My mother is one of the most miserable humans on Earth, and has been for years. Whenever anyone has asked her "How are you doing?", for as far back in my memory as I can reach, I can never remember her saying "I'm fine". Now she's smoked herself to death. She has COPD, CHF, steroid-induced diabetes, a colostomy, osteoporosis, bone spurs in her neck, neuropathy in her limbs, brittle skin that tears at the drop of a hat...the list seems endless. She refuses to get out of bed to try to exercise to keep up any strength, and wants me to do more and more and more for her.
She's in the hospital right now because of a fall last week. She says her knees gave out.
I don't think it's so horrible that I just want this woman to finally have some peace, and yes, honestly, for the rest of us around her to have some as well. The discord and disharmony this narcissist spreads with her always ALWAYS negative attitude takes a toll. She will never change, and her health will only continue to go downhill.
I realize that I don't get to make the decision of when she goes, but I will admit that I do want her to. I think it's the only way she'll finally be "fine".
Think what you want but don't forget one day they will be gone and you WILL BE SORRY.
ABSOLUTELY AGREE WITH YOU!! It is one thing to think of death only as a way out, end to suffering and pain, comfort and peace. My mother was very Christian, strong, Professional, Proud WOMAN and for her to deal with ALS, Lou Gehrigs the way she did was admirable!
When my mother passed I was there holding her hand, talking to her, singing to her, letting her know it was ok to let go. I was not angry and bitter and pissed off because I had to be there.. You know, these elderly people still have senses. So if you are bitter, they are bitter and mean
You are doing NOBODY any favors by being their caregiver and being so Angry. Unfortunately, you are more than likely taking years off of YOUR life by all the stress.
Denant... there is ALWAYS a choice! It may not be one you wish to make, but not standing up for yourself is a choice. If you feel this strongly about NOT taking care of your MIL... you need to tell your husband. If he refuses to do anything about it... then you are faced with making another choice... stay or go... It sounds like hubby has already made his choice, and I'm sorry sweetie... it was mom.
Good luck.
Honestly, I believe this post has made a GREAT reference in the fight against Elders's and euthaniza
Your Mother is sick, sounds like help is needed for her and for you. Maybe you could get somebody to help you with your mother . Sounds like a break is needed and well deserved!
Good luck to you, I hope things get better. I would call the Department on aging in your area to see what goodies they may be able to help you with.
Last Thursday, I was awoken at 2:00am by her moaning. I walked into her room and found her on the floor in a pool of blood and urine. She had fallen trying to get to the bathroom, hit her head on the floor, gashed open her forehead and was totally out of it mentally. With my husbands help we got her back in bed, cleaned her up and tended her wound. Called hospice to make sure there wasn't anything else to do and then I stayed up all morning with her. She was out of it till Friday evening and then finally started to come around. Turns out she had stopped taking one of her medications, she was throwing it away when I gave it to her. Well, this medication is the one that replaces her liver enzymes and prevents toxins from building up in her blood. So the toxins built up, she lost her mind and become very confused, and fell...... Long story short, (cuz I could go on and on), she accused me of messing up her medications, not only did she accuse me, but she started telling family members that I was giving her more medication than she was suppose to take and it was MY fault she fell. She now keeps a log, and ever time I give her the medications, she writes down what I gave her, how much and at what time. I have never been more insulted in my life. I am the only reason she is still alive, it is my care, my feeding her, my cleaning her, my efforts that have given her this extra time with her family and she is treating me like shit. Sunday we had another fight, again she was being just awful and I told her she wasn't allowed to talk to me like that in my house. She refuses to take any responsibility for her words, her actions and the way she makes people feel. Her response is always, "your just too sensitive" or "you toke it the wrong way".
Making the situation worse is the fact that my husband will not stand up for me. He just says she has always been like this, and she won't change. Well, that is fine, but I don't have to continue to allow someone to treat me like shit in my house.
With that all said, How do I stand up to my husband and his family and tell them she is not allowed to continue to be in my house? I feel terrible, I feel like a horrible person throwing a dying person out, but I have had it. It would be a totally different situation if she just once appreciated everything I have done for her, her daughter and everything I have had to give up. But she refuses to see anything I do in any thankful way.
Wow - I really needed to vent. :)
Ohiodaughter-- like your Mom, mine is sweet and loving. When she does die I know I will feel sadness and shed some tears, but I will also feel relieved. This is no way to live because it's not living--it's simply existing on both of our parts.
A couple of things come to mind that I would like to comment on.
1.) The idea of "it would kill me to put my loved one into a home" is really not a healthy thought to hold onto. Nor is it a good thought to voice to an elderly loved one. Depending on the physical/mental condition of a loved one it can become necessary. So, better to hold one's tongue. And never say never.
2.) For all her "you'll never get me out of MY house", I never thought my own narcissistic mother would adjust as well as she has to Assisted Living. Now, how the other residents have adjusted to HER may be a different story....
3.) Yes, I have wished a loved one would die. I prayed for a heart attack to just take my husband when he was at end stage with cancer. It didn't happen.
I nursed him throughout his illness at home, pretty much by myself. I had Hospice for the last 10 days, but they didn't come often or stick around when they did come. They checked him, assisted me with bed-bathing him and changing bedding and left. He was comatose for his final 5 days. As I had written elsewhere, his final words to me were "no hospital" - which is what I had promised him.
4.) Yes, now I have wished that my mother would just go peacefully of a heart attack. But it is a whole different thing. She is 93 and has led a long life. She has Lewy Body Dementia and Parkinson's Disease.
Thanks to all who shared their story,
Deeana
He did not want to be hospitalized because he did not want to receive any further treatment other than pain medication. He specifically did not want antibiotics or any IV fluids. And of course, no CPR.
Now I'm a primary CG in stress I hope I never get that way.
We got the call he'd passed and I WAS SHOCKED.
Why? I had begun to think my beloved daddy wasn't going to get to die! I was closest to him and I knew how bad he longed to just go to his 'long home,' as they say. He'd often said he wasn't going to take his meds so he could hurry it up but knowing the suffering he would endure waiting for the end with a chest full of fluid, he could never do it. He had been a proud and strong man who doted on my mom and never let any do anything for him if he could possibly do it for them, instead. We watched him shrink away in body and spirit.
So, that night, when my mom arrived at my house down the street to go to the hospital together, she and my (now ex) husband were hugging in sorrow in the living room and I was impatiently waiting in the hallway, coat in hand, ready to go wish my dad GODSPEED and celebrate (inwardly) with his own spirit that now he was finally free to 'fly away' home.
I know they thought it a little strange that I did not cry. How could I cry on such a happy occasion as the end of my brave father's misery?
Of course I cried at times later on, and missed him terribly...something which was alleviated when I moved back home to take care of my mom...since his spirit is here with us, I know...but the night he died, I thanked GOD with all my heart for finally taking mercy upon him and taking him away from something that was no longer a life.
I'm a registered nurse (not licensed since I don't work except to take care of my mom) and I worked mostly in geriatrics and medical (chronic and terminal illnesses). There are things far worse than dying as many of us already know.
I speak from a good and loving experience and frankly have no first hand experience of the sort that so many of you wonderful kindred spirits here have had to endure through dysfunction, narcissism, and all the rest of Pandora's box...but I will say with all honesty that I don't see anything wrong with having a desire to see the end that kind of existence, either. Someone who has spent a lifetime making those they are supposed to love and support instead miserable, confused, and resentful, can't really be living, either. I think, in fact, that it must be far worse than spending 3 years dwindling away from CHF or similar...it lasts a lifetime and it must be a painful lot of years to endure...although in a way not as bad because surely they don't even realize they are miserable if they have never been satisfied or content with life. They have nothing to compare it to.
Dying is not the antithesis of living but rather just a phase in continuing existence and depending on what one believes, can actually be a reprieve and a chance to possibly do it again in a different way...or not...at any rate the end of misery is not something to cry over, imo, no matter the circumstance.
In another post I mentioned that my mom had fallen and broken a femur. She went to the hospital, then into a rehab facility. She ended up falling at the rehab center and breaking her wrist, and got sent back to the hospital, was treated for an infection and the wrist, then sent back to rehab. And that's where she's been as of 5 p.m. tonight.
I'll be honest. The time, about two weeks now, that my mom has been away in the hospital/rehab has been the most peaceful I've known in years. After 10 years, I feel I've done right by my mom. She has everything she could want or need, she's clean, her clothes are fresh, her room is fresh and clean, her bedding is crisp, I cook great meals for her that are delicious and healthy, I wait on her, running back and forth all day and night getting her this or that, or whatever. If she gets up, which is almost constantly, I have to get up, too, or God knows what she'll do or get into. I'm like the cat in a room full of rocking chairs when she's around. From early in the morning, till late at night, sometimes on into the next morning, she needs or wants something, always something, and I can't relax. I can't rest. I can't sleep. I can't get out of this house. My ass hasn't warmed a chair for more than 5-10 minutes at a time in as long as I can remember. She literally is calling for someone, or needs something, every few minutes. The times she's fallen were when I was either in the shower, or in bed asleep. For a long time I associated sleep with bad things happening, and then I found I couldn't freaking sleep even if I wanted to. Every single second, of every single day, is spent watching out for my mother so she doesn't do something stupid or dangerous, or trying to figure out what in the world she wants. One night she called me out of bed 4 times, all for trivial things, like needing one extra ice cube in her drink. Or, waking me up to get her a yogurt at 2 a.m. As I said, it's literally always something. It never, ever ends. My days are just a blur. Half the time I don't even know what day it is, if it's a week day or a weekend. I'm so exhausted and fuzzy that I wake up that way and stay that way. I can't remember the last time I actually felt energized.
Did I mention the screaming and wailing we all get to listen to at least several times a week? Before, I could kind of interpret what my mom was saying, or trying to say, even when her alzheimers and dementia started getting really bad. Now, it's so bad that I literally can't make heads or tails out of what my mom is trying to get at. It's simply pure gibberish, with a word or two here and there that I'll catch and understand, but that's about it. I try my best to be patient, I mostly just stand there and listen, maybe give her a nudge or prompt once and awhile, but anymore it's almost impossible for me to get it. And when she realizes that I can't understand, she flips her lid. She will sob, loudly, and wail, and moan, and scream...she can, I swear, keep that up for 2-3 days at a time. She just won't...stop. Off and on, all day, all night, she's yelling, and wailing at the top of her lungs, or she sits there moaning and crying, and I swear it literally sounds like someone being tortured. I cringe just thinking about it right now. There is no place I can go to get away from it. One night I couldn't stand it anymore and I ended up going outside and walking up the street. Our windows were cracked and I could here her up the drive way. It's insane. By the time she's done with one of those jags...and there are usually at least a couple a week...I'm wiped out. I'm so edgy it feels like I'm going to come out of my skin any second. I can't sit still, I'm anxious, nervous, and utterly and totally miserable. I'm so far in the dark sometimes after having to deal with that mess that it feels like I will never know anything light, or joyful, or pleasant, or anything at all peaceful, ever again. At those times I feel so trapped, I feel such a sense of desperation to REMOVE myself from the situation it's ungodly. And I have no place to run. I have to do this. There isn't anyone but me. And I loath every single second of it.
I'm sitting here thinking of my mom coming home again when rehab is done, and I'll be honest. I feel a dread that I can't find words for. I feel like I want to run screaming into the night at the thought of it. I want to curl into a little ball and beg whatever powers that be not to torture me anymore, I've done my 'duty' for 10 years, I'll be good, I promise, just please, please, please, please, don't make me do this again... I feel like I should be gibbering in a corner somewhere, babbling in total panic at the mere thought of it. I can't do justice to this kind of dread with words. And that's sad as hell. But there it is. I don't want to deal with my mother anymore, not for one more minute of one more day. This whole situation has twisted me so badly I'm worried I won't ever recover. The person that walked into this damn sure isn't the person that'll walk out of it.
Do I want my mom to die? Sometimes. Yeah. Because doing what's right for her has cost me. Right now, this minute, with my house quiet and peaceful and beautiful for the first time in ages, thinking of how it's going to be when my mom comes back here makes me shudder and cringe. It's absolutely unbearable. I honestly don't want to deal anymore. I want to get ON with my LIFE. That life I gave up, that life I'd like to live, instead of just freaking exist in, because that's all I'm doing. I'm not even human anymore. I'm just an extension of this old woman that's my mother, a convenient extra hand and pair of legs to run around and cater to her many, many, never ending needs. I don't need a name, I don't need a face, I don't need brains, I don't need to talk, I don't need to do a goddamn thing except do for my mother, day in, day out, year after endless year. You think I want to go BACK to that? I'd be a liar if I said I did. No, I don't necessarily want my mother to die, although why she'd want to live when she's never been the least bit pleased with anything, or satisfied or happy with anything, is beyond me, but I just don't want to be the one that has to deal with her. I don't want to do this anymore. I will NEVER do this again, not for anyone, unless it's one of my sons. I'm afraid of people now. Why? Because I'm scared to death they're going to TAKE even more of me somehow. Crazy, I know. But I've had one toe over the line into crazy for a long time now. This has taken so much out of me I don't know if I'll ever have a single thing to ever give to anyone again. And that's pretty sad, too, but there it is. I just want my part in this to be over. Am I selfish? Oh yeah. I feel very, very selfish. And I really don't care at this point. I simply want to take care of MYSELF for a change. In the peace and quiet. Yeah, baby. Peace and quiet. There's nothing more beautiful. Especially when you don't have any. lol