversations about it. One day she accused me of continuously going on about my wedding to deliberately upset her. I had definitely not done that, but clearly for her any mention of it by anyone was too much, and my replying to someone else's question counted as me "continuously going on about it". She was not aware of the many times I had wanted to make some reference to it and had not done so, to spare her feelings.

It may be that while from your point of view you have continually thanked the helper, they haven't noticed all the praise and don't feel they have been thanked enough. However, when people are angry and having an argument all kinds of things are said which are not really meant or not really true, so that may be what happened here too.

" they haven't noticed all the praise and don't feel they have been thanked enough. "

UTTERLY IMPOSSIBLE I CAN ASSURE YOU.

 

[worriedson1]

AGAIN..

My friend who is irish and i told him about it and other stuff was quite frankly disgusted as he said in ireland if anything happens its a case of his relatives saying pretty much of "No Questions asked, All hands on deck, we are famly and we are here to HELP you".

 

[FifiMo]

Your Irish friend is right so far as family are concerned but in this case the woman isn't family and I think that is the subtle difference here. Sure she helped you out and you appreciated this and told her so. What she probably wanted was for you not to start depending on this help and for it to remain within her gift/control to decide when she would do something or how often. In her mind there is a big difference between her giving help voluntarily and you being able to ask for it. As long as things were on her terms it was fine. Not that you asked her to do anything but that is what she perceives is the case.

It is not.A nice feeling when you find that something which you thought was being done out of the goodness of her own heart turns out to have strings attached to the extent that you don't therefore know what the ground rules are! Maybe the answer to all of this is to thank her for her help one final time but explain that things have moved on since then and that you now have carers involved and someone to do some cleaning and that her help is no longer required as everything's is now covered. Then leave things at that position.

Fiona
Xx

 

[lallstom]

Hi
I have the opposite problem . Mother in CH for 1 month now. A 'friend' of hers she has not seen for over 5 yrs resurfaces and visits every day.Takes in food toiletries etc, cries with her cos she is there etc. I hardly know this woman. I visit 2/3 times a week. Wish she would go, don't understand what she is doing.

 

[Miss Merlot]

I think this might be a somewhat idealised view of Ireland somehow...

AGAIN..

My friend who is irish and i told him about it and other stuff was quite frankly disgusted as he said in ireland if anything happens its a case of his relatives saying pretty much of "No Questions asked, All hands on deck, we are famly and we are here to HELP you".

 

[Jessbow]

Are you in Ireland then, Worried son, and is this person family? if the answer to either is 'no' then I am not sure what you mean.

My guess is that you have offended him/her in some way, and he/she has withdrawn their support.You probably don even realise you have.

Time is probably the best healer.

It might help if you could really explain what actually happened, and we can perhaps offer more heelpful suggestions

 

[Navara]

What I think is this.

At the end of the day, the only people you can REALLY rely on are family.

It always gets to be too much for friends and neighbours in the end, so its better not to get them involved and avoid the hurt.

We watched as our mother's so called friends and neighbours gradually started avoiding her, making excuses for not dropping in, crossing over as she approached, not picking up the phone when she rang etc etc. As family, lets be truthful, you often feel like doing the same, but you just don't - because you're family. That's all there is to it.

 

[nita]

I think it depends how much she does and whether she really expects payment for it. Perhaps if she is doing it out of friendship, you could give her the occasional present of chocolates or flowers to show your appreciation in a tangible way. Maybe it's getting too much for her; does your mother need more doing for her now? - you need to talk to her about it.

 

[Dazmum]

Isn't this lady a neighbour though, and not family? Did she offer to help you or as a home help, is she paid? It's a tricky situation. When she said, 'look at all I do for you' did you get the idea she wanted something, ie. a token payment or the occasional bunch of flowers or bottle of wine? It's hard to know how people's minds work isn't it?

Oops, I see I've cross posted with Nita who has the same idea

A friend of mine was letting neighbour's dogs out at lunchtimes, the woman (unlike you) rarely thanked my friend and in all the time she did it, and I'm quoting my friend 'never once did she even give us a bottle of wine of a box of chocolates', it's only a little token but for my friend would have made all the difference to how she felt. Just a different and female D) viewpoint.

 

[Shash7677]

From previous posts the person is a neighbour, they work/worked as a home help but not a home help for worried sons mum, does that make sense?

Sorry if I've got that wrong worried son, you seem to have gone quiet.

 

[Navara]

The other thing you need to watch, I think, is when a neighbour is around the same age as your relative. They may start off with good intentions feeling able to help out, but then as they get older too they can start to feel overwhelmed.

I've seen this happen in my neighbourhood - and it predictably ended first with the neighbour feeling put upon "don't you think THEY (the family) would realise I'm getting too old for all this" and then the family feeling peeved "well she only had to say if she didn't want to do it any more, we never asked her to start helping" etc etc etc.

Bring on the BIG society hey!

 

[worriedson1]

................................

 

[worriedson1]

From previous posts the person is a neighbour, they work/worked as a home help but not a home help for worried sons mum, does that make sense?

Sorry if I've got that wrong worried son, you seem to have gone quiet.

Sorry was busy there.

YOU ARE RIGHT.


There is a reason she said that but its an immnensely long, emotional draining story. She said itas part of a long heated discussion we had in a pub.

You help someone, it's out the pure goodness of your heart, you dont throw it back in peoples face, it sadly has tanited all the good she did, sad really..

 

[garnuft]

She's given you the length of her tongue then?
She's been helping you, without payment and she's become fed up of being taken for granted?

Unfortunately, if you get the mickey taken out of you, you DO throw it back in someone's face.
We are all only human.

What I would do is buy her a bunch of flowers and apologise for making her feel this way.
Swallowing my own ego on the way.

 

[worriedson1]

She's given you the length of her tongue then?
She's been helping you, without payment and she's become fed up of being taken for granted?

Unfortunately, if you get the mickey taken out of you, you DO throw it back in someone's face.
We are all only human.

What I would do is buy her a bunch of flowers and apologise for making her feel this way.
Swallowing my own ego on the way.

SHE WAS NOT TAKEN FOR GRANTED NOR TAKEN THE MICKEY OUT OF

Mum and i constantly thanked her and said how much we appreciated her.

 

[garnuft]

She said itas part of a long heated discussion we had in a pub.

I think there's a chance she's upset.

 

[worriedson1]

I think there's a chance she's upset.

Yes thanks to her boyfriend and i was not standing for it when he said i expcted her to look after my mum when i was out having drinks in edinburgh with a friend ,that was the main body of the conversation. Her Bf was talking BS btw and i should know..

That's the gist of it.

I quite honestly cannot be bothered typing out the full drawn out story, i sent her a text saying i would be in edinburgh and was just to let her know my mum was in the house herself. Just to give her that knowledge and nothing, NOTHING more. I was being a responsible son and proud of it.

I never asked her to pop in, i never implied it, i never expected it.

The Advice i got was on here..

 

[zoob]

Sometimes you just can't win.

 

[Shash7677]

I think, think and you're allowed to tell me to sod off I won't be offended, that your neighbour maybe feels obliged to check on your mum, especially if you've left her for a night/weekend (you didn't say how long you were away for).

Previously when you've been away she's checked on mum hasn't she and said that maybe mum shouldn't be being left but this was prior to mum having carers in (of memory serves me correct).

If it were me I would feel it necessary to check on your mum knowing she was going to be on her own for a long period of time. Not being critical of you and everyone deserves a break but its not the first time you've left mum so maybe she was just ticked off and thinking here we go again.

Would the care company you use provide extra carers if you are away again? It may be worth asking them. It does sound like your neighbour sounds like she feels put upon also a conversation in a pub over a few drinks never ends well in my experience.

Speak to her and her boyfriend and clear the air, explain calmly that you didn't expect anything from her when you went away and you're sorry if she felt that you were. As others have said a bottle of wine as a peace offering may not go amiss, however much it may peeve you to give it to her ;-)

Take care
Sharon