I recently had a needs and financial assessment for my husband who has fairly advanced Alzheimer's (can't dress, toilet, shower, eat, find his way round our tiny cottage, get a drink of water etc independently). I do all these things for him. Six year's ago, when all this blew up and I was about to retire, after many year's of what as far as I was concerned was a very unhappy marriage from which it seemed impossible to escape as my husband was financially dependent on me, we had agreed to live "separate" lives. I would continue to support him, but he would do his own thing (for the last 25 years essentially a bit of gardening and not much else, it's a long story)' and I would live mine. However, Alzheimer's intervened and I felt obliged to forget my plans and care for him.
Since then, I've got more and more depressed, undergone counseling a couple of times, health going downhill through lack of sleep and lack of social contact (he can't safely be left) and had thoughts of suicide or murder circling round my head.
SS agreed I needed backup, mainly to give me some "me" time, and are about to start funding three days a week daycare. I said what would happen if I decided I just couldn't carry on? I feel sometimes very hostile to my husband but keep it under wraps so far. He is 74, I am 68, I feel my life disappearing and hatred growing, and I am on my second course of antibiotics for the chest infections I get these last few winters because my reserves are down - I used to be a very healthy person.
The Social Service person's response was that if I said I couldn't or wouldn't care for my husband any more, they would be obliged to take over. It felt as though I had been thrown a life line. At the moment, my husband still knows who I am. I'm the only person he always, well almost always knows. But there will probably come a time when he doesn't, and as people keep pointing out to me, it's because I am there, 24/7.
Some time before too long I want to say I can't do this any more. It would be different if, like for so many of you, he were my great love, but frankly, he sucked the joy out of my life for many years, and threatened suicide in front of our then 11 and 9 year old daughters when I said I wanted to leave. My main feelings are sorrow that he should have to have this beastly disease, accompanied by dislike bordering at times on hatred. I wish him dead 20 times a day.
But what I am really afraid of is my life line being taken way - that is, if I say no more, will they in reality just keep throwing more day care, or carers at me. I don't want my home turned into an old people's home, I don't want hoists, grab rails, incontinence supplies, puréed food, a house that smells of wee, all things we are steadily creeping towards. Suppose they say after all, no, SS won't fund (and we certainly can't) then what? I feel terrified to ask and put it to the test. My daughters cannot understand my fears, they think I am mad. But life has been such a strain, keeping everything going for so many years since my husband simply stopped working at the age of 49 and refused to discuss it.
I'm sorry, this is a very selfish post when you all work so hard to care for people you love, but I feel very end of tether'ish.
Since then, I've got more and more depressed, undergone counseling a couple of times, health going downhill through lack of sleep and lack of social contact (he can't safely be left) and had thoughts of suicide or murder circling round my head.
SS agreed I needed backup, mainly to give me some "me" time, and are about to start funding three days a week daycare. I said what would happen if I decided I just couldn't carry on? I feel sometimes very hostile to my husband but keep it under wraps so far. He is 74, I am 68, I feel my life disappearing and hatred growing, and I am on my second course of antibiotics for the chest infections I get these last few winters because my reserves are down - I used to be a very healthy person.
The Social Service person's response was that if I said I couldn't or wouldn't care for my husband any more, they would be obliged to take over. It felt as though I had been thrown a life line. At the moment, my husband still knows who I am. I'm the only person he always, well almost always knows. But there will probably come a time when he doesn't, and as people keep pointing out to me, it's because I am there, 24/7.
Some time before too long I want to say I can't do this any more. It would be different if, like for so many of you, he were my great love, but frankly, he sucked the joy out of my life for many years, and threatened suicide in front of our then 11 and 9 year old daughters when I said I wanted to leave. My main feelings are sorrow that he should have to have this beastly disease, accompanied by dislike bordering at times on hatred. I wish him dead 20 times a day.
But what I am really afraid of is my life line being taken way - that is, if I say no more, will they in reality just keep throwing more day care, or carers at me. I don't want my home turned into an old people's home, I don't want hoists, grab rails, incontinence supplies, puréed food, a house that smells of wee, all things we are steadily creeping towards. Suppose they say after all, no, SS won't fund (and we certainly can't) then what? I feel terrified to ask and put it to the test. My daughters cannot understand my fears, they think I am mad. But life has been such a strain, keeping everything going for so many years since my husband simply stopped working at the age of 49 and refused to discuss it.
I'm sorry, this is a very selfish post when you all work so hard to care for people you love, but I feel very end of tether'ish.