My mother has chronic pain and dementia. I'm so tired of hearing her cry multiple times a day, nothing I do helps or helps for five minutes. Today she wanted to push on her back and legs and I just thought 'what's the point'. It's only gonna help while I'm doing it and I can't do it for more than a couple minutes. I've been pushing on her legs for thirty years, I grew up pushing on her legs. Clearly, it hasn't made a lasting difference and I don't want to anymore. I don't want to listen to her crying, in fact, I don't really respond to it much anymore. I'll sit in the same room while she's crying and not say anything.
I know once she's dead I will look back at this and feel like sh*t, but I don't know what to do anymore. I've done lots of things in the past but I'm tired of it all, the crying, the pain, watching this for my whole life, doctor appointments, her frequent irritation and depression, her inability to do things for herself or to try. She prefers to place that on me. She tries to give me messages to tell people after she's dead. That made me angry, there is no reason she can't tell them herself now. She can write a letter or make a phone call, she just finds excuses not to.
I don't want to be angry or frustrated at her while she's alive so instead I stuff these emotions down. Given her habit of crying five times a day, that doesn't seem to be a successful way of handling this either. If I give her comfort during it, she starts asking all these questions of why God is punishing her or why there is something about that makes people not want to help her. I don't have these answers.....
And......you feel like sh*t now.
This is one heckuva legacy.
From what you’ve written here (and elsewhere), your mother was difficult and emotionally abusive long before the dementia set in.
Are you familiar with the phrase “parentfied child?” If not, start Googling.
Now that real caregiving has set in (not the dumping Mom has put on you for 5 decades - but real caregiving), your triggers are going off left and right.
And rightly so.
At this point in Mom’s lifelong campaign to mold you into her no-boundaries chore minder, proxy spouse and whipping post, you need care more than she does.
What is convenient for your mother is toxic and devastating for you. It’s time to break the cycle.
It’s perfectly OK to switch Mom’s care to hands-off (home help or nursing home) or bring in a palliative team.
The priority is for you to start re-building you. Now.
You are in crisis — and your complicated emotions will outlive Mom (understatement). It is crucial that you get a jump on your own healing now.
((((big hugs)))) You do not deserve this sh*tshow. You never did.
Make the changes you need to make. Find the support you need.
And don’t give one thought to who is miffed at (or confused by) the new you. Your healing, your terms.
It’s OK to take care of yourself. It really is. 🧡
It sounds like your days with her are becoming trying and very difficult to handle. This is classic burnout. Even though you sit in the room and ignore her crying, you still hear it, and if you had a blood pressure cuff attached, your bp would be on the rise.
Do you have any help with her at all? Any health aides who come in to give you a break? Family? If not, you realize you are doing the work of 3 shifts of nurses/aides at a facility.
Later this week, after New Year’s, call her doctor. Discuss Pallliative Care, which is different from Hospice. Tell them about these possibly phantom leg pains and that you are weary of being her masseus. Ask about medications available for her depression. “Woe is me” is a common emotion in the elderly. Heck, with a bedridden husband and financial issues, I, myself often wonder why God is punishing me, too. When she moans and kvetches, give a noncommittal nod and change the subject. Promise to write these notes to everyone and then forget about it. Or, if you’re feeling generous, call these friends and tell them to call her if she can carry on a conversation.
Get yourself some help. Insurance will pay for a Home health aide a few times a week. And, there is always Assisted Living or a Skilled Nursing Facility.
Putting her in a facility that meets her actual needs, not wants and demands and delusions, is caring for her.
You don't deserve to be treated with such disrespect and hatefulness.
You start by getting her a needs assessment and that will tell you what type of facility to look into.
You matter, please get some boundaries in place and enforced until you get her into a facility.
I'm very sorry for any lady who has chronic pain and dementia. Your poor mother.
I hope to make it clear that I don't doubt your mother has real care needs. What I question is what those needs are, exactly; and from there how they might best be met. Has there been, recently or ever, a professional assessment of her physical and mental state?
As a thought exercise: if you could change one thing about your situation, what would it be?
Isn't it time to consider a big change - to a facility? It looks like she is unhappy no matter what, but your quality of life could be vastly improved. Obviously, she is very mentally unhealthy. Paranoia, delusions and anger, for any reason, psychiatric or dementia related, are serious conditions. There are facilities that take medicaid patients and that have trained personnel that would care for your mother 247 as well as having programs to engage her. Personally, I think she would be better off in one of those and I know you would. I am not knocking the care you are giving her but, if she has been prescribed meds for dementia, then she must have been diagnosed with it and she will only get worse and beyond your capacity to care for her. You work and you need to keep working for your own good. The time will come when your mother cannot be left alone safely. Please plan ahead for her sake and yours.
You are fatigued , emotionally i'm sure as well as physically, I will pray for strength for you .....hang in there.
I lost my Mom 14 yrs. ago, different disease but very similar situation, she was ill from the time I was 12... I watched as well as cared for her in nearly exact circumstances , although my mother turned to God and found her peace with her faith in him, God doesn't prevent these things, but he WILL help you through them, rest assured.
And I too thought I would look back at the times I wasn't nearly as sympathetic as I should have been and feel regretful, but to be honest, I KNOW I did everything I could, as you are now.
Its ok that you are feeling this way... you are tired UNDERSTANDIBLY !!
I have always looked at things KNOWING there IS a reason,. I don't believe in coincidence, "when" the reason will be revealed is the "unknown", but you will realize what it was ….when its time.
Maybe this separation of emotion, is a needed callous to help you handle "when" mom is no longer in misery.
Remember, you are doing OK … and you are human , this is hard...
Hang in there,
prayers for divine assistance for you and Mom.
((HUGS))
Moni
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