How do I help my homeless mother?

hi there is anyway if some one can help me out with the situation that I am facing.
my mother is disabled with no income and I am the only one who helps her for everything. I pay rent bills and for food for both of us. but I just got married and my husband wants me to stay with him in his apartment which is totally understandable but I am scare if I leave my mother alone who will pay rent and bills and there is no one who can take care of her. eventually I have to leave her and wont be able to help her for long term because I'm pregnant and will get maternity leave soon. so I will not be able to help her financially. there is any government low who can help her out with this situation pay her rent and bills as she is old and disabled. her legal status is permanent residence but she has completed her 5 years in united states and going to get the citizenship soon. please guide

The person here I feel most sorry for, LoveMa, is the teenage girl. It is difficult to have divorced parents, to be from a "broken home." It is difficult to live with one parent and visit the other. And can you imagine what it would feel like to be told, "Sorry, you can't live with me any more," by your mother? You think it would be bad to push your mother out (and it would). And now you are dealing with a teenager who has been pushed out by her own mother. You should be able to relate to how bad that would feel.

And then this young lady moves in with her dad and is asked to share a 10' x 12' bedroom and a tiny closet with an elderly lady she is not related to and probably doesn't know. What are you thinking?

You now have two bedrooms and a storage room. You need three bedrooms. Make a project out of converting the storage room back into a bedroom. Housing his daughter has to come ahead of your husband having his own closet. I don't know what your yard is like or your climate, but perhaps a small storage shed would be helpful now. I assume your husband was paying child support and that he isn't now. Use that money to make your home welcoming to his daughter.

I understand why you want to keep Mom with you, and I hope that works out. You can't afford a studio apartment for her, but what can she afford? Doesn't she get SS? Have you looked into subsidized housing for her? There is often a waiting list for those apartments, so even if she qualifies and wants that kind of independence she may still be with your for months. It is important to get that storage room turned into a bedroom.

Anyone who marries a person with minor children, no matter what the circumstances are at the time of the marriage, should be prepared to have the children become a part of their household. It doesn't always happen, but it happens often enough to be a factor in the marriage decision.

This is a very difficult situation. But it can be resolved, and all four people can share the house and the love. It should not be either your mother or your stepdaughter. You need a solution that respects the needs of both of these loved ones.

My situation is a bit different. My mom helps, is loving and does not cause problems between my husband and I. Recently my step daughter (17) moved back in with us because her mom moved to her mother-in law's for economic reasons. We have a 3 tiny bedroom (about 10'x12 rooms) house with 3-4 foot wide closets, so my husband has his clothes in the spare room along with all other things that don't fit in out tiny room. I feel really bad for my mom because I feel we are pushing her out. Before my stepdaughter moved back in, mom was never home because she was taking care of my dying father and before that my sick niece. I felt I now wanted to take care of her, but I feel miserable, I can't make us all fit. I am not a rich person, or else I would get het a studio or something. At first I had asked my stepdaughter to share the room, but she refused. I am so heartbroken.

Homeless, you are obviously intelligent, educated, and articulate. That you have maintained your job while living in your car -- managed the laundry and hygiene issues and shown up presentable to work each day -- shows you are also resourceful. These are all attributes which should help you work your way out of your present predicament.

As many as 10 million families lost their homes to foreclosure during the housing crisis. Most of those families did not wind up living on the street. The one family I know scrambled when the foreclosure became a sure thing, and wound up moving directly into another house. I have a disabled friend who lives from hand to mouth and has horrible credit, but he has never been without a place to live.

How many places have you applied to rent? 3? 10? 100? It only takes one landlord wiling to rent to you, but it may take a big effort to find that one. Have you been saving money hand over fist while living in your car? Could you offer to pay several months rent in advance?

There are firms that help people with poor credit find apartments. There are many articles on the internet about ways to increase your chances. Instead of moaning about the state of family life, get busy and find a place to live.

When your adult children were living with you, were they paying rent? Wasn't that enough to avoid foreclosure? Perhaps, in hindsight, "doing and doing and doing" for one's children is not always the best way to raise them. As for blaming this site or others like it for your daughter's attitudes, do you really think that a few hours of reading the words of strangers can overcome years of upbringing? Who raised your son and daughter to take and not give back (if that is in fact what is happening)? Maybe some setting some boundaries would have been a good thing for you to do.

I hear you being very judgmental of your daughter. She must apologize before you'll reconcile. (Apologize for what? Not inviting you to live with her? Daring to suggest you need help with your mental health? Living her own life?) I think it would be a huge mistake to try to live together at this point. Get back on your feet financially. Get your affairs in order. And then work on repairing your relationship with your daughter, if that seems worthwhile. In an airplane you are told to put your own oxygen mask on first. I think that applies here, too. Help yourself first.

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Homeless - I see lots of red flags in your comments that would cause me to run if I were your daughter and I'm not trying to be mean. If you have poor credit and can't get a place to live - but have a job and money - look in the paper. In my early years I rented a room in a house - as long as I paid a deposit - credit was not so much an issue. Or work through your church, if you belong to one. You seem to think that your daughter is obligated to take you in. Obviously there are reasons she does not want to and you need to honor that. Good luck.

You also blame this site for your poor relationship with your daughter. It sounds like you are not looking at what behaviors might be driving your daughter away. This website HAS given people perspective. It has helped me set boundaries with my mom - who will steam roll right over me and guilt me about what a daughter "owes" her. She feels that I owe her over my husband and son. My mom never acknowledges that any of her behaviors could be driving us away - it is always someone else's fault. I see much of that in your responses.

Homeless, the examples you cite refer to one parent or grandparent. But for many of us, there are two or three parents in their 80's and 90's to care for. Our children have their own families, our daughters have full time jobs and they live in their own homes. Unlike years past, there's no large extended family to do care as a team....just one or two tired seniors paddling fast.

There's no Waltons happy ending with a couple of seniors with their own age related issues doing 24/7 hands on care for two or three elderly parents. Boundaries are necessary in some families to achieve a modicum of balance between our own responsibilities and those we take on to aid our parents.

HomelessMother, what happened to families? Many times in order to find employment and to succeed, one had to move to another location away from families. And to keep climbing the corporate ladder, that means another move to another city. My Dad did that, so did my husband.

Also within the past decade or so, women are now in the workforce, thus no one is home to take care of an elder, unless one resigns from their career. Or pay for outside help. And not everyone is cut out to be a caregiver, I wasn't so I concentrated on the logistical side of caregiving which in itself was overwhelming.

Plus our elders are living longer. During the time of the Walton's, someone in their 50's and 60's would had been considered very elderly, and modern science wasn't available, so more heart attacks, cancers, etc.

Now a days elders live into their 90's and 100's. My own parents were 95 and 98. I had to set boundaries, as my parents still viewed me as being in my 30's with a lot of energy, not someone in their 60's with my own age decline issues and major health issues. Without boundaries my parents would have outlived me.

Homeless Mother, sometimes apartment rentals or private room rentals, if someone has poor credit, the landlord might accept the person with a double security deposit. I did that with one couple who had filed with bankruptcy, they rented a house from me, as both had good jobs. It worked out well.

Put aside the grown children for now as they are adults. You need to look out for yourself at this point in time.

You talk about boundaries. What ever happened to family? What ever happened to multiple generations living together in one house, grandparents, their children, grandchildren. I do genealogy. That was the way that people used to do things. Some still do. I have a co-worker who moved with her whole family to a bigger house so that her parents could move in with them. Another co-worker moved back home with her mother because they were both having trouble with money. I have a cousin in Switzerland. Her grandmother's house burnt down. The grandmother moved in with my cousin and her sister. My cousin even gave her grandmother her room because it was on the first floor. Boundaries are not good for families. They separate people. But I guess that's an old-fashioned way to think of things.

Before you ask about her brother/sister. And this is the honest truth. He/she is going through a sex change right now. He/she doesn't want me there with him/her while it's going on because of the stress of his/her transition from male to female. And yes that IS the truth.

Have you ever gone through a foreclosure on your house? I did, the whole process. A Court judgement does not look good, at all, on your credit report. It not only trashes your credit score but it takes almost forever to get off of your report.
As for the back story, we have always had a good relationship. We always got along. In 2009 she moved to California. She liked it at first but got homesick and was going to come back. Then she met this guy who got her started smoking pot. She had never done anything like that, that I knew of anyway. And she changed, not for the better. She didn't want to come back anymore because of this guy. I thought "Oh well maybe it will wear off.". But it didn't. He moved in, no job and lived off of her for almost a year. He was from Arizona and had to go back for some reason. He didn't come back and it broke her heart. By then she was a habitual pot smoker and I think may have experimented with other things. And she didn't change back. She used to be very sweet but I don't see that very much any more. She had never had very much of a temper but now she does. I never know how she is going to be when I talk to her but I think that is the pot and/or whatever else she is doing. A friend of hers from here went to live out there and stayed with her at first. She texted me and told me that she was worried about my daughter, that she was different and not in a good way. Then my daughter was in a really bad bad car crash. Her back was broken in two places and she had seven broken ribs. She eventually lost one of her kidneys. She was totally out the first two weeks after the accident. They did that at the hospital because she would have been in so much pain. She doesn't even remember me being there. She left the hospital and I went and stayed with her for three weeks. In the hospital, I took care of her like a private nurse. I did at her home too. I did everything for her, like I have always done, because I love her because she is my daughter. I couldn't stay longer because I had left her brother, who was unemployed, with only a little bit of money, and I work at a school so I had to come back for that. She says I was only there for a couple of weeks, mainly because of her being out the first two weeks and then she was groggy the third week. I think that she has held it against me.
In order for her to not get hooked on pain meds, she has one of those medical cards and uses cannabis. I have never liked it but I read up on it and it does help with pain. So I haven't said anything. But she knows that I don't like it. That was one of her reasons for me not coming to live with her, I think the main one. Even though I have never said anything at all, she said that I would be judging her about using drugs. Which isn't true. And I tried to tell her that. It helps her so she needs it.
So I am just letting her go. It hurts me a lot but I am not going to bang my head against a brick wall and chase her around because she doesn't want me around. Even if it means that I am living in my car. But she will have to come to me and apologize. I may or may not take it her apology but we will just have to wait and see.
Is that enough of a back story?
And I haven't told friends and relatives because I have felt the change in people's attitudes when I go to look for somewhere to live and I am forced sometimes to tell them that I am homeless. I don't want to feel that from my family and friends.
And Blannie, if you have never had children, you can't understand. So why do you comment?

So Homeless Mother where are your friends? Are your children the only people you can depend on? Don't you have any other resources? I don't have children, but I'd never want to depend on my grown children, I'd look for other sources of support if I needed it - siblings or friends. Or a faith community or even a homeless shelter.

I have a feeling there's a backstory to your daughter's refusal to help you. It sounds like she's spent a lot of time trying to figure out your relationship and has set some boundaries with you. I doubt that was easy for her. Tell us more of the back story. Why was your credit wrecked, so that you are forced to live in your car? What choices have you made that have led you to this point? How do you want your daughter to be there for you?

I'm sorry but I am very bitter about this. I always told my children that if they ever needed me, that I would be there for them. And I always tried to be there for them. I always thought that they would be there for me. Apparently not.

Yes I did get in touch with Social Services. They won't/can't help me because I have an income that is over $40.00 a month. I will just keep looking. Maybe something will turn up.
My objection to the BPD "diagnosis" is that my daughter gave me several dozen reasons why she wouldn't help me. I countered every one. Her last reason was her "diagnosis". This from someone who dropped out of college at the end of her first year, really didn't even finish the year. She apparently read about the BPD in one of these blogs and "researched" it. I guess she decided that it fit me because she said that she loves me but I have to get help. She has no degree in anything, much less Psychology, nothing to support her "diagnosis". Just another excuse to turn her back on me.

Dear Homeless; You are clearly an intelligent and clear-sighted person.

Have you been in touch with social services to find you temporary housing?

There are folks with Borderline Personality Disorder who are able to lead relatively normal lives when they are compliant with meds and therapy. Without those, folks with BPD go haywire; there are difficulties with forming close relationships that come into play and interfere with day to day functioning.

I can tell that my daughter has read this because of the things that she has said to me. I have been living in my car since February. Money isn't the issue. I have a job and Social Security but I can't get a place to live because my credit is wrecked. I went through a foreclosure with the house that my daughter and son both lived in with me for almost twenty years. After years of doing and doing and doing for them, when things started going bad with the house, they both moved out. They had people to move in with. When I finally had to leave, I moved into my car.
I have read several of these"blogs" and all they are are selfish people encouraging others to be selfish. Loving and caring goes both ways. Mothers don't raise their children the best they can expecting their children to turn their backs on them when they need them the most. But then they find places like this on the Internet that encourage their children to stab them in the back, and "Oh, it's Mom's fault.".
I can't get a place to live because of my credit and I have no address. I don't know what I am going to do when it gets cold. And thanks to you people and what you encourage people to do, I can't go to my children. My daughter has even "researched" on the Internet and has given me a diagnosis of having Borderline Personality Disorder. I read about that in one of these "blogs", that that is what most homeless parents, especially mothers, have. She saw it and ran away with it.
I hope you are satisfied. You say about destroying relationship. You all have destroyed my relationship with my children, especially my daughter.

compassion - feeling or showing sympathy and concern for others.

I think we need to be compassionate/caring towards ourselves too. If caring for someone else affects us too negatively, we need to change what we are doing.

I see compassion on all that mimi tried to do for her mother - "we rescued them, let them stay with us, gave them money found new doctors, talked to social workers, filled out disability forms etc...." but her mother rejected all attempts to help her.

It sounds like mimi tried everything she could to help her mother, at the cost of her own health, but her mother did not cooperate at all. Finally mimi was worn out and had to attend to herself and her family. You need to care for yourself while caring for others. (((((((hugs)))))) mimi

What does it mean to be compassionate? There by the grace of God go I ...

I don't see any compassion here... There by the grace of God go I ...

I know this post is from three years ago but I wanted to say to JerseyBride that I have dealt with similar (and currently much worse) situations with my mother for the past 15 years and what I wish looking back on my life is that I had separated myself from her emotionally long along because now I am suffering my own emotional/mental crisis. This of course affects my family so essentially my mother's life problems has now claimed five victims not just one. I hope things have gotten better for you if not (as they never have for me) please try and remember your children and you come first. You are not responsible for your parents emotions and honestly if it has been going on as long as my situation I feel we are no longer responsible for them at all. Had that been the case all the other times we rescued them, let them stay with us, gave them money found new doctors, talked to social workers, filled out disability forms etc.... would have worked and life would be happy and perfect and not ended with her living in a shelter and me anxiety ridden in bed. So my advice for you...save yourself!

Captain, keep your mean comments to yourself. You make assumptions about someone you don't even know. This is a place for help and support, not a forum to judge others. You're lucky to have parents that you get along with and don't cause you heartache at every turn. Why are you even here? To spread hate? Keep your opinion to yourself.

is this what happens when the economy sh*ts the bed ? unemployed mothers get doors slammed in their faces . the mothers might be lying , thieving troublemakers OR those details might have been added to justify the lack of compassion on the part of the kids . at no point in my life would my mother have ever not been welcome to live with me and she was bipolar as a housecat . im sure it would have been burdensome for my family but thats just the way it would have had to be .
jersey,
hug those three pets for me while your tossing ice water on your mom thru the screen door .

My aunt was going to be evicted so my mother went and paid all expenses to move her to her house. She thought it was to be a temp. arrangement but it became permanent. My aunt received SS benefits but allowed the grand daughter to access her checking account every month leaving my aunt with no money. Not even money for food or medicines etc. I went to back to stop the practice but they were unable to do anything because my aunt would not cooperate with bank and close her checking account. this has gone on for years now my mom had to be put in a nursing home and my aunt has no place to go. Her family wouldn't come and get her. she is in a nursing home now recovery from a blood clot. I cant take her in one I am sick myself and wouldn't have the funds for another person. My aunt and mother are so stubborn that we couldn't do anything with them but all professional people kept saying they are not taking med. correctly etc. I was told my mom needed to be in a nursing home- she would fall and then she would go recover ask to go home and they made an assessment she could walk to the refrig. go to bathroom and get a drink of water and they would release her. take her the doc. for follow up visit and dr. wanted to know why is was allowed home. This is such a stressful way to live I almost do not know what to do!!!!!!! Drs. need to be more pro-active with diagnosis and put your loved ones where they know they will be safe instead throwing off onto the family. I have some strength in knowing I am not the only one going through this

Hi Zzzahkia. I grew up just like you. My mother and older brother are homeless and schitzoprenic. Unfortunately with schitzophrenia, paranoia accompanies their wild fantasies and delusions. You might be the best person to make decisions for you and them. You can't help anyone unless you help yourself first. Worry about you. Call 911 or an ambulance everytime they have an epside and tell the operator you need a mental health counselor to show up with the ambulance. If your mom is unwilling to seek help for herself and is a danger to you, herself or others, they will bring her to the hospital for psychiatric evaluation at the local hospital. Go down to the hospital with them. Tell the nurse that you understand HIPPA and that they can't tell you about your mom's condition, but that you're happy to explain what's going on if they'll listen. (They will listen.) Tell them, the doctor's anyone you can the whole truth, especially any paranoias or "trigger words". If you are lucky, they'll treat her and get her on medicine and help her get back on her feet with a place to live and treatment in a local respite home.Unfortunately, this is OUR lifelong struggle and I'm still battling this cycle today... You are not alone.

UPDATE: Well, she showed up on my door that night and stayed for 2 months. Now, I have a 6 week old and she did the same thing to me the week before she was born. She got a job as a live in caregiver for the mother of a friend and left my house in January. She came a week before my due date to help out and showed up being fired from her job and kicked out of her house for stealing things and opening a credit card in the old woman's name and not paying it. I refused to let her move in. She is living in hotels and staying at my house maybe one night a week when she runs out of money. She did get a job and found a place but with the money going to hotel rooms she cannot save anything. I have paid for her hotel rooms just to keep her out of my house. My husband and I want to be alone with our new baby.
Thanks for all of the advise and kind words, I just don't think I will ever get away from her.

Jersey Bride now Mom

tough love is the way to go, if it was me, I would not let her move in either, if there is a low rent housing area near by, try that and maybe pay her deposit if she does not have enough.

I am going through the same thing. I am only 16 and my mother is homeless. My older siblings won't let her stay with her. My mom by the way has schitzophrenia:(. How can I help?

You can help mom by not helping her. She needs tough love. Accepting any kind of shelter that has a roof over one's head so she is not out under a bridge or on the street should be a blessing. Beggars can not be choosy.

If you and mom are at each other's throats, can't stand it when she visits you, then having her move in with you will be World War III. You can love and help mom from a distance. If she is homeless and is picky where there is shelter then she will eventually learn her lesson. Do not make her move in with you. People can't come and live in your house without an invitation. Work on your relationship with your future husband if you plan on having a life together. If you neglect your relationship with your fiance, it will suffer. You already tried to have a relationship with mom but it is unsuccessful. People do not change and trying to change people is a full time job. If you change yourself and set boundaries and come up with your own rules then people will behave differently towards you.