The Caregiver & Dysfunctional Families: How are you doing?

Hi everyone. I haven't checked in in awhile, it has been too crazy and I've been depressed. I went on my vacation to Arizona for 5 days. Didn't get to see Sedona, one of my traveling companions ended up in the hospital for 2 days. I almost cried in the ED, I went on that trip to get away from sick and needy people.

While away I was finding mom refused to stay at the caregivers house and actually crawled up and down the stairs at my place. I FLIPPED! Coming home we had 2 huge blow ups. We are signing her up for MediCal so we can get IHSS but it will take a while. Toured the board and care, not bad. Have papers for the Doc to fill out. And mom remembers enough to know I'm going on a trip in May. She asked Gwen if I'm going to put her in a nursing home then. Well.....I just Might!

I booked a cruise to Alaska and am taking my son with me. Will be gone 10 days. I need to live my life and for 5 yrs I've been saying I can't do things because mom is here. But 5 yrs is a long time to be denying myself for a selfish B. During one of our arguments she wanted me to be straight and honest with her so I told her she's mean and rude and nobody wants to have anything to do with her. So THere!!

She's been much nicer ever since.

Loretta, sorry you're going through such a hard time.

Loretta there is only one thing to do. Take her to the nearest ER for whatever reason. She must have a UTI or something and refuse to take her home again.Tell them you are sick have a migraine or something and must leave while she is treated. DO NOT TELL HOSPICE what you are doing and don't tell the ER she is a hospice patient. When the hospital calls to have you pick her up tell then you can no longer care for her. By then she will be yelling for her meds which of course they won't give her and they will probably transfer her to a psychiatric facility where she will undergo detox and after that be placed. They can not drop her back at your front door. You will have to put up with all kinds of harassment from the hospital, nurses Drs and social workers but stick to your decision if not for you for the sake of your children. Your alternative is to do nothing. If you wait for a NH she is going to refuse to go so again you will be up a creek without a paddle . Do not tell anyone what you are going to do especially brother. The land and mobile home will be seized so make sure there is nothing in the trailer you want because Medicaid will come and padlock it. If brother wants a fancy funeral when the time comes he can pay for it. I am so sorry if this sounds really harsh and very difficult to do but ask SA what she had to do. You can send her a private note on her message board. good thoughts and courage come to you. Just do it and stand your ground. Come back and tell us how things went. Blessings

Emjo,

I read about your kitty, and I'm so sorry about that, may he rest in peace.

Much Love & Light! Margeaux

Veronica can I like your comment twice? Loretta, When you take your mother to the ER tell them she has a MENTAL STATUS CHANGE .. they will see how she is acting and admit her. When you said your kids are scared thats a show stopper. You've done all you can...Let us know how things work out.

So glad I found this topic/thread. Like many others we were viewed as the perfect family on the outside...My 80 year old mother I am caring for constantly tells me what a great life/childhood we had. At this point, it is fruitless to argue otherwise. My immediate family consists of 2 brothers, both alcoholics, 1 deceased brother that was an alcoholic- & committed suicide. My father was a control freak and we were all codependent, my mother included. I am working on my codependency issues and luckily, I do not abuse alcohol, just food! My father never wanted us to grow up and held us back through emotional abuse. Both brothers have filed bankruptcy twice and have financial issues. Both have codependent children. I am happy to report I have broken the cycle. I have 2 lovely, independent, financially successful daughters. I talked at length to them about the family. Me, I am working on my issues. Married twice. Went back to school, graduate this fall and trying to pick up the pieces and move forward. As the only daughter, I find myself in the caregiving role. Right now I unemployed, but looking to find work after I graduate. Trying to set boundaries with my narcissistic mother. Hope to get a job & wean her off my caregiving responsibility. My father died in January of this year & have many conflicting emotions, I am sad, but also feel the reign of terror is finally over. I have read several books about codependency and it is sad I have wasted half my life not taking care of myself and only taking care of others. I am a work in progress, would like to go back to therapy but cost is an issue.

Sandwich,

You poor darling. I had a good laugh at how you posted what a day you had.
I hope you don't mind my saying, that it was absolutely hilarious to read. These are the kind of things this battle ax aunt of ours used to do when she was in the care of my sister and the caregivers and how I ended up here. What an angel you have for a husband. O.K., I certainly you find the proper place for her soon.

Much Love & Light! Margeaux

Loretta~I can relate to a lot of what you posted. I suggest you read a thread called " Two years this July my mother has been living with me. She is a mean and hateful woman and I just can't do it anymore." If you can read through it to where she finally got her mother out of her home, you will learn a lot. It is true that once a social worker takes over, your mother's assets will be frozen, this includes if she has a home and her bank accounts and any income. If you are living in your mother's home, you will be forced to leave. Lisa, who created the thread, had to get a second social worker to help her because the first sw was intent on reuniting them, so don't be afraid to get another sw involved if the first one is not listening to you.


Mimix2~You came to right thread to find support...welcome!! We understand, many of us came from alcoholic families, myself included. My sister is now sober but has many health issues as a result of drinking, my eldest brother is estranged by his choice but we suspect he is an alcoholic because he does drink and had a bleeding ulcer 2 years ago. My second eldest brother does enjoy his Jack Daniels, he and his wife have a pac,t when he is drinking or they are socializing....when she believes he has had enough, she will move his glass away from him and he accepts it. It sends red flags up to me!! He also has health issues but not related to alcohol. I have managed to avoid the alcohol, I do have a beer or two but not very often, most often it is in the summer time after working in the yard. We are all a work in progress and at different levels of our growth. Come back when you are ready, you can come here to vent, share and get feedback from others.

Well, I have thoroughly pissed off my sister! I do a little guilty but I have been trying to get through to her for over a year now that I want my weekends to be my weekends just like her weekends are for her. I told her all I am asking is that you ask me if I am able to do something before you volunteer me for it. On Saturday and Sunday (her weekend) she seldom comes to town, she most often will not answer the phone. My weekends which often are not 2 consecutive days, I am running errands, visiting my mom, picking up supplies for mom, or I am at mom's house seeing that the yard waste is put out for pick up or dr. appts for mom. Don't get me wrong, I do not have an issue seeing to my mom's needs, but I do have an issue when my sis adds more to my plate because I am locally located to mom. My sister is only working 20 hours a week, she can work these 20 hours in 2 1/2 days if she wanted to, but she insists on going to work daily for 4 hours each day. It is costing her more in gas because she lives 30 minutes from her job. I am not saying that my sister does not have her hands full with taking care of all of mom's financial, but she has developed boundaries around her weekend. That is all I am trying to do too. I told her she would not like it if I said, Oh "K" can take care of that, "K" can do this or "K" can do that. Well she didn't respond back to any of that. Maybe I did not handle this in the best way, but I have tried to get her understand since the first of last year when mom was still at home and I was running back and forth between work, my house and mom's house and sis would come down here to give me a break even on Saturday and Sunday. Granted, she was still working full time then, but in Feb. of last year she was demoted from doing accounts receivables to data entry. It was her employers first step to faze my sis out. Then in December of last year, they told her she could only work 20 hours a week. Sis is in denial and she thinks she will be able to get full time work from them when the economy changes, it is not going to happen. She is not the only older employee they have done this to. My heart breaks for her as she only has her job in her life. The friends that she had have all disappeared because they are all drinkers. My sister put her friendships first over family including her daughters. If she had these friends in her life now, she would put them first...I know this to be fact. She does have a couple girlfriends from childhood that she will get together with a few times a year...dinner after work. If I suggest that she and I have dinner when she gets off work...she is too tired or can't afford it. Enough ranting about this, she will get over this.

I just have one other to bring up about my sister then I will shut the h*** up for a while, LOL!! For Thanksgiving for sister wanted to bring dessert...a pie. Well for the last several years none of us would eat dessert (my mom would bring an apple or pumpkin pie), we are all burned out on apple and pumpkin. So, I suggested to sis she buy a pecan pie. Sis won't eat dessert because of diabetes, even though hubby is diabetic too, he loves pecan pie and so do I. Sis came in my home...she hands me the pecan pie saying, here is your pecan pie, I personally will not eat it as it is too sweet but I bought it for you!!

Oh my goodness!! I found that thread from Lisa... Her situation was identical to mine, it was as if I was reading about my mother! I only got to read the first few pages because I have to go have test at the hospital this morning due to a bad report on my mammogram :(. When I get back I'm going to sit with a cup of coffee and continue reading the rest, I can't wait! Thanks so much.. This has really helped me, there is actually people out there that is as crazy as my mother! I get worried when I have yo leave home be sues I have to leave her here by herself, I had to take the phone away from her at the request of dispatcher from the 911 center! So if there was an emergency, she hasn't a phone. I have to go to the hospital tho, I have to get this done. I've let myself and my health go to care for her for far too long. The reason I had to take her phone is because she is a hypochondriac! She was calling 911 crying wolf! Sometimes I wasn't even aware that she had called 911! When she was at her home, she did that often. She wanted to be in the hospital when she had taken all her pain pills and was withdrawing, she got her fix at the hospital and they would release her with a script for more pain pills! We live in ky and when the KASPER reports started, they caught into what she was doing. They have her in all surrounding hospitals computer like a mugshot pic of her with a warning label of drug abuser! That's the truth, weird as it sounds... I seen it and a hospital staff employee explained it to me. Anyways when she moved in with me, she was calling 911 because she couldn't poop, headache, and one time she called and lied to them saying I was a burglar and when I took the phone from her the dispatch demanded I give the caller back the phone, I was trying to explain to the dispatcher that I'm not a burglar, that I live here, that this is my home! The dispatcher believed what mom was telling them, within 5 minutes there was 3 different emergency vehicles with sirens, lights and all zooming in my yard and driveway! Once they came inside my house, that's when they seen for themselves that she was lying! So then the lady at the 911 center told me to take the phone away from her because there has been too many fake calls from her and if there was a true emergency then there could be a chance that they wouldn't take the call seriously! But the crazy mother that I have was trying to get me removed from my own house!! Thank you all so much for letting me get this all out!! I'm not alone anymore :). I've worked in the healthcare field for over 20 years from the hospital, nursing homes to home health and have never came across a patient like my mother! All my patients throughout the years, every single one of them was so grateful and kind and appreciative with everything I did for them and I enjoyed being their caregiver but this patient here is far by the worst I've ever in countered!! My own mother!! What a nightmare!!

I'm glad that Sharyn was able to refer you to Lisa's thread. That was the very first thread I read when I found this site looking for how to caregive 2 bedridden parents. Although her story had nothing to do with my situation, I was hooked by the title. At that time, I had a dial-up connection for the internet. Every time I hit the darn "enter" key, it took 1-2 minutes to turn to the next page. Then the internet dropped, I had to re-dial, etc... I got so fed up because I was so into Lisa's story and my internet slowness was driving me crazy. I went and got a wireless connection which made my phone bill go from $28 to $82.00!

7Loretta, a tip I learned while I was reading Lisa's very very long thread. If you can open a Word File, then just copy the internet site's info on the above "www.aging.care.com/discussions/The-Caregiver-Dysfunctional-Families-xxxxxx" and then paste it on your Word File. So, that when you come back to read Lisa's thread, you can continue where you left off. When I first started reading her thread, I had to go to the FIRST page, then kept scrolling NEXT, NEXT until I found where I left off. Because my internet was very very slow, I ended up spend Hours just reading a few at a time. I learned a lot from Lisa's thread about what to do and not to do.

FYI, if you do set up a file for her thread, then you can also take notes and then copy the site's top info and paste it. Example, the funny part at the bank. You can type - "bank incident ... and then paste below it the website's page on it by copying/pasting the www... '

I am glad you found Lisa's thread. I thought of her immediately as I read your post because of the similarities. You won't be able to stop reading it until you reach the end. It took me about 4 days to read through it, LOL!!

Book~Thank you for your words of support. I do feel like a bully for doing this to my sister, but she doesn't listen or hear what I am saying. Now I have hurt her feelings and my own.

Hi all, I'm lurking. There's a couple more doctor's visits for my father this month to get him back on track after he just quit taking meds and such. After that, I did tell my older bro I would bring my father down to Indy and show him some neighborhoods and properties.

My life is moving so slow. The crises I've faced, one right after another, just seem to be over. July 21, 2011 was the day I dove headfirst into caregiving, and it just seems I may be a different person altogether now. I am still going to gym and trying to get myself strong and healthy so I will have the strength to make whatever changes/moves need to be made. But right now… its just slow… I used to like to MOVE MOVE MOVE things along, but it doesn't work like that anymore. That's ok.

Hello Loretta and Mimi, Marialake and DiLynn, as well as all of you wonderful "regulars." I've been reading, just don't have much to add right now. I hope everyone is well. Spring just might be here at last for some of us, now THAT is great news!

Loretta. not sure what Kasper reports are but there definitely are HIPPA laws that others can not release someone's info. Huge fines are involved if violated.

KASPER is Kentucky All Schedule Prescription Electronic Reporting. In New York it is called I-STOP: Internet System for Tracking Over Prescribing. These laws nullify HIPAA, you become a poster child for drug abuse.

In California it is CURES/PDMP. I am sure every state has their own version of this law. Thank you pst for bring this to our attention.

I went to my mom's house earlier today to spray with round up. It was very difficult being there on an emotional basis. The walls were bare, most of the books were gone, the pictures were all gone, the 1970's stereo cabinet turn table and 8 track was still there. I was not surprised to see it still there. Sis thought it was a collectible. Anyway...it has tore me up emotionally, I can't deal with going over there now. Once they remove all that is left..the house will be empty except for the curtains (drapes for the snobs) on the windows. The teacups are all gone, the sewing machine and cabinet are gone. I am grieving this loss much harder than I anticipated. Well gotta go and take another break to get myself together again. I hate being so emotional.

Pstegman-Do you know if they have the Kasper version in FL? My mother needs to be on the list ;)

Go to NASCA.org and enter your state, they will tell you who is in charge with contact information.

The Florida Prescription Drug Monitoring Program, known as E-FORCSE® (Electronic-Florida Online Reporting of Controlled Substance Evaluation Program), ...

Sharyn.... as hard as it is.... grieving is good..........hugs to you!

Found this our when I last visited my PCG. the nurse had to go on line and found that I had a prescription last Oct for some narcotics odered for post op pain. The surgery was cancelled so I told the nurse I had filled the prescription ahead of time but the sugery was cancelled so I never used them. My husband had an absolute fit when I told him. He said I should never have told the nurse I did not take them because now "THEY" know I have them and can come knocking on our door and demand to see them. Isn't paranoia wonderful? At least it makes a change from the rants about the Crimea. Just a minute we have gone on to robocalls!!!!!!!!!!!!

Hello everyone, I feel this is a perfect site to find. Other people to talk to, and know that we are not the only ones going through this.
I took care of my parents ( while they were still at home ) for 12 years now. In 2006 my father died. A year later my mother fell, I had left her in the care of my sisters daughter, I took a two day vacation with my grandson who was 10. During those two days my sister( who never worked) tried to get mom to give her power if attorney , and wanted mom to sign her house over to her. My mom refused. Long story made short my mother fell while in my sisters care and had to have surgery , she was injured when they tried to get her up, two disk had to be removed and replaced by cadaver bones. She has been in my home now bedridden for over six years. She is paranoid schizophrenic she has a colostomy bag ,a catheter , she can't turn over or move her-legs and I have her in my family room which is the heart of the home she can look out on the deck she has a big screen TV with over 300 DVDs . A caregiver during the day while I go to work. nobody helps, my mom does not want to see my sister or brother. They are a lot alike , my brother had nine children, that was raised on public aid , my sister had three, and she didn't work either.
I have three grown children who have their own family's to care for and they are wonderful parents. My mom would have died if I left her in the nursing home, she was there for therapy after the surgery for rehabilitation but she couldn't keep up so Medicare shut her off. I feel so alone at times, I don't remember what it's like to just go somewhere and not have any worries . I don't regret one minute the decision I made to take care of my parents , I love them very much, my father is gone but he is still in my heart. Even though my mother is bedridden, since Sept. 2007, she has not had pneumonia are any bedsores in my care. I changed her psychiatrist and we worked together on getting my mom down to 20% of the psychiatric medications that she was taking. She is alert, has a great memory, and happy. She will be 84 in July. I am almost 61 , and divorced 20 years now. If anyone has questions on caring for patients that are in mobile and/or bedridden. Feel free to contact me. God bless all of you out there that feel alone, there are times when it helps just to talk about it. :). Julia

Loretta,

I am so glad that you joined our thread. Much of the already given advice is great!
I had a friend, who wasn't really elderly but blind. She went blind as a result of an industrial accident and some chemical exposure. It affected her organs, one being the liver and needed an oxygen tank. She too was a smoker. Many of us who were around her would be very concerned when she'd drag her tank around and light up a cigarette. It was rather odd too, because this woman thought of herself as some kind of heath guru at the time since she used aromatherapy in her health protocol. But never did she give it much thought about smoking in near proximity to those oxygen tanks.

I do hope for your sake that you find a way to find a nursing home for her. Someone, even a relative who you are obviously concerned about, no matter the history endured......deserves to be in your home. I think that for many of us who realize the truth about the matter that we do have to come to the point of others taking over the care of someone such as your mother, and that's o.k., too. In this regard, I wish you the very best, and will keep you in my thoughts.

Much Love & Light! Margeaux

Sharynmarie,

Thanks for asking about me. I don't think you went about it the wrong way in pointing it out to your sister the distaste in the fact she volunteered you to do something for someone else. It's very annoying when others don't seem to value your time. Anyway, since I'm well acquainted in your sister's method of operation......I'm sure it must have taken some courage on your part to tell her this. Be proud, for standing up for yourself, and try not to buckle into her guilt trips. Even the post about the pie, this spells guilt to me, especially when she made the comment she was bringing it for you,
and given the fact she can't eat something/should not eat something like this.
This isn't your fault. You have a new attitude, and that's good!

Hugs,
Much Love & Light! Margeaux

Gladimhere,

How are you doing? I'm really sorry to hear about what you've had to endure lately concerning your mother! I'm sure you've heard also, that the more meds given to an elderly, it is possible they could have these kinds of issues with bowels. I'm very happy to hear that she has returned home, now. It does dis-orient them more than we often realize. I think my mom gets dis-oriented when my sister takes her on those long drives to my brothers homes. She seems to think....that it's necessary to do this, since mom is very homebound these days.
Your in my thoughts, Glad!

Hugs,
Much Love & Light1 Margeaux

Margeaux-good to hear from you. I hope your trip was for pleasure or at least you got to relax and enjoy some time away. I told sis that if our brother wanted this item bad enough he would come get it himself. I am already storing a few things here for my brother...over a month now along with 5 big boxes of clothing for my mom. I have to store it in the garage ...no room in the house. Sis has her share of stuff she is storing too. I am not the energizer rabbit. I talked to hubby telling him I need to get away from here for a day in the mountains. Thank you for your words and support..I do appreciate it.

Margeaux, I'm doing well. It was a very challenging weekend. Mom's days of being a cooperative patient are long gone! It was pretty much what I expected, though. But, back to normal, as normal as normal can be around here. Am still keeping a close eye on mom, same problem may be starting again. They did not start any new medications so I do not have a clue what the issue could be. I sure don't want to go through that again this soon! It is astounding what changes have occurred in mom since the last hospital visit, just six months ago.

Well, to add on more to my plate, I found out today that the store manager is transferring me to Tracy...a 25 minute drive one way. I told my deli manager that I cannot do that, I was transferred here specifically because of my mother's health and I need to stay local. I also told her I would try to fight it by getting a statement from my mother's dr and calling the union. Getting only 24 hours a week is not going to work with gas expenses for a 50 commute. I am devastated by this...too much to take in, please pray, send positive vibes out, Thank you!!

Sharyn.... thats a bummer. Can you talk to the store manager?

Sharyn, did they give you any reason? Definitely take it up with your Union. hopefully they will be able to fight this. Good vibes