DEAR AMY: I have a dilemma which is common for my fellow baby boomers.
My mother married young and had five children.
Mom is now almost 90, the “kids” are senior citizens, and even the grandkids are mostly in their 30s.
Nobody wants the “stuff,” like Grandma’s china, that ended up in my garage with Mom’s move to assisted living.
I want my garage back!
I try talking to Mom about donating the unwanted stuff, but her response is that if I want to get rid of anything I should give it back to her, which is impossible.
She is in the early stages of dementia, and can’t really think practically anymore. Can I just go ahead and donate, without talking to her about it?
If I had the space, I could just keep it in boxes until she passes, but I don’t.
What’s the “right” way to handle this? The five of us “kids” have a hard enough time navigating her decline as a team, without this added tension around Nana’s china.
– Tired Boomer
DEAR TIRED: Many people who might have used family things to furnish their own homes (if they had inherited in their 20′s or 30′s), are trying to cope with heirlooms when they are currently trying to downsize.
You are faced with an ethical dilemma because you’d like to start the process against your mother’s stated wishes (an understandable choice on your part). I think you’d ultimately feel best if you adhered to her wishes, despite her dementia.
This is where a storage unit comes in.
It would be a good idea for you to get “the team” together to go through and transfer things to a nearby storage unit. Devote a weekend to this task.
The process of doing this as a group before your mother’s death would be very different than after her passing – when you will be stressed and grieving.
Doing this now will revive a lot of memories (which you can share with your mother – and each other).
During the transfer you can as a group organize and label things, and perhaps start the dispersal process (with siblings taking some things home) and store the rest until after your mother’s passing.
(You can email Amy Dickinson at askamy@amydickinson.com or send a letter to Ask Amy, P.O. Box 194, Freeville, NY 13068. You can also follow her on Twitter @askingamy or Facebook.)
