I am with Pam. You have FAR too much going on to have houseguests and plan meals for someone not in the family. Yes, ideally it would be good to get to know her a little, but yikes he picked a crazy time. Wash, rinse, repeat, and do not help with logistics of any kind. If he is incapable of figuring it out, making arrangements, and having her at a hotel, coming to get him, etc. then she is going to figure that out. If he manages it, then so be it, and she can also figure it out. She is a grown woman, and it is not good for either of them to think they are going to have this romantic thing and then assume that like 14 year old teenagers, "mom" is going to take them to the mall and roller skating. This is how it worked out with my own mil who had long ago fiance' whom she ended up not marrying try to reconnect with her. We knew all it would mean is WE would end up care giving for one more senior citizen, and have enough managing two elderly mothers without that. We could only take so much stress, and then BAM, hit the wall with force. So Mark told her if she wanted to buy a plane ticket, figure out how to get to the airport (nearest one is 1.5 hrs each way and she can't drive it, doesn't know the way), and go see him, figure out her health care while there, and the whole 9 yards, be our guest, and the same went for if he came up here. There isn't even a motel within 13 miles of her home, and no taxis out here. Neither one of them understands uber, so it just nipped it in the bud. Without significant help from us, it never happened. They have a nice email and phone call relationship for. I did not facilitate logistics for my non-adult children when they had crushes. Not doing it for medically fragile elderly thus placing immense burden on me while already under such stress as a care taker. Now if he chooses to move there, and the girlfriend can work out the details (again I would not be willing to lift a finger on that), you can't stop it unless he is declared mentally incompetent and you are given conservatorship. You don't have to facilitate it either.

He is really adorable!

OP, I think you do need to find a job just for you to have money you can put away, and a break from this mess. Your husband is horribly disrespectful, and in my experience with friends whose husbands acted similarly and had the inlaws backing their sons' bad attitudes, it did NOT end well. In all three situations, the husbands blind sided their wives with divorce papers. None were prepared. Having a job gives you time away from all of them and a financial way forward. I can tell you that in my state, you would not get anything. Those family farm situations are sacrosanct and usually tied up in such a nice, neat legal bow that it is never an asset split in divorce. So for your own sake, please begin looking for employment. Get your own bank account and do NOT put his name on it, make your bank password something he can't guess and keep it well hidden. When eligible, get a bank issued credit card, use it once or twice a month for small purchases, and pay off promptly so you can begin building a credit score. The other thing about having that job is you have an outlet and can begin building some confidence. You may make friends through co-workers. You need to separate your identity from him and his family. It doesn't matter if this job is something in your field or the basis of a career. You can change jobs in the future. As for him, I would end all the wifey poo niceties. He treats you like crap, so I would begin treating him like a bad roommate. No cooking for him, no doing laundry for him, no sleeping with him in both the literal and non literal sense, no favors. Be cordial, but never open, and don't engage in conversation. If you absolutely have to go on the family vacation (you could easily get out of that though if you get a job right away because it won't come with vacation time to start), take some books, supervise your own kids, but do not get involved with him and his folks. Again, cordial, but formally aloof. You need to create a wall there so no one thinks you are going to engage in care giving for them. He can either suck it up and live with the new you, or make a stink. Make a stink doesn't change anything. He can realize he has majorly screwed up his relationship with you - not likely - and change, accept the new status quo, or divorce you. No matter what though, you will be in a better place mentally and financially to handle it. And frankly, if he leaves all the medical care decisions about the kids to you, then go get them vaccinated and don't say anything. If the kids have reactions for a couple of days and he notices they don't feel well, say 'They don't feel well" and move on. If they tell him they are vaccinated, let him rant and rave, and you pretend it is nothing more than 'WA WA WA WA WA " and stare at your book or whatever it was you were doing. Then calmly look him in the face and tell him that if he wants a say in future medical decisions about the kids, he can take on x, y, z responsibilities for the kids including taking them to well child check ups and developing a relationship with their doctors/practitioners. Then walk away. Legally, you are within your rights to vaccinate them without his permission. I know of no state that says both parents have to sign off on a vaccine. If you are however afraid he will physically abuse you if you do it, then that right there is the very best reason you have for beginning to set yourself up for the potential of the marriage not surviving. You should not live in fear and under constant duress, however, he isn't going to listen to reason so it falls to you to be brave, and begin changing the dependency on him. Many, many hugs! This sucks and is hard. But you can do this.

Well, the one thing working in your favor is that so very many places are looking for employees, and having any degree is great, having a master's degree even if it is unrelated to the job opportunity can still be a huge plus. So if you are thinking that you would like to work toward independence so you feel less trapped, I think you probably could get a decent job and focus on only applying to places that are taking covid seriously.

Awesome. That was fun!

What about physical therapy assistant and working for a sport's therapist to see if he would like it enough to pursue the full degree? So many teams have them on staff, even some high schools. The best p.t. I had after my car accident was the sport:s physical therapist for the local high school. He was awesome, and it was something he kind of fell into. He had been a star football player, offered a scholarship to play for MSU, got injured, and bam...end of sports scholarship. He had really great p.t. and trainer post-injury, and it got him to thinking about he could contribute within the field of sports without playing sports, and would be a very satisfying field. He said it was a huge motivation for him to hunker down and get good grades since he really wanted to do it so much, and being a medical field, the requirements were stout. He never looked back, and told me what he really loves about his job is that while most of his friends tend to be very ho hum about going to work, he is excited and looks forward to it.

Vent away, and know that we are your cheerleaders! You are doing and amazing job! Everyone who says otherwise can go pound sand.

We lived in Florida for one year. When summer waned, we said "We cannot live like this!" Dh began interviewing for jobs out of state, was offered one in September, and by October 1st we were gone! Oh, and Florida weather isn't just weather. They have weather that is insects, like love bug season. I cannot.even begin to relate to you how gross that is. I do NOT know why that peninsula was colonized. We only agreed to visit his parents at Christmas or Easter once per year. I am pretty certain the rain came in insect form! 😁

Hear, Hear!!!

I know just how you feel. When our youngest got it last month at college, my heart sank. He had symptoms for 24 hrs. that's it! But I didn't sleep a wink that 24 hrs until he assured me was doing great, and took a cell phone picture of his pulse ox readings. Many hugs! 💓

NM, oops, wrong thread.

So very many hugs from me to you! I have no great wisdom to share except get a good lawyer, and give yourself and your kids a LOT of grace.

Old thread, but update for us. We continued with 4H for an extended period after our boys were into college, and we kept mentoring competitive rocket teams. The pandemic gutted our program (it did not have to be that way but both county, regional, and state leadership made some spectacularly bad choices), and we are now retired. Until that moment, I die not realize how burned out DH and I were. We just kept running like energized bunnies for the sake of the students in the area who were a part of our 4H club. We had begun planning for another Introduction to the World of Engineering class -.4 hrs per week, 32 weeks a year - rocket team 8 hrs a week, 32 weeks a year - and the once per month STEM project with 30 kids not in the engineering class or on the rocket team. And all the years we have done this, dh has worked a very demanding well more than 40 hour a week job. Pausing for a few months while waiting for 4H to sort itself out - which it never did - allowed us to stop long enough to feel the bone tired exhaustion we were ignoring while continuing to push through on pure adrenalin and sense of duty. Tendering our resignation was one of those terrible moments in life. There was sadness, regret, maybe a little guilt, definitely sorrow knowing 12 years of program building had come to an end, and yet an utter sense of relief and mental/physical burden lifted, and freedom from something that on top of homeschooling had dominated our lives for so long. After our two year retirement/hiatus, we are back at it, but not with 4H and never will return to that program. Instead, we are involved in mentoring a couple of university rocket teams. It is so much fun working at this level. No hand holding, no parents, no middle school emotional drama, no piles of 4H paperwork. We are also working as volunteers to help pull off three major rocketry events. I don't see us going back to teaching/mentoring young kids while dh is still working. We have just reached a place that despite our passion for education, it isn't sustainable. But our grandsons will be 10.5 and 6 when dh retires, and they are being homeschooled. We will be moving permanently at that point to be near them, so I have a feeling we will be involved in education again. And I think when the eldest is old enough to be on an American Rocketry Challenge team, we will be mentoring middle and high school ages again. I am sure we will be well rested by then. In the mean time, I was able to take two courses necessary to complete the general sciences minor I just narrowly missed when I graduated with my B.A. way back in the mists of time, and began taking engineering and space tech college coursework. Most of it has been easy because I used to teach it, but by having the college credits, it formalized the knowledge. Eventually, I would like to judge documentation and presentations for IREC so this just helps build my resume for that. I do think teaching full time, including homeschooling, can very much burn people out. I know a ton of public school teachers who refuse to teach outside of schools, work with kids in church or in community groups, or take leadership positions in volunteer work because they need that weekend down time from being constantly in that mental teaching and prepping mode.

That looks like fun!

That is hard. I have no soothing words, but I do encourage you to not put yourself through the Sunday rigamarole. Elder care is crazy hard, and making it worse simply because the elder will not embrace the reality of the work involved for.caregivers is not acceptable. Stay strong. Do not make your weekends that much more exhausting and frustrating. Hugs!

Awwwwww.....Sid is winning my heart! 😁

We had a brief, big spike this past summer when a bunch of people who thought "Let's retire in the country" bought up houses that had land (there wasn't a lot for sale either so some even walked up to home owners and made offers on houses not on the market), and then it was all over. There isn't a lot of inventory, but what there is is back to taking 3 months t a year to sell, and will sell below asking price. So it is back to a 3 bed 2 bath 1400 sq ft ranch or something similar going for less than 150,000 in the town north of us, and right around 100,000 nearby. There are no good jobs so there is no reason for young folks to stay nor for anyone to move here except to retire. Some of those retirees will be happy, but a larger group of them are bring big babies about the lack of maintenance on the side roads in winter, and come spring when manure goes on the fields, they are going to be e,tra unhappy. Well, and then the inevitable use of their wells and skeptics as though they are on city utilities and find out how much one pays for septic pumping. It is the same old same old. They romanticized life in the country without educating themselves. But this current crop paid TOO much for their properties and are already underwater. They aren't going to get it back, and are now stuck. We have a little bit of this every time something happens to cause a wave of retirement like when one of the Big Threes puts together a really nice early retirement package. In this case it was year two covid and people nearing 62 being "done" with work. The number of teachers from the northern burbs of Detroit was surprising. One of them hit a deer with her car, and I stopped to see if she was okay. She wanted to know how common this is. Really common, unbelievably common, this is why you are paying a shocking rate for comprehensive coverage on your car compared to when you live in Rochester. Poor gal. She was pretty shook up. And of course she thought someone would come get the carcass. Nope. It is going to lay in that ditch and then become very stinky this spring. The county cut all money for roadkill removal.

This is an excellent idead!! 😂😂😂

I do think the real estate market will right itself in the next ten years. The Silent Generation is rapidly dying off as are the first third of the Boomers. Gen X, Millenials, are really struggling to afford the current prices, and Gen Z is a group that has self identified as not likely to invest in home ownership because they expect to change jobs and move many, many times in the early years of their careers. They are pretty adamantly opposed to having kids so many of the family homes with lots of bedrooms, and yards, and such are not the kind of thing they want to buy. So I do think within ten years there will be more homes for sale than there are buyers which will drive the price down. We bought our retirement home for reasons other than investment, and have no expectation that it will retain its current market value much less appreciate.

Ugh! Stupid wind!!

Oh, I agree. I hate it, and think it is a trash test. But sigh. It might be a reasonable option under the circumstances.

Tiggy, my heart is breaking for you! I just want to hug you.

If you can fix it well enough for him to do decently on a placement exam, you will.be doing him a HUGE service! I would not even worry about "credit" and at this point assume he will be tested. Or even better yet, of he is ready, have her sign him up for the June SAT. That is a go to achievement test here, and if he passes the algebra 1 section, since he is in 8th grade, it will not matter about the geometry, algebra 2, or the few trig questions. They will be looking at that basic algebra. It is not a great test, but it is widely recognized.

This is a common thing done in some schools. They let the student into 8th grade algebra 1 but if their achievement scores or grades in math or teacher recommendations were iffy in 7th grade, they make them take another, easier math alongside algebra 1 so if they do not pass algebra 1, they did not fail 8th grade math and then have to be placed in remedial high school math. Some schools just require it of everyone which is extra stupid but I am not claiming that the education powers of this state have any common sense much less operate very smartly or efficiently.

There is no oversight or required testing. And actually, you are right. The statute had been amended. When I began homeschooling the only exemption from compulsory attendance and teacher licensing was religious. They have expanded that. This is good. When the state supreme court decided it back in the 80's it was.pretty strict and religious exemption was it.