How do I deal with an emotionally needy mother who wants all of my time and attention?

I took care of my mother for five years in her home. She had a lot of emotional needs, was always concerned about the grandchildren and my sister, and expected a lot of them also, wanted them to be telephoning her or writing letters and spending more time with her. However, mom had a way of being controlling and gets upset with thinks don't meet her expectations. As a result, the grandchildren don't want to come to see her, don't want her in their home, and was the one that had to try to satisfy all her needs, calm her down when they didn't come and visit or call, etc.

She had a close boyfriend and they had wanted to get married, but he died last year. He had gradually gone downhill, and mom was wanting more and more of my attention to fulfill her emotional needs. We moved her to the same town where my sister lives, thinking it would help her to move on, but she was still hanging on to old memories of her two deceased husbands and her boyfriend. She also was calling her friends and running up big telephone bills. She was demanding 100% of my attention and I finally got worn out from trying to help her. She started falling in the apartment and then would wake up in the night, think one of her husbands was out in the parking lot to meet her, or think she received calls from them during the night. She is now in the nursing home, I am still the one trying to fulfill her emotional needs. We have narrowed the phone calls down to Sunday afternoons now using my cell phone, as she does not have a phone in her room. I am still the one having the explain away why my other family members don't come to visit very often and giving me and my family members guilt trips about not doing more for her. My sister got guardianship last week and mom and my sister had a big fight over it, hope this doesn't all blow up tommorow when we have her over for Thanksgiving dinner. This sounds a lot like what my mother has been going through, she was always a very social person and needs a lot of support from others and now that she is in the nursing home she is really upset.

It does help to vent now and then. And I do understand your frustration and that feeling of hopelessness, because you feel like there is no solution. I always feel guilty that I feel trapped and depressed a lot of the time. My husband and I are Christians and go to an evangelical church. My MIL is Catholic. We have invited her to our church and even told her we would drop her off and pick her up at a Catholic church, but she refuses to go. She has always made comments about my husband changing his religion for me. Yet, my husband is active at our church while she has no interest in going to church anywhere. So there you have it. That's another reason I always feel guilty, because I feel as a Christian I should have more compassion. But we are only human with human emotions. We can only do the best we can.

I can relate to all the stories here. Praying for a miracle. I'd like to avoid all family drama, if possible. Unfortunately, it is not always possible. I resolve to be thankful, anyway. I can count many blessings, and plan to focus on those. Not all is good, but a lot is. Thank God for the good.

That is only one perspective. Sometimes parents push their children away, are mean and hateful, and have unrealistic demands on their offspring. Sometimes they have caused a rift, with unreasonable expectations. You can't just blame the children, be they adult or not. Respect needs to go both ways. Shame on parents who treat their kids this way.

Christina
Your e-mail to sbil was nothing but a sarcastic lecture, that I was even taken back by it when I read it!!!
Apparently you have never been a caretaker of an elderly parent and if so well then alls I can say is I am glad it wasn't me you were taking care of with that uncompationate razor sharp attitude. People don't come here for that! We come here to support on another, not tear down one another!!!
So on that note Ms Insensative I think you should do one of two things, either get off this site or appologize to sbil for this horable act of such unkindness.

sbilyeu, we have the opposite problem that you do. My mother-in-law is very passive and won't talk to us at all. She has decided that she doesn't want to be a bother so she will just sit in her room and not talk to anybody. It used to bother me, because it is very awkward when someone won't even make small talk or make eye contact with you. But now, we just let her do what she wants and go about our business as though she is a tenant in our home. My MIL has lived with us for almost 7 years. She has dementia and was forgetting to take her medication and ended up in the hospital. We had to make a very quick decision to fly out to where she was living, pack her up, sell her house and bring her home with us. It was very difficult for her to leave her home state after 83 years. We thought since she was alone, that she would be happy to be near her son and grandchildren. My husband is an only child, and my MIL has the attitude that because she is his mother, that she should come before me. She also resents that he moved away from his home state when he married me and didn't live near her. So I have never been her favorite person. We had a fairly good relationship though as long as we lived in 2 different states. Now, it is just awkward and uncomfortable with her living with us. We are very good at taking care of her physical needs and she is in good health considering she has a lot of problems like diabetes, high blood pressure, etc. But emotionally, it is very hard to deal with and has caused problems in our marriage.

One of the things that has helped is having her go to senior daycare. She seems to like to talk to people her own age. It helps us with our guilt, because we know she is out socializing, getting exercise, playing games and not sitting in her room. Our local Area Agency on Aging allows for her to go 3 times a week and even picks her up in a van. Check in your community. Every state has this organization and a social worker will come to your home and explain the programs that are available.

Her problem is not friends...she is very social and active in her church. They had her participate this last Sunday in the service. She has her priorities all misaligned. She, though 82, is the guardian over a woman who gave my father shots for his illness while he was alive. This other woman is single with no siblings, thus my mother caring for her, my father was her pastor.

Anyway, she needed my mother to come and see her in Tulsa - 50 miles away- mother can still drive during the day. Mom went to see her Sunday, the only day of the week she has major plans during the day...said she was too busy during the week...doing what...I don't know! So, now what is going to happen is I will be overseeing the both of them.

She has been to the Sr. Citizen Center, has many friends there and enjoys it, but chooses to not go. I spoke to her about paying just an amount to us so that she would not feel obligated to buy other stuff...no, she will continue buying stuff...all the wrong stuff of course. I feel so guilty for my annoyance by her, she walked into the room while I was watching tv...alone...in a big easy chair asking "what do you have going on in here?" I turned and sarcastically said..."watching tv, can you not tell what I am doing?" She stormed out. I teach all day and do not feel like participating in idle chit chat...have outright told her this and she tries to guilt me with the response that I should because she wants to talk with me. She talked on her cell phone over 1300 hours to her friends and sister in one month...we got her a land line to use now.

Sorry for the rambling...just needed to vent...know there is not an answer or solution...but for what it is worth, it just helps to know that I am not alone in my frustrations, either similar or not, frustrations are frustrations.

Confused: Your boyfriend should be the one on this website reading about all the people who are trapped taking care of life sucking parents.
If he doesn't train his mother up now, then he's doomed for a life of servitude.

First let me say I am NOT being hateful here and not condemning anyone about what they had to say.

I am 56 years old and for a time I lived with my daughter and her family. I was hurt when they would leave and not tell me they were leaving. I felt the same way about "paying my own way" and I wanted my grandkids to come to me to visit.

Was I needy? NO! I had been the care-giver all my life and all of a sudden I wasnt. I had payed my bills and my way all my life and suddenly I couldnt. They were a part of my family so why was it such a big deal for me to be part of theirs? I had been independent all my life and suddenly I was "under someone elses control". As for the grand kids coming to "visit" did you ever think that perhaps her area was her "home" and she wanted them to come there? Couldnt she have time to be with her grand kids without everyone present?

I think the person that wrote the above question should be praised for wanting to know how to help but at the same time Im ashamed they did. Why have we tossed our old people..our PARENTS...aside? Is it to much trouble for them to be around?

Other nations care about their old, think they are wise and show respect. Only in America do we stuff them in nursing homes, never visit, and just forget them.

I live in an apartment building with older people, like 80 plus, there are people in there that have never left the building during the entire 3 years that Ive lived there. AND no one has came to visit.

Shame on all of us that push our parents away.