Hi everyone
Not been on this website for a while but am struggling at the moment with stress and guilt at not wanting to take even the smallest part of caring for my mother. First of all is this normal?
A bit of background info - my mother was diagnosed with probable AD just over a year ago - she lives on her own (my father died over 30 years ago) and is 78. I have 2 older brothers who are doing an excellent job of sorting care out for our mother, we have at present a lady who comes in the morning to look after mum and keeps her entertained for the morning and makes her lunch (mum is certainly not capable of making her own lunch) she then hands over to another carer in the afternoon who hands over my Mum's friend who stays with her over night. My mother lives in the north west and us kids are all based in the north east so we can't do this day to day care ourselves.
This is a new arrangement as Mum was OK to leave on her own over night until recently when she started getting up and dressed in the middle of the night and rang her friend to ask where she was - at 2am in the morning!! Obviously this became difficult and my brothers arranged night care for her.
Mum had been prescribed Aricept and then taken off it again - there was such a decline that the doctors were persuaded by my brothers to prescribe it again but she will not revert back to the stage she was at before they took her off and that makes me mad too!!!!
Anyway to continue - We and our extended family have been visiting once a month on a rota type basis to look after her and give her main carer a break as obviously (as you all know) it is a very tiring. We now need to cover the extra nights and I am ashamed to say that I don't want to - its not that I don't care - I do - Its just so difficult to see her this way especially as she treats us kids differently, if either of my brothers ask her to do something she will try to do what they want - if I ask - she will tell me that she doesn't want to do it. If my fiance is there she will - Am i making sense here? Basically men are more important than women (yea right!!!) must be her upbringing I guess.
We bring her away for a week usually during school holidays so that Mary gets a weeks break which we did as normal in February - she was only at my house for 2 days but by day 2 at 10am in the morning she had me in tears (which I hid from her - no point in both of us being upset) I had to ask my fiance to take her out for half an hour to give me the chance to calm down (bless him - after one look at my face he took her out for a drive to the shops)
Ever since I have been stressed and tearful - my question is how to deal with this - or should I say how do other people cope especially those of you who are full time carers - actually thinking about all of you is making me feel worse - I apologise if you think I am being a tad selfish but I could use some tips on how to cope with looking after someone who you know and yet don't know?
Conversations don't really happen as Mum can't follow them any more - I think she doesn't understand the words and its all confusing for her so keeping her entertained is a huge challenge - again any suggestions? She seems to like doing jigsaws but I have noticed of late that she doesn't find many pieces to fit anymore. She has her puzzle books which keep her busy for a short time (I know she gets some of the answers from the back of the book but hey does it really matter?
She enjoys Scrabble & Solitaire on the computer at home and at my brothers houses but won't play these at my house for some reason??? I know there are no answers with this and that this is part of the frustration - I like to know "why" unfortunately no-one seems to know the answers - I hate this disease.
Any suggestions on coping and entertaining her will be hugely welcome.
Many thanks
Kay
Not been on this website for a while but am struggling at the moment with stress and guilt at not wanting to take even the smallest part of caring for my mother. First of all is this normal?
A bit of background info - my mother was diagnosed with probable AD just over a year ago - she lives on her own (my father died over 30 years ago) and is 78. I have 2 older brothers who are doing an excellent job of sorting care out for our mother, we have at present a lady who comes in the morning to look after mum and keeps her entertained for the morning and makes her lunch (mum is certainly not capable of making her own lunch) she then hands over to another carer in the afternoon who hands over my Mum's friend who stays with her over night. My mother lives in the north west and us kids are all based in the north east so we can't do this day to day care ourselves.
This is a new arrangement as Mum was OK to leave on her own over night until recently when she started getting up and dressed in the middle of the night and rang her friend to ask where she was - at 2am in the morning!! Obviously this became difficult and my brothers arranged night care for her.
Mum had been prescribed Aricept and then taken off it again - there was such a decline that the doctors were persuaded by my brothers to prescribe it again but she will not revert back to the stage she was at before they took her off and that makes me mad too!!!!
Anyway to continue - We and our extended family have been visiting once a month on a rota type basis to look after her and give her main carer a break as obviously (as you all know) it is a very tiring. We now need to cover the extra nights and I am ashamed to say that I don't want to - its not that I don't care - I do - Its just so difficult to see her this way especially as she treats us kids differently, if either of my brothers ask her to do something she will try to do what they want - if I ask - she will tell me that she doesn't want to do it. If my fiance is there she will - Am i making sense here? Basically men are more important than women (yea right!!!) must be her upbringing I guess.
We bring her away for a week usually during school holidays so that Mary gets a weeks break which we did as normal in February - she was only at my house for 2 days but by day 2 at 10am in the morning she had me in tears (which I hid from her - no point in both of us being upset) I had to ask my fiance to take her out for half an hour to give me the chance to calm down (bless him - after one look at my face he took her out for a drive to the shops)
Ever since I have been stressed and tearful - my question is how to deal with this - or should I say how do other people cope especially those of you who are full time carers - actually thinking about all of you is making me feel worse - I apologise if you think I am being a tad selfish but I could use some tips on how to cope with looking after someone who you know and yet don't know?
Conversations don't really happen as Mum can't follow them any more - I think she doesn't understand the words and its all confusing for her so keeping her entertained is a huge challenge - again any suggestions? She seems to like doing jigsaws but I have noticed of late that she doesn't find many pieces to fit anymore. She has her puzzle books which keep her busy for a short time (I know she gets some of the answers from the back of the book but hey does it really matter?
She enjoys Scrabble & Solitaire on the computer at home and at my brothers houses but won't play these at my house for some reason??? I know there are no answers with this and that this is part of the frustration - I like to know "why" unfortunately no-one seems to know the answers - I hate this disease.
Any suggestions on coping and entertaining her will be hugely welcome.
Many thanks
Kay