Mom accusing dad of cheating and family drawn into a mess

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The last two years (since 2009) have been hell. In 2009 my dad had a female friend who was about 10 years younger than my dad and they corresponded via e-mail for a while. My mom managed to gain access to my dad's e-mail because she found his password written in a log book. She read through the e-mails and thought because they had decided to go to a place for lunch that my dad was cheating. I read through the e-mails my mom showed me my dad had sent and I came to the conclusion that my dad was not cheating or intending to cheat. I don't want to go into the details and it was so long ago that the details now are a bit hazy now. Ever since then my mom has held a grudge against my father and has never "let him forget it."

Fast forward two years. My grandmother is beginning to suffer from dementia and my father doesn't want to put her into a government funded nursing home. My parents have had fights about how to deal with my grandmothers health care, and a couple of months ago my cousin got terminally sick with cancer - she has two months left. My grandmother recently was placed in a retirement home but she ended up getting into a tiff with a resident and came to my parents home. My dad is mad because his brothers are useless and are not taking the time to go up and see their mother or even take care of her because they're "too busy." Today my parents got into a fight and he stormed off and my younger bother asked my mom "where is daddy going?" and she said "to his girlfriends house." I was miffed by this and said to my mom "you're starting with this s hit again" and she said "mind your own business" and that "I knew nothing about this family." She said my grandmother use to cheat on my grandfather, my aunt cheated on her husbands, and now my dad is doing this.

My mom use to go to counselling and talked to my next door neighbour who is a pastoral counsellor at our hospital but my neighbour said my mom didn't want to listen to her advice and she only had a few sessions with the other counsellor before she stopped going.

This is obviously taking a toll on everyone.

That really sucks.

Unfortunately, there is little to nothing that you can do about it. Some people will believe what they will in spite of any evidence to the contrary. In fact, some will even consider the presentation of such evidence to be proof that their beliefs are valid.

As my own ex-wife once said, "If I am so wrong, you wouldn't need to prove it!", and "Since you are trying so hard to prove me wrong, you must be trying to hide the truth from me!", and "I already know what you did, I just want to hear you admit it!"

(I was trying to earn a little extra money by moonlighting as a bouncer, and she was certain that I was going to bars to pick up women. Nothing in the world would convince her of the truth. Eventually, she divorced me to marry her boyfriend.)

I'm afraid that your mother will never be convinced, and that your parents' marriage is going to end in divorce. Get out while you can.

Good luck.