My mom moved in with me about a year ago. I am her only child. Sorry, this is a bit of a book. My son, daughter & I were running over to her place 3-4x/week. She started falling was fearful to live alone, & was rearranging her daily pill sorter when I'd set it up for the week. We met as a family, & decided to move her to my house.
She previously was diagnosed w osteoarthritis, bi-polar, borderline pd. She has since been diagnosed w Alzheimer's Disease, dementia, COPD. It is hard to care for her. I just got a grant 2 free adult day care days, which I use. I was diagnosed w stage 3 ovarian cancer (when I told her I had cancer, she asked what happens to her if I die). I have GI issues & osteoarthritis. Remission 2022, but chemo side effect is more GI issues & osteopenia. I'm on disability. My daughter & her kids (ages 10, 5 &2) live w me. Mom's primary doctor only had her on meds for depression (which mom admits to), but had to ask neurologist (who diagnosed her w Alz/dementia) for bi-polar med, bec primary dr didn't feel comfortable... even after mom threatened my family w her cane if she got angry (took it away bec of that & sge was suppposed to use a walker anyway) & she broke her bedroom door from repeatedly slamming it if angry (like if we had ac on in summer). Shes had anger issues off/on in her life & I have police reports from her behavior in her 60s. Neurologist told mom she must let me rest & get eough sleep & said if i go down, she goes down. She glared at him. Mom's response to his nurse when he left the room: " they'll have to fight me Bec comehell or high water, I'm not going to a nursing home." I'm her POA, but she has it set up if I die, my son takes over. I have visited nursing homes & have her on wait lists. I feel guilty bec I wish this was over...either Nursing home or one of us called home to heaven. She's been a nightmare ever since I can remember. I have very, very few positive memories of her. Frankly, her wild lifestyle when I was growing up & having a mentally ill mother has been trauma for me. I never remember from early age, her not being in some sort of mental health service and on psychotropic. She has a psychiatric appointment this month. I see a therapist (B4 cancer, I was a therapist, go figure). May have found a local support group for dementia caregivers. It's been a living nightmare. How to deal w guilt and burnout?
I have a theory that the vast majority of mentally ill people wind up with a dementia in old age. Like your mother and mine, too. There was no way I could ever live in the same house with my mother again. Once was too much, and nearly drove me crazy, I vowed to never do it again. Living with a demented and personality disordered mother IS a living nightmare!
I have stage 4 melanoma myself and I'm glad my mother passed away before I was diagnosed. She'd have made MY cancer all about HER and never given me a moment's peace, even knowing of my suffering and pain. Had I had to deal with HER histrionics on top of my own issues, I think I'd have had a nervous breakdown tbh.
If mother gets sick with the slightest thing, get her to the ER and then refuse to take her Home at discharge time. The social worker will have to find her placement, period. Sound harsh? Not as harsh as what YOU will be put thru by continuing to house her at YOUR expense. It's time to care for yourself now, my friend, not half baked mothers.
Sending you a hug and a prayer for remission, as I've enjoyed the past 9 months, and no guilt for getting mother out of your house.
To have guilt you must have CAUSED something.
You haven't caused your mother's problems and you cannot fix them. So there goes guilt out the window. Grief is so much a better G-word for what you are witnessing. And for never having had a mother without severe limitations and an inability to mother well.
You are going to have to now take responsibility for doing your very best to save your own life. You have enough on your plate with that. While your decision to take your mother in given her mental status was certainly well meaning, it was poor a poor decision even were you WELL, but now, given you are not well, it is out of the question. Your mother will require placement. By that I mean placement now. You cannot wait until you are too ill to function to get her moved. She should now be placed with the help of Social Services. Your therapist CAN, SHOULD and MUST assist you with getting your mother out of the house asap.
This isn't something for argument or for distress. It is something that must happen, sadly. Nothing in life is exactly as we wish it to be. She won't be happy about this, but it must be at this time and for the foreseeable future. Not everything can be fixed.
I have a friend who just passed her 6 year anniversary S/P ovarian cancer. You can do this, but it is going to require all your strength. There will be others to care for mother. I hope that your therapist is helping to guide you in your responsibility to yourself and doing the best job you can for your healing so you can continue to be a support to those you brought into the world. She is going to need to be more than a "listening post" here; she needs to guide you to APS or other social services that can get your mother into immediate care.
I am so sorry for your problems here. I am a survivor now for 36 years of the dread-C. I know a little bit about all that's involved, and how overwhelming it can be. It is going to be a YEAR at the least of your needing all your strength for yourself. I wish you the best and hope you'll update.
When I told my MIL I had cancer she said "So how long before you die?"
Ouch.
Well, I lived and am in remission for the last 3 years. She was mad at me for not dying. So I sure get that. It's pretty hopeless when people like that can feel compassion for someone else where their lives are the only ones that matter.
You got some great advice. You need to not have mom in your eyeline on a daily basis.
Either resign your POA and give it to YB, or simply place mom. She won't die from the horrors of being in a NH. She might actually thrive.
Most of all--YOU will thrive. Cancer tx is 50% the drugs and 50% the attitude of the patient. Going through chemo with almost no support and knowing that my MIL was probably praying for me to die--the mental fight was almost as hard as the physical one.
I didn't see my mom while I was txing the cancer. She also couldn't handle it. It was so hurtful to have both my 'moms' basically ignoring the biggest fight of my life.
You need positivity and love surrounding you. If people can't provide that, then you don't make room in your life for them. ANd NO GUILT. You've done nothing wrong!!
Period.
((Hugs & wishing you all the best))
You didn't cause her problems and you aren't reponsible for her happiness. You need to make yourself the priority and this can't happen if you have to orbit around her.
May you receive peace in your heart as you make decisions (((hugs)))
My mother showed an uncharacteristic level of concern when husband and I got COVID, probably because she knows if we die she’s screwed!
I ask myself every day how she’s still alive with her lifetime of smoking. He recent pulse Ox at urgent care after a fall was 92. I think she’s got COPD, which nobody seems to care about.
Every day I just hope she will meet a peaceful end, or that I can get her in a facility paid for by Medicaid when it’s needed. I anticipate she will refuse. I have POA but don’t want guardianship.
This is a woman who recently led me to believe she was agreeable to going to rehab after her neck surgery, yet telling her friend she would refuse. She’s medicated on Seroquel now, more pleasant and easy, but one can NEVER forget who these mentally ill people are at their core.
I hope you can get your mother in a NH and save your own health.
The way she treated you and the depth of her issues exclude her from being taken care of by you now. Get her out of your home, whatever it takes. Yes, she's sick, she has been for some time. You're not going to be rescuing her from her most dreaded fate of a nursing home. You're not able. And the nursing home, by the way, is able to take care of her much better than you can. That's just the way it is.
Some times we have to stop being the savior of everybody. Sainthood gets you nothing in this life. I'm so very sorry you find yourself in this situation, but you matter to a lot of people, not just your mom. She doesn't have your best interests at heart now - and maybe she never did.
Like they say on an airplane, put on your own oxygen mask first. Then breathe.
Ignore mom. Stop having anything to do with her. She'll manage.
Good luck to you in this sad situation.
I just want to say that you have my support and that I will keep you in my thoughts and prayers.
I made peace with all of my trauma/abuse with the help of a dear spouse and therapist. I can now care take my family member, guilt free and with some compassion.
Get some professional support on this issue. You won't be sorry.