@Thethirdmrsc . I really do feel for you. You are right to choose your mental health first. At least that can eventually be mended. “What about me” was a cry I used very often.Like living with dementia, you don’t know until it happens to you, well, the same goes for the care home. I would see your posts, but they didn’t apply to me, or so I thought, but really we are only a crisis away from it. Now it’s a different story, and the guilt is such a weight, that I couldn’t cope, that I chose my mental health over his, and don’t start me on the bitterness I feel, for having my life taken away, to have to work to survive, no husband to share the burden of a health scare. I cry at the drop of a hat now, and dementia is really my whole world. What will I do when it isn’t? sometimes I want to shout at him, what about me? But at the moment, it’s still all about him, and he just doesn’t understand. I told him I had a breast lump, and he said I do too much running around! Turns out it was a blocked gland, but I didn’t want to belong to 2 clubs. The dementia club is enough for now.
”Dementia is your whole world” what will you do when it isn’t.”
I can tell you.
My husband died just over 7 months ago and I am now in the process of reclaiming my life.
As much as I still grieve for him I keep it mainly to myself because I know from
previous experience …now twice widowed….that people, no matter how close they are as friends, after the first couple of months have got over it.
I have chosen not to feel any more guilt .I cared for him at home until his last breath and he is still here with me, in the garden under the apple tree. A great comfort.
I took myself on a foreign holiday 3 months after MH died and have now just got home from a couple of days away where I visited the places we went just before he was unable to do any more.
I wish you strength to cope with whatever is ahead and that goes for you too Peter, please try to stop this feeling of guilt. Bridget has been a lucky woman to have your love and in spite of everything, we have to either go on or go under.
I wouldn’t mind betting that she would be very cross with you for choosing the latter.