Yesterday, I talked to my family solicitor about registering Power of Attourney with the Court of Protection for my mum, so that I can start to shoulder some of the struggles with finances.
My mum doesn't have a diagnosis as far as I know (she went for a test and they apparently found nothing wrong) - though she may have chosen to conceal it from me. However, having seen my dad through the various stages of dementia (he's now in the very advanced stage, in a carehome near my mum) I can see what is happening. At the moment she goes from good days/times to bad, where she is disoriented and frenetic, can't remember what she needs to tell me and has pretty poor cognition.
I live some 5 hours away from my mum. I have a troubled relationship with her. I want to do my duty as best I can, but I am really very fearful for my mental health and my own relationship (I have been civilly partnered for 12 years).
My mum has never "talked" to anyone in her life, but a couple of years ago, over a drink with my parents-in-law, chatting about experiences growing up during WW2 she revealed that her mother (my grandmother) was ill when mum was around 3 or 4 years old, and my mum was sent away to be looked after for a while, because my grandfather had been sent to Burma (1942). A little later in the conversation, she was talking about being in this boarding place where two sisters - not nice - were in charge. Out of no-where she got suddenly upset and started saying that all the people abused by Jimmy Savile should have kept it to themselves, that it does no good. As soon as it was out, she steered the conversation away. All of us knew it was weird, and that she had expressed something, in her own way, about being both abandoned and then abused at an early age.
My mum is now becoming frail, isn't eating properly, is depressed and showing signs of dementia. I think she has had PTSD all her life - having looked up the symptoms, it goes some way to understanding my mum - why she is as she is - which includes my own problematic experiences of her as a child and growing up. I was always afraid of when she would get angry for no apparent reason, and I have difficulty recalling close times with her that make me smile (as I do with my dad). This is not to say I don't love her - I do, but with a caveat that she causes me distress, always has.
Suffice to say, I have spent my life protecting myself in some way from my mum. And I have always been terrified of the black hole at the centre of her - without having any of the recent revelation to make any sense of it.
As she develops dementia, she is becoming insistently needy, and berates me for not being in touch (sometimes she forgets). She might be critical in one call, and then all over me being nice the next. I used to phone my parents every 3-6 months as a method of personal survival. But this isn't possible for me as her daughter any more. I am trying to phone her once a week.
Her relationship to me and others is that of a five-year-old who wants everyone but her to take responsibility for her life. Attempts to help are often met with antagonism and refusal. She is a darkly depressed child.
I have a brother who fled to Thailand, has a family and works there. I find him even more problematic than my mum; she idolizes him, and in many ways he is like her. He's not a bad person, but I would say "on the spectrum" and his help can make things worse - his style of communication is loud-hailer.
Anyway - that's the background. Apols - this feels a bit of a too-long post.
I spent 4 days with my mum to make up for having spent Christmas with just me and my partner, for the first time in over 10 years. 4 days is way too long and I am suffering the fallout from this - now three weeks ago. I have had a series of tremendous arguments, and have traumatized my partner with displays of self-harm. I have just sought counselling and think I have some of the signs and symptoms of Borderline Personality Disorder - which I experience as extremes of emotion, anger and self-harming and being terrified of being left. I feel very tender and upset about this self-diagnosis - but it is the first time anything has made sense of the way I can occasionally be.
I guess I am afraid of the future, the future of finding ways to cope with caring for my mum. The idea of having her live nearer (she would jump at this in a fraction of a second) would be the end of my mental health. But the idea of travelling to do long weekends with her, or worse, having her visit is equally troubling.
WRT my dad, after a few years of upset and trauma in dealing with it, now I am just very sad about him and miss him a lot. The whole of my family landscape has shifted, my ways of dealing with my broken "family self" - the one I try to keep from capsizing me - is no longer working.
I wonder if anyone else has experiences that echo this. My mum never meant to be a bad parent, she was dealing with things beyond her, but she was in many ways neglectful and abusive - and has never taken any responsibility for it. I feel very very sorry for her sometimes, and bad for myself. Not sure how to look after myself with this little cauldron.
My mum doesn't have a diagnosis as far as I know (she went for a test and they apparently found nothing wrong) - though she may have chosen to conceal it from me. However, having seen my dad through the various stages of dementia (he's now in the very advanced stage, in a carehome near my mum) I can see what is happening. At the moment she goes from good days/times to bad, where she is disoriented and frenetic, can't remember what she needs to tell me and has pretty poor cognition.
I live some 5 hours away from my mum. I have a troubled relationship with her. I want to do my duty as best I can, but I am really very fearful for my mental health and my own relationship (I have been civilly partnered for 12 years).
My mum has never "talked" to anyone in her life, but a couple of years ago, over a drink with my parents-in-law, chatting about experiences growing up during WW2 she revealed that her mother (my grandmother) was ill when mum was around 3 or 4 years old, and my mum was sent away to be looked after for a while, because my grandfather had been sent to Burma (1942). A little later in the conversation, she was talking about being in this boarding place where two sisters - not nice - were in charge. Out of no-where she got suddenly upset and started saying that all the people abused by Jimmy Savile should have kept it to themselves, that it does no good. As soon as it was out, she steered the conversation away. All of us knew it was weird, and that she had expressed something, in her own way, about being both abandoned and then abused at an early age.
My mum is now becoming frail, isn't eating properly, is depressed and showing signs of dementia. I think she has had PTSD all her life - having looked up the symptoms, it goes some way to understanding my mum - why she is as she is - which includes my own problematic experiences of her as a child and growing up. I was always afraid of when she would get angry for no apparent reason, and I have difficulty recalling close times with her that make me smile (as I do with my dad). This is not to say I don't love her - I do, but with a caveat that she causes me distress, always has.
Suffice to say, I have spent my life protecting myself in some way from my mum. And I have always been terrified of the black hole at the centre of her - without having any of the recent revelation to make any sense of it.
As she develops dementia, she is becoming insistently needy, and berates me for not being in touch (sometimes she forgets). She might be critical in one call, and then all over me being nice the next. I used to phone my parents every 3-6 months as a method of personal survival. But this isn't possible for me as her daughter any more. I am trying to phone her once a week.
Her relationship to me and others is that of a five-year-old who wants everyone but her to take responsibility for her life. Attempts to help are often met with antagonism and refusal. She is a darkly depressed child.
I have a brother who fled to Thailand, has a family and works there. I find him even more problematic than my mum; she idolizes him, and in many ways he is like her. He's not a bad person, but I would say "on the spectrum" and his help can make things worse - his style of communication is loud-hailer.
Anyway - that's the background. Apols - this feels a bit of a too-long post.
I spent 4 days with my mum to make up for having spent Christmas with just me and my partner, for the first time in over 10 years. 4 days is way too long and I am suffering the fallout from this - now three weeks ago. I have had a series of tremendous arguments, and have traumatized my partner with displays of self-harm. I have just sought counselling and think I have some of the signs and symptoms of Borderline Personality Disorder - which I experience as extremes of emotion, anger and self-harming and being terrified of being left. I feel very tender and upset about this self-diagnosis - but it is the first time anything has made sense of the way I can occasionally be.
I guess I am afraid of the future, the future of finding ways to cope with caring for my mum. The idea of having her live nearer (she would jump at this in a fraction of a second) would be the end of my mental health. But the idea of travelling to do long weekends with her, or worse, having her visit is equally troubling.
WRT my dad, after a few years of upset and trauma in dealing with it, now I am just very sad about him and miss him a lot. The whole of my family landscape has shifted, my ways of dealing with my broken "family self" - the one I try to keep from capsizing me - is no longer working.
I wonder if anyone else has experiences that echo this. My mum never meant to be a bad parent, she was dealing with things beyond her, but she was in many ways neglectful and abusive - and has never taken any responsibility for it. I feel very very sorry for her sometimes, and bad for myself. Not sure how to look after myself with this little cauldron.