So for years my mother, 63 now, has struggled with working with Lupus for 30 years, which has taken a toll on her body. But unknown to a teenage me at the time, she used pain medicine to help with her arthritis and injuries resulting from her Lupus and joints. After a second knee replacement, she developed a wound they grew between her anus and pubis. She struggled to get help, work from home and balance it all. But slowly more and more she had to use pain medicine to control the pain. Her IBS, a result of Lupus, only makes it worse as it aggravates the wound. Her work ended up terminated her after her return to the job after short term disability. She worked for a year being told she could work from home but they never accommodated her disability and long story short was fired shortly before the pandemic began. After an horrifying journey to get her short term then long term disability, now I struggle to make sure her CObra doesn’t expire after the 18th month.
now the real problem. She has overdosed on her pain meds before. One time she almost died with kidney failure l. If I didn’t check on her before I left for work, that would be it. After a fall last year, she was able to get homecare nurses.
but I have had to use narcan on her several times since. If I bring it up to the nurses or her doctor, she might lose the only help that she has right now. I myself have went beyond my limits. Gave up socializing pretty much before the pandemic to try and help. I pay most things as she has crazy hospital bills. And I am not rich.
whwn I confront her or try to help or even give the narcan, she gets upset and blames me. She claims it was her other medicine and tries to hide what happened. From me, her doctor and nurses for fear of losing what help she has.
so I am at my wits end and a loss. What do I do?
I can call her doctors office or confront one of her nurses and explain. But then will I be left with a mother suffering in more pain without the pills she relies on to relieve her pain and symptoms? Lupus is already a harsh diseases. Add an injured back, disabilitating wound, replaced knees and it’s just too much. ER gives her a pain shot, looks at her wound and sends her home and takes 300 bucks. Ambulances when I have had to call can cost 700-1400 WITH her insurance. Hospitals charge 4-5k a night. IF they keep her as COVID has destroyed what help that would give her.
I feel like my life has ended and I been forced into a position that I am not qualified for. Work 50 hours week and struggle to find time for myself away from home, which feels like a prison now.
I am her son, but I am not a caregiver. I try to do what I can, but it has broken me.
am I wrong for giving narcan? From something she claims she didn’t take? Even with managing her pills I feel she hides and takes them all at once for a stronger effect. It she yells at me saying I am
always accusing her.
I am the only son and she has been alienated from the family, for this specific reason as I found out.
You are her son, you are not a caregiver.
You do what you can.
You do not have all the information.
You are unable to discuss her openly with her professional advisers.
You are not in control of her medication.
Here's the thing about Medications Administration - it's all, or nothing.
If your mother were to agree, and if you had the time available, and if you already had a good working relationship with her health care team, then it would be sensible for you to take complete charge of her meds to manage her pain and her conditions safely.
But since that isn't practical, and isn't even on the table as far as your mother's concerned, then it is both inadvisable and unfair for you to take *any* responsibility for your mother's medications - including Narcan.
I'm not suggesting you just leave her to it and let her overdose if she must. Document document document, report report report. Don't go behind her back, make calls in front of her and tell her why.
There are established ways to manage medication, it doesn't matter much which approach is decided on, but somebody - which means your mother and her care team - has to pick one. And the one they pick can't include relying on you to spot when she's overdone it. Refuse the responsibility unless a) you also have your mother's consent to your controlling meds and b) you genuinely do have the time to take it on.
At present, your mother’s life virtually depends on you staying right where you are. If you had a vehicle accident or anything else that put you in hospital, what would happen? Could she find the pain drugs, which I guess you hide? If she did, would she overdose? Could / would she find the Narcan and use it appropriately? Would she die from the overdose? If she couldn’t find the pain drugs, what would she do? Call 911? What would she tell ER? What would they do? If she didn’t find the drugs, what other horrible things might she do? What would you feel about your own 'responsibility' for leaving things like this?
All of this is resting on you, your willingness to sacrifice your life and money, and your availability. You may even be risking the law yourself. The secrecy that you feel is needed is stopping you from getting any outside input. It would be good if you could share some of the responsibility. Does she have a social worker you have some reasonable trust in? Could you ask the social worker to refer you to a psychiatrist (they all have MD degrees) that you could talk to? Preferably one who works with family, and will also take on the ‘privacy’ approach of a counselor. You need help for yourself and your own burdens, as well as for her. Even if you go anonymously, you need more than this site can do to help. Don’t leave it like this. There is no good outcome coming, and she is only 63.
Best wishes and sympathy, Margaret
do I go against that information they gave me? I don’t do it just to do it. I do it when the signs show it’s dangerous for her to continue with w/e high she is on.
beyond that, do I just let her ride whatever out? If it’s all or nothing l, given my job and what I do being demanding and not set scheduled, it would be nothing. Would I then be failing her?
20 years into my job, it’s not something I wish to lose. I don’t have siblings or partners to help, so it’s been a solo, eye opening, and terrible realization on how poor the safety nets are for elderly.
she was approved for long term disability. Medicare/cal is a last resort as they don’t cover all her medicines and insure if her current lupus doctor can take it.
Your mother remains in control of most of her medication. You (ethically, legally) can't lock it out of reach and ration it. You're just expected to keep your eyes open 24/7 and whack her with the Narcan if she's been in too much pain and taken too many meds (or forgotten, or got confused, or mistaken one for another).
At the risk of sounding three years old again - this is Not Fair.
Who's your mother's lead physician? Because somebody needs to get a grip and work *with* *her* on managing her condition. It's not good enough to let her struggle and expect you to fight the resulting fires.
it’s been hard. My mother believes if I talk to her doctor, the doctor will drop her as a patient. She is prideful and doesn’t want people to know her business, but then it gets extreme like this. She guilt trips me into doing most things, sometimes I rush from work on my lunch to do something for her, fearing she will fall again.
but because of covid, hospitals didn’t want to keep her initially last year.
my apartment doesn’t feel like home anymore and I dread getting off work these days.
Wait. Wait, wait, wait. You say your mom has OD's numerous times, and the only - the ONLY - advice you got from the hospital/EMT's was "this is how and when you administer Narcan"???!!!???
Has your mother ever been admitted into a drug program? How about a detox center? Psychiatric unit? Has this ever even been offered to you/her as an option?
My poor friend - your mom is an addict. It doesn't make her a demon; it doesn't make her a bad person. She has been abusing her pain meds; I have no doubt of the pain she has been in, and now it has become a downward spiral. And you, you poor soul, are now the one left holding the proverbial bag.
You need to contact your mother's primary PCP - or whichever doctor is prescribing all of these painkillers - and tell them EVERYTHING you have told us here - the non-healing wounds, the multiple uses of Narcan, the IBS, the lupus, the pain from the knee replacement, etc. - and get your mom into a program IN A HOSPITAL! If she doesn't have money, you need to contact the SW at the hospital and get her onto Medicaid! I am torn between grief and anger for you that you haven't been given any sort of options to HELP mom - not, in essence, to just slap a band-aid on a gaping gunshot wound and send you off on your merry way!
If mom's useless PCP can't/won't give you any sort of assistance or guidance, then the very next time mom takes too much of her pain medicine, you call 911 for an ambulance, you INSIST she be taken to the hospital, and you lay it all on the line there, that mom needs an admission to the detox ward, or similar unit...they will get her weaned off of the pain meds AND treat her wounds and her other symptoms - under a controlled environment!
If mom's health issues aren't brought under control - and I mean control above and beyond *just* pain management - she's never going to be able to break this cycle!
Good luck, and God bless you!
She is manipulating you, the way most addicts do. You need to start out by going to Al Anon or the equivalent.
You are a good child. Your mom needs a lot more help than you can give her at this time.
Addicts think that they can deceive others but that is because they are not rational people.
Protect yourself. Offer rehab to mom but if she isn’t ready, it won’t happen.
Wishing you and your mother all the best.
You should give her the choice of you handling her opioids or moving some place else. Because you finding her dead is not something that you should have to live with.
63 is not elderly. She needs to take responsibility for her actions and not destroy you if she chooses to continue on this self destructive path. Chronic pain sucks but, it is not a free pass to psychologically and emotionally abuse anyone, especially her offspring.
She can seek alternative treatments for her pain, she wants to get high, that's why she lies. Time for an intervention.
You have to stop letting her manipulative actions control you. What exactly do you or she thinks will happen if she pulls one of her stunts while you are at work or sleeping? A loving mom doesn't treat her children like you are being treated.
She has lost the privilege of privacy by dragging you into her pit of drug abuse, now she needs to own her behavior and love you enough to seek help.
You are only failing her by agreeing with her actions and her choices to continue with this risky behavior. Sometimes love means doing the difficult things and putting your foot down, standing up and saying "not on my watch!"
There shouldn’t be any shame or stigma attached to addiction.
Addiction happens for various reasons and it effects all kinds of people, young, old, rich or poor, blue collar to professionals, people who didn’t graduate to those with advanced degrees, the everyday Joe or Jane to famous people, the homeless to people who live in mansions.
People who live in chronic pain are only seeking relief.
Some younger people cave to peer pressure.
Some start dealing drugs to make money if they are poor, then start using themselves.
Sex trafficking is all over the place and those young girls and women are drugged.
Thank God that addiction is being openly discussed now.
Let’s hope all addicts will be offered help instead of demoralized.
Years ago doctors freely prescribed pain meds. The patient wasn’t educated on possible addiction. Then they were cut off and many addicts turn to street drugs because it isn’t easy to doctor shop anymore.
Your mom has to be ready to receive help in order for it to work. It’s a process. Addicts generally feel worthless.
Just a warning, please don’t be so naive to believe that even if a person does want help, that it is easy for them. It’s hard to quit.
Some people are able to stay in recovery, others are not successful.
Relapsing is the norm when trying to quit. Please be understanding of this. It takes most people several tries before they can quit.
My brother stopped using from time to time and led a successful life, he even owned his own business but the urges are so strong that they fight it for the rest of their lives.
Unfortunately, my brother did not succeed beating his addiction and died from liver disease in his 60’s.
Addicts are not rotten, ‘good for nothing’ individuals. They are human beings that deserve to be treated with dignity.
You can hate the disease. You can hate the confusion, pain and suffering that it causes for everyone.
Some believe that a person is betraying them or trying to be manipulative.
They are doing whatever they have to do in order to get their next ‘fix’ because they can’t do without the drug.
They need help to detox. Going cold turkey is horrible and there are safer and more humane ways to withdraw.
No one wakes up in the morning and says, ‘Gee, I think that I would like to be an addict today.’
Once a person is in rehab, has detoxed and is receiving help for their mental and physical health needs, they will be able to think clearly and be taught to take responsibility for their actions.
Allow others to help your mom if she is willing.
You can love and support a person
but still protect yourself.
Step away if her behavior is harmful to you.
I desperately tried to help my brother. He refused rehab.
I had to step away from my brother to protect myself and keep my sanity.
I went to a support group and therapist to find coping skills.
Wishing both of you my very best.
I know how you feel. I have watched my brother overdose too. It’s terrifying.
AnonInNeed, it seems to me she needs some heavy-duty advocacy and support with getting the advice and therapy from her medics that she should be able to expect. I've found an organisation called the Lupus Foundation of America; their site also offers support for caregivers at https://www.lupus.org/resources/for-caregivers.
If you can access it there is good basic information (you probably already know most of this, but - ) at https://www.nhs.uk/conditions/lupus/
The trouble with her having been struggling *successfully* for so long, up until very recent years, is that she may be cynical and jaded and resistant to seeking help, and believe that she has to sort this out on her own - e.g. her anxiety that she'll just get "fired" by her doctor if she is candid about her difficulties and her symptoms (not being in the USA, alas I can't be completely confident she isn't right about that).
But she doesn't have to be on her own. And in any case, it is still true that you cannot accept responsibility for a situation you cannot control.
It's incredibly difficult to help a patient as experienced as your mother go back to square one and make a fresh start - you have to trail back through decades to try to find the end of the thread. But that doesn't mean it isn't worth trying. Best of luck with it, please keep in touch.
Cobra will expire after the 18th month. If she is on Medicare then you need to find a suppliment with a prescription plan. Medicaid maybe where u should look. There are State programs for prescription coverage only. NJs is called PADD. My nephew was able to pay, out of pocket, a little more on the Medicaid prescription plan and get a med he needed for free. There are tiers.
You need to get your Mom to a doctor. She needs a good physical and labs run. She needs pain management specialist who can teach her how to take her meds correctly. I would say she needs to be taken off everything and start back little by little. She may need to be in a facility and be monitored.
Both of you, you and your mom need all the support that you can get.