687
Dear 687 - I completely understand how you feel. My Mum was aggressive to my Brother and I when we were young. I was petrified of her. My Brother lives in the same town as her but when our Dad died he made the decision not to see her unless he absolutely has too. I have much younger children though and made the decision to soldier on so that they could not accuse me of keeping them away from her later in life. (She stopped us seeing our Nanny!) I carried on seeing my Mum partly out of duty, not love at all.
She is now suffering vascular dementia and has had a few strokes. She is furious with me because she is now in a care home and she blames me totally for this.
When she had the diagnosis from the Consultant, he was so helpful. I felt guilty for putting her in the care home even though the experts were telling me she cannot look after herself properly. The Consultant explained that her language is surprisingly good for someone with so much impairment, which means she can be quite convincing when telling them she wants to go home. It turns out that her Dementia is worse than I originally thought. It helps very much to think about the things he told me about Dementia as it explains her behaviour to a certain extent. He also advised me very strongly to look after my own mental health, which we often fail to do. He told me beyond a doubt that if I took a weekend off (I live at some distance now) then she would probably not remember anyway and since she is in a good home I know she is being looked after well. I no longer exhaust myself by visiting twice a week and feel so much better.
Mum is very aggressive towards me and has threatened to kill me, frequently swears at me, tells me I ruined her marriage (which she ruined herself!) etc etc. BUT she thinks it is my job to look after her, which cannot happen cos I am a single Mother with three kids and a job (recent Divorce). The Doctors and carers are all supportive about this and understand that I simply cannot care for my Mother on top of everything else. (Oh and I can still run faster than her and always ensure I have an exit route)
The carers have been amazing. They actively help by distracting my Mother so I can leave quickly if necessary.
The other technique I use is to not to give any reaction at all if she starts too warm up - I just shrug and say hmm! Since she does not get a response she seems to give up.
Is it time for you Mother to go into care? You have a life and a responsibility to your children - and like me are probably not qualified to look after her? I lose my temper internally with my Mother all of the time and simply could not cope with her taking over my life. I would definitely not do this unless there was no other way.
I really hope that things improve for you. The comments that remind us that this is an illness and that actually they are unaware of the effect of their actions are so true and helpful.
