I think I have the reverse of the Midas Touch

[snoggy1one]

I think I have the reverse of the Midas Touch.. Everything I touch turns to cr*p lately. Its like the Skittles Ad but everything I touch or do, or say etc turns to rubbish, and turns out to be a disaster.

I have just had enough stress to last me a lifetime and things keep piling up and up. I am waiting to turn the corner and have some fun and happiness but I cannot seem to escape from all my problems. I don't know where to start really.....

What a year this has been. Mum has been deteriorating so much over the past year and she used to be such a pleasant , patient and quiet person. She is now awkward, and difficult. She criticises me all the time, and insults me saying I am putting on weight, my hair is a mess, my clothes are too tight, too small, and nothing is right whatever I do. I have tried hard to ignore it, but it is smashing up my confidence.

Mum is getting very hard to visit in the care home. Each time she wants to come home with me, and regularly insults me and plays me up. I have to sneak out and make excuses at the end of the visit and get the carers to distract mum whilst I come home as mum never wants to be left alone. Then I come home and feel emotionally drained and worried about her.

I have tried short visits, long visits, spacing visits out, and nothing works. I am always the bad guy. I always try and arrive positive with sweets, chocs or a treat for me, but mum then gets angry when I am leaving or nasty, and most of the visits ends in disaster. Then I drive home and get upset and want to go back again to make things right between us.

I think the carers get fed up when I visit because they always have to pacify mum when I leave, and then they have to put up with my phone calls later when I get home checking if she is okay. Mum gets so worked up that she refuses her meal afterwards and then I wonder if my visits are disrupting her too mum and is it actually worth going and am I doing her any good or is it too unsettling, yet I do not want to abandon her.

Mums sister used to visit weekly but has given up now and doesnt want the upset of mums outbursts. I am upset about that as it helped to give me a break when my Aunty visited mum and I feel more pressured now. I feel that I am left to it now as one by one all my family and relatives, apart from me have dropped off visiting mum.

To make matters worse, my work has dried up and I am now without employment, which zaps my confidence to rock bottom too. With all the added upset and pressure, I feel drained all the time.

Just when I thought things couldnt get any worse.....My step daughter is only young and has just announced that she is pregnant and her partner is a walking disaster, my worst nightmare, with no money, no real job, and certainly no prospects. He is total dreamer and I am worried about how she will cope and manage financially and emotionally. I have enough problems coping with mums illness without having to support another family. I am trying to cope but it is really smashing me up and I just don't know which way to turn.

Hope you don't mind me off loading again.... but I need some support right now. I am tired out and losing lots of sleep, and just need to moan.... again.... sorry xxxxxx

 

[CareGiver-1]

Hi SNOGGY1ONE -- You've been having a very tough time of it.

A similar thing happened to a distant cousin's (John) father who was in a Catholic nursing home. John's mother and brother discontinued visitations; John felt like his dad just could not be cut off from the family. Upon each of John's departures, his dad became screaming-upset with him leaving. Then John's dad turned physically violent against anyone at the home. He had to be sedated and restrained each time. John finally had to stop visitations. It really turned out better for John's dad -- by not visiting and just sending flowers, or chocolates, without a card from family members -- his father was pacified thinking someone liked him and did not notice that no one came to visit, the nursing home became peaceful; they gave John weekly reports on his dad so the family was kept in the loop. After about a month John got over his initial guilt, felt much less stressed, and could handle his own life better.

That is what John did, but I don't really know what you can do except to talk to a counselor at the nursing home and get some advice on how to handle your mother.

As for the step-daughter getting pregnant, where is her dad in all of this? My sister's two daughters got pregnant when they were 15 and 16. It was difficult at first for she and her husband to handle, but talking together, and counseling with their pastor and with the daughters helped a lot. Turns out neither daughter married the fathers of their children and are better off for it. Breathe -- take it one step at a time/one day at a time -- talk and listen to each other.

If you need a break from all that stress, do like I do every now and then, I go to the laundry room and cry, get it out of my system, wash my face, and feel a little better for having done it without feeling guilty that I broke down.

Take care, better times will come.

 

[cragmaid]

Don't visit...or at least don't visit too often. Don't fret about leaving Mum in the hands of the carers....that is what they are there for. Try leaving at meal times, ask the carers to take Mum into the dining room and then leave. Don't ring the home to see how Mum is, when you get home, ask them to phone if there are problems, but stop looking for them.
Stop letting Mum and Dementia make a victim out of you.

Hard words I know, and even harder to put into practice.....I know that too. I've been the evil one, the one who forced her mother to live in care, who didn't love her enough to let her stay home ( to fall down the stairs, starve herself and live in last week's or longer dirty clothes). ....but practice them you must, if you are to survive what your Mother's illness is throwing at you.

Your step-daughter's situation is another problem to be faced....but again there will be help and advice for her and you. I assume that she is wanting to have the baby, therfore you will support her, but that does not mean take over and manage her life....she has to be allowed to learn and to grow into the role of parent, as does her partner. There are so many here who will, like me, have married too young, married the wrong person, had children, had too many children had problem children........the list is long with faults real and imagined. Stop and draw breath, pregnancy is nine months and the challenges do not have to be faced all in one go.

Take care of you, because, believe it or not, you are actually the most important person in your family, and all the rest need you to be strong.