Anyone else feeling depressed?

Mom always wants to go back "home". Sometimes that's when her children were kids and sometimes it's when she was a child. She just wants her own place and to be left alone so she can cook for herself....it is so very sad.

If the nursing home have a garden or similar place where you could take your Mom when you visit, it might help a little to take the edge off her feeling of being confined. I was in a similar situation when my husband was in a nursing home and there was no realistic way of filling his requests. I can identify with your feeling of sadness.

There is nothing like watching your parents age and die to bring on a sense of your own mortality. It is a huge mental adjustment, even if you can come to terms with it. At some point, you realize that you have to stop thinking about how it might be the last time you will do ____ or that your time is limited, or that you won't get to do everything you ever hoped, and get back to focusing on living well. Being around or even just seeing elders who are active and vital people helps and I've decided I will be like that. And though I am supposed to be thinking about retirement (I'm 58), other than necessary planning, I absolutely refuse; in fact I am busy learning about a new area within my rehab field and taking every chance to help the young'uns in it move along. Most of them even seem to like the attention and encouragement, though you do have to be careful that historical perspective does not become your disease rather than your gift.

So, now I say "if the whiskey don't get me, I'll live 'til I die." Good old Irish pub song. (I really don't get anywhere near enough whiskey. I hold my liquor like a sieve, and my religious persuasion is one that allows use of alcohol but not getting drunk, though I enjoy what I can.) I have a pretty serious genetic tendency to depression and in my younger years needed medication on a couple of occasions, but now I can usually manage it with some good low fat dark chocolate or a whole chocolate meal (i.e. cocoa cereal with chocolate Silk and a nonfat chocolate pudding or chocolate frozen yogurt with that fancy whipped skim milk stuff that Whole Foods sell for 3 bucks a can - hey my mental health is worth it - for dessert) and/or a nice hike or bike ride.

It is a fight that must be fought. It may be some darn dry old lemons we have to squeeze to make our lemonade, but squeeze them and squeeze them hard. Find any drop of joy you can find and fend off the negative Nellies as best you can. Just say NO to rectal retinitis (aka sh*%!y outlook on life). Don't be like the ones who close up shop and start saying "I'm too old for..." way before its time and end up sitting around waiting for the end making themselves and everyone around them a little sadder every day. Mix your metaphors, and mix your drinks, people!!

And, BTW, Spring is almost here. We've made it 9/10 of the way, I hope I hope.

When the weather gets warmer I will take mom outside-when she will go. She doesnt like change even just walking out of her room and complains her hip hurts whenever I tey to persuade her to walk down the hall.