I've been taking care of my mother with dementia for 9 months with little support from my sibling. I am feeling frustrated, tired and drained!
I've asked my sibling for more support and she becames angry. I know she lives 3 hours from us, but maybe helping 1 weekend a month would give me a breather. She refused!
How do you all find time for self care?
What is your situation? Do you and your mother live together, and if so, in your house or hers? Or are you going somewhere daily to take care of her?
Do you have a job and/or family that you are also managing?
If it's too overwhelming for you, then the best thing would be to hire a part-time caregiver to come to her home, or place her in a memory care facility. This should be at her expense.
I'm sorry for your exhaustion and frustration. I hope our suggestions can help you find some solutions. Don't just carry on as usual at the destruction of your mental and physical health.
I'm not sure how bad your mom's dementia is. Can you afford to have a visiting angel come in during the week some time so that you can go have some uninterrupted time for yourself?
As I'm writing this, it's because I needed a time out from my mom. My heart goes out to you, honestly it does. I was just getting ready to take her on her daily outing to the store. She started railing at me because the neighbor returned some storage containers. I had made them an appetizer for their Super Bowl watching. The neighbor had brought a few brownie bites, and I committed the sin of offering one to my mom.
She proceeded to pull a piece of paper out of her bag saying she has a sensitive gastric system and has to be careful about what she eats.
Every day, she has a different sense of what is and isn't okay. So I've learned to be very flexible with respect to what she eats. It makes meal planning a nightmare, however, and I live with the notion she may opt to refuse anything I offer her. If that's the case, she's on her own. I take her to Whole Foods every day.
I know I have some things that I need to do for myself and I have to push myself to do them. I know I'm just not myself and have been living with a low grade depression because I so rarely get a break from her.
Today I'm doing okay because I'm sprucing up my room and decluttering. In a moment, I'll take her and our dogs to the store so she can shop. Then I'll stop in and get what I need while she waits in the car with her little dog to comfort her.
What upsets me is when I begin to wonder how many more years I will have to spend living like this. She has been with me for six years. Living with me, she eats better, gets more exercise because I got her a dog. I have mixed feelings about this whole set up. I want her to have her dignity, and she's perfectly happy to rob me of mine. She has absolutely no concept of what a nightmare it is to live with her constant litany of complaints.
If I have a difference of opinion, she calls me Hitler. She tells me I'm just like my father, and then lists out every last one of his imperfections.
I miss what it was like for me before she came here and I long for the day when she no longer takes up oxygen in my home.
It is what it is, and I look at it as my daily practice to find things to do and be grateful for so that I do not become her.
Ha, ha here I've ranted away and behaved just like her.
Do something nice for yourself today. I'm gonna go get some exercise so that I can feel better physically and maybe work out some of my icky can't-stand-the-gal who's living in my house blues.
Also, now that I've had a rant, I'll find the things I do love about her, like she waters the plants and feeds the dogs and takes them outside a million times a day.
I don't know if any of this will help you at all. I know it helps me a LOT when I'm at the end of my tether to know I'm not alone, even though we all have different details.
As a dear friend says, If it's not one thing, it's your mother.
I have bee there in your cituacion is very exhausting job. Is there any help from the city, county or support group you can reach out. Ok, if your siblings are unable to help you then ask them if they are willing to pay someone to help you so you can have a break. Best of luck.🙏
If you are to the point of burn out you may have to have your mother start paying for some in-home help so you can get out a few hours a day or at least a couple days a week to do the things that you enjoy.
Or it may be time to have your mother placed in a memory care facility where you can get back to just being her child and advocate and not her burned out, frustrated and tired caregiver.
If your mother was in her right mind there is no way in hell that she would want you killing yourself because of her.
Please don't forget that you matter too in this equation.