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Living with mother

In Michele Hanson’s bittersweet Guardian column she describes life with her ailing mother. Tragic and comic, the frail yet brave old lady exercises a power over the three generations who share the same home. These extracts from Living with Mother, a collection of her columns, provide poignant glimpses of life in her dysfunctional household

Moving

My mother is in turmoil. She must make a horrid decision and she can't. Shall she move in here with us or shall she stay in her own lovely flat in Hove? There things are all on one level. She has two lavatories, one bidet, comfortable chairs, peace and quiet and tidiness. But she cannot spend the nights alone. All sorts of dreadful things may happen: angina, heart attacks, robbers, vertigo, nightmares, insomnia, loneliness or sudden death. These are the things she lies sweating and expecting when she sleeps alone.

But in our house she is safe. I am on hand to summon the doctor or ambulance. Unfortunately, our home is dreadful. It is full of mountainous stairs, mess, dribbling barking dog, noise, rows and the screaming daughter and granddaughter.

And the sofa is too low, the chairs too narrow, the stairs too many and too steep, the meals too late, the tea too weak, the whole place too messy and the gardener and visitors irritating.

It's only a pretend choice anyway. She doesn't really have one, which throws her into a fury. She must come and live here with us in Hell. It is at least entertaining. She tries to be positive about it. And we have better services up here in town: the doctors, the dentist, the hospital and the social workers are charming. Down in Hove they tend to be curt, surly and always in a hurry, perhaps because of the glut of elderly people down there. And the social club up here is superior. There is bridge, dancing, bargain hairdressing, and the lunches are divine. Her friend there, Esther, asks her a difficult question over lunch.

"Tell me, Clarice," she says, looking rather anxious, "you're living with your daughter. What's it like? Because I might have to do it."

"I told her," says my mother, tactful as ever, "that you do things your way and I mustn't interfere. That's the way you run your life."

This must be an edited version. But what will Esther do? What will several million other Aged Ps do but have to leave their homes and live with their children, or watch their life's savings evaporate paying for residential care?

A dreaded thought. We cannot bear my mother to do it. She does not want to end up sitting in a dull semi-circle of brown or green armchairs watching the telly. At least most people in our house can walk about. If we all try to scream less, put in an outside lavatory, train the dog not to dribble and bark, make nice strong tea and early dinners, things would improve no end.

Meanwhile, my friend Rosemary’s mother is rather envious of my mother. She longs to move into her daughter's home. But Rosemary has the poorly husband to look after, and two children and a cat and a full-time, gruelling job. This is not an easy time of life. Rosemary and I are beginning to long for retirement, when we too will be able to sit about reading large biographies. I shall send my mother over on Sunday to give Rosemary's mother the lowdown on life with a daughter, her adolescent child, dog, paramour and messy house. It will be a realistic picture. My mother is not one for toning things down. She tends to speak frankly. She has herself considered sheltered accommodation, but even for that one has to pay through the nose.

"I might as well be miserable here," says my mother sensibly.

Extravagance

Now that my mother lives on the premises she is able to observe the details of our life – a shocking thing to watch when one is 89. She is horrified by our expenditure. I have taken to lying about the cost of everything. I halve it. My mother is still outraged. There she is busy saving paper bags, Christmas cards and bits of string, then out I go and fritter money on a ready-made, steamed syrup pudding.

"How much was that?" she snaps, astounded by the price. "What did you do that for?" she roars. "I can make one." She stamps off to the kitchen and whips one up for tuppence.
We now buy no shop cakes or biscuits. We save egg boxes, jam jars, used stamps and old sheets. We darn clothes, re-use tea bags and save rainwater. The house is filling with ancient scraps and rags. And we are not allowed to waste a crumb of food.

"It's from living through the war," explains Rosemary. She has a touch of it herself, often running about the house turning the lights out after everyone.

"Blackout, blackout," shouts her son in a mocking way. Soon my mother will be issuing ration books to curb our profligate lifestyle. Microwave dinners, bought puddings and oven chips will be strictly limited.

My cousin in the North is under similar constraints. Her mother (my auntie) also moans on about cost. Like me, cousin lies and halves the cost of everything. Only last week she bought Auntie some smoked salmon for a treat. Auntie commands her to shop around, but what with a full-time job and everybody's shopping to do, she hasn't the time, so as usual she halved the price.

Naturally Auntie was thrilled with the price of the salmon. She thought it such a bargain that she gave it to the cleaning lady for a present. Cousin was furious. She now has to go shopping for more salmon and tell more lies. She and I are both enmeshed in a web of deceit.

And of course I have lied like billy-oh about the stairlift. It arrived today, three hours late. My mother lies in bed glaring at the installers. She has never wanted it. "I'm not a cripple," she has shouted repeatedly. "It's a bloody waste of money."

I remind her that this is a recycled stairlift, second-hand, and the minute she drops dead (we have given up on euphemisms), we will sell it and get our money back. This makes her feel better. She stops snarling at the installers. For hours they fiddle about on the stairs and I must leave them there and go to work. They are under oath not to mention cost.

But I forget my keys. What luck that my mother can now answer the door. I look through the letterbox. There she is sailing downstairs on her lift. "Ground floor, men's wear, ladies' shoes, lighting," she calls out gaily over the grinding roar of the machinery. We are thrilled to bits, even though the lift resembles a sliding plastic lavatory and does nothing for our hallway.

My mother swans up to the lavatory on it, down again to make marmalade, up again for a rest, and down again for Coronation Street. She even stops mentioning the price. Encouraged by this development Rosemary and I take her to Marks & Spencer for a new nightie. Every nightie is pink or cream. My mother is sickened. "I'll look like an old woman," she shouts. She had hoped for something more dashing – in bold colours and patterns and no teeny pink flowers.

I buy myself a brassiere and halve the price. The woman behind us in the queue hears Rosemary and I discussing my mother's attitude to spending. She joins in. Her mother will buy nothing new and lives in worn and tattered rags. "I'll make do," says the mother heroically. “This will last me out.”

Obviously my mother is a spendthrift.

Click here for part two of this story

This article was created: 18 October 2006.
This article was last edited: 15 February 2007.

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