My dad is just like his father, and I'm so worried I will end up like him: dementia, hateful, abusive. Is this kind of narcissistic hate in our DNA? (I don't know what my mom would have been like because she died at 61 but she was always wonderful). I'm just so scared that I will somehow end up a terrible person like him and his father.
If I could hope for one thing in life it would be that, when it my time, that I just drop dead. I don't want to be kept alive by pills, surgeries, and the charity of others. I want to make a clean break and cross over.
Having a parent with untreated mental illness is a nightmare at any stage of life, especially when the accompanying behavior is abusive. My heart goes out to you. I know because my family is rife with these illnesses, whats worse, our family never talks about it because of the shame. Our parents were raised at a time when mental disorders were feared and terribly stigmatized, sadly that attitude has not changed all that much. I am not surprised your Dad refuses to see a doctor. Much of my family is the same.
Little by slow the public is being forced to see mental illness as just that...illness. It sounds like you are taking charge of your mental health, thank goodness! I am doing the same for my own illness. I believe things will be different for me when I am older than it is for my parents. I have sent years learning coping skills and building a support network around me. I believe the same for you.
I don't hear judgement for your Dad in your words ... I do hear worry and perhaps confusion. I hope your Dad gets the attention he needs. Meanwhile you might want to check out NAMI the National Alliance on Mental Illness. They are a wonderful resource for anyone touched by mental health issues.
She has always preferred to sit in the dark, alone, and look for the negative. I have told her that if Jesus did take her, she'd nag him to death. Not even heaven would please her. No anxiety or mood altering med has ever helped her. She would never consider therapy or self-help books. She is the passive victim in life who has zero control over events and her emotions. Everybody else is responsible for her happiness and we have all been a giant let down.
No thanks. That isn't how I choose to be now or intend to be later. I want to be that funny old lady wheeling around Shady Pines saying a friendly hello to everybody.
However, I have also observed that innately resilient individuals seem to "weather the storms" of old age better than those who do not possess spiritual resources. (I am not talking about religion here - spiritual resources are something different.) When a person has never developed coping skills along the way, they sometimes become impossible personalities by the time they are senior citizens.
My mother totally lacks curiosity about the outside world. I am curious about nearly everything though I was not as a child; I think my natural curiosity was suppressed. So mother calls me in the middle of the night to say her water isn't running. It never occurs to her that this is happening to half the town because of the freezing weather because she doesn't care about anything beyond her own gate. But I am curious enough to read her local small town newspaper on the computer and can tell her about what's going on in her own town and so what to do about the water problem. I know this is ridiculous. I phoned her the other day to tell her her local mall was flooded, so don't go shopping there. I am my mother's curiosity.
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