People don't realize what it involves with taking care of an elderly parent. It's life changing......it's almost like a curse.......it's terrible. I have no time for myself......had to quit my job......have siblings that won't help.........my mother is in terrible condition......eyes, heart and arthritis. She is always constipated and wants milk of mag all the time. I feel like I'm trapped......no time to do anything myself. When a parent gets old....it's terrible......life is terrible.
Then add the economy to the picture. The unemployment numbers are terribly skewed and misleading. Did you know that to be considered as employed in the numerous surveys conducted by the census bureau you have to be over the age of 15, and working one hour a week and being paid for it?
We're all trying to do the right thing and care about our loved ones. I think it's a misrepresentation that all these magical things happen through our desire to do what is right. My concern for others on this site is that they don't feel good about themselves because none of this has happened for them. It certainly hasn't for me.
When you can bring my only sibling across the ocean from Europe and get extended family to visit and give me a week's break, call me. I myself, am not clinically depressed. I'm depressed by the place I am in and no amount of pills will help my 'coping skills.'
I'm not so sure you understand where most of us are coming from without the possibility of a support system. Your intentions are good, I'm sure, but they don't reflect the reality most of us face in our own lives.
I can relate on some level, I feel for you, but I have to agree with others who've replied that you (and I) need to start thinking outside the box, getting real advice from people who "get it" wherever you can find it, and find a way to KEEP YOUR CAREER. I am a stay at home Mom with a 2 and 4 year old, my daughter has a year and a half before she starts Kindergarten, and my mother, after working as a psychiatric nurse in NYC for 40 years, became homeless when they reduced her pay for a couple months last summer, so she was forced into retirement at 67. She somehow made it that long by the skin of her teeth because she was making a decent salary, but she's quite crazy, a hoarder, more or less reclusive, and she's thankfully moving into an apartment over my garage in June...Sh'es been living in my house in my 2 year old's room with my husband and our 2 kids because she had nowhere else to go. She never leaves the house, she just plays solitaire on her computer and eats meals, rarely helps, never goes shopping, nothing, even though she's physically able.
In any event, everyone has these weird crosses to bear. I dod ALL her retirement paperwork, it almost killed me last fall. I almost had 10 heart attacks trying to get her to successfully continue her health insurance.
I am trying to tolerate this so she can wait until she's 70 to collect social security because she doesn't make enough from her pension alone to pay for assisted living, which she could need anytime. She drives us all crazy, she never get sout of her bathrobe, she has no friends and it's just me and my sister. She hasn't had a frined in 20 plus years. She divorced my Dad in 1976, hasn't had a relationship since, and he died 7 years ago :( I miss him!
Anyway, I need to find a way so she doesn't hoard in my house and so that my marriage doesn't self destruct from all her negative energy. SHe has some positive energy, too, but not much! My husband is really critical of her and I, and now he refers to her and I as one person half the time. It's really scary, I'm walking on eggshells trying to keep her out of homelessness until she has enough monthly income to go somewhere, I just hope it doesn't cost me my family. It's like walking a tightrope.
Whoa, life really is hard when there's a dependent parent and two little preschoolers who require CONSTANT attention. I don't get much sleep, I get zero real exercise, I am tired and depressed. I know I need to find a path for myself that's sustainable or all the work I've done will be in vain.
Blessings to all of us...
Stephanie
Not good that it's causing problems w/your husband --living with a crazy hoarder MIL, preschool kids & a wife that is being driven nuts can't be fun.
I see a therapist once a month, he has been an amazing asset. Most of these gains are because of him.
Both Medicare and Tricare will pay for you to get respite care. Tricare up to a month a year. Thank you for all you do. You must be a terrific friend. Cause you are a wonderful, loving person. I do understand. I have had MS for 40 years. I have learned coping skills. Funny, but Dad having a neurological disorder finally understands the hell I been in for those 40 years. Good luck,
I quit my job, one that I worked so hard to get and that I dearly loved, to care for my mom.
I am on the other side of caregivng now but quitting my job is the one thing I really regret since the industry moved on in my absence and getting another job like that one is not going to happen.
I loved my mom, but I wish I had handled it differently.
We know so much more now than we did when I started caregiving 9 years ago but more and more people are being sucked into this vortex of elder care.
Good luck and I hope you make better decisions than I did.
lovbob
Fed Up you nailed it.
lovbob
Roscoe, please get some help from organizations in your area that can help. There are volunteers that can provide assistance and give you a reprieve.
No, everyone does NOT gain strength, courage and compassion that enriches our lives. Unfortunately, far too many of us gain frustration and exhaustion and a horrendous depletion of our own lives.
I may sound bitter and resentful because I am (no matter how hard I pray for these feelings to go away)
It doesn't bother her at all that not one of her other three children does nothing.
This has been a most unpleasant and unrewarding task.
I had strength, compassion and courage (which is why I attempted this; but, she has beat me down.
I, sort of have, or see from a diferent perspective: Yes, our parents raised us according to them. Well or not, is, for this group or question, irrelevant. It is just a fact.
What I see is not a debt, is more like a transfer of dreams from a generation to another, a genetical factor common to all species. Therefore, we are not in debt with our parents, we are in debt to our children.
So, if for love or obligation or bad luck we have to do it... it has to be done. But, I insist, we have as aprimary duty, to take care of ourselves, otherwisw is of not use. And it also means to mark limits. Dificult as it is.
We did not choose ourt parents. They did not choose us. Is a sort of a matter of luck.
On the other hand, must of us, at least in occident, choose our partner(s) usually sort of thinking. Taking care of a wife/husband is the real difficult duty, the nighmare of caring. Be patient and careful.
Roscoe, it's okay to say no. I've done it. I struggle every day but find strength here at this site because I read what others have done or are doing and I know what my limitations are. I don't judge, because everyone has their own reasons for the choices they make and some don't have a choice at all.
Emancipate yourself from this torment. If circumstances change, you can change your mind later or contribute to loved ones care in other ways...it doesn't have to be on-site round the clock care.