I moved in to take care of my parents 16 months ago.
The job is too hard, so I am moving out.
I will still caretake from my own home, but living here is more than I can stand. I am married and have six children. It is too much. Has anyone left or kicked an elderly parent out after taking on the committment?
Finally, let yourself off the hook. What you are doing is reasonable. I'm willing to bet you haven't thought just about yourself in sometime with so many people needing you. Please use this change of situation to put yourself into your caregiving plans so you don't find yourself in such a dire place again. I hope things get better for you soon.
You did the right thing.
What I am really here for is back up and support for my mom. She has some limitations as well. Neither one of them can clean their house or take care of their yard. If dad falls, most of the time we are here to help. he has fallen a total of twice in the last 16 months, so its not a huge concern.
My mom is a diabetic though, and she is forgetful sometimes. She leaves her pills out often, and I have a 2 year old. A few weeks back, my two year old got into her pills and jammed some in his mouth. Thankfully, they were not dangerous. But while I had poison control on the phone with me, I went through both mom and dads pill lists with them, and there are 2 that my mother takes that could kill my 2 year old with just one pill. The incident of him getting into those pills shook me enough to decide to leave.
My mom is absolutely heartbroken. She is afraid of being lonely. My dad was never much of a talker, but with the Parkinsons disease, he really isn't a talker and often has no idea what he is talking about. My mom is very afraid of living alone with him, and I can understand why. I really can. It can't be easy for her. But I can't continue to live here because it is just really hard to raise your family with your mom right.there.all.the.time.
Keeping my kids quiet enough to live with elderly folks (remember, there are SIX of them) and raising them according to my own rules which they think are sometimes silly or bad is hard. If my 2 year old wrecks something, its not just my something they have wrecked. Its moms lamp or dads entertainment center or dining room chairs. I don't allow my children to wreck stuff, but as there are many of them and I can't be in all places at all times, it has happened. And its beyond stressful. My kids are in the prime of their childhoods and I feel badly about letting them have friends over (more noise for grandma and grandpa to deal with. I let my 11 year old have 3 friends over for a birthday, and it was upsetting to my father because they were all boys and boys that age are loud)..
I just feel like I can't live my life here. I feel like my kids can't live the life I wanted for them here.
It is a nice big house in a nice neighborhood. Our old house is small, but nice. We are moving back there. Its going to be quite the adjustment after being used to all of this space. But even all of this space isn't enough space when I am trying to keep everyone happy. My mom says she is happy because she doesn't want me to leave, but I can tell that this is all too much for her too. She is just more afraid of the loneliness than the noise.
Before we moved here, I homeschooled my children. I loved it. We had a good system going and had a beautiful pattern to our days. When we moved here, I had to send my kids to school. I found a WONDERFUL school to send them to and I had a new baby since we have been here, and it was nice to have time with just my baby and toddler while the kids were at school, but choosing to send them to school was not my choice. It was a huge life interruption for me. And I think my mom doesn't realize how big of a blow that was to me. I don't think she realizes what a sacrifice that was. It would be helpful if she knew and acknowledged it.
Anyhow, I plan on coming in 3 mornings a week for 3-4 hours to clean and chat with my mom. We hired lawn service this week. I'll handle my dads pills and hopefully take him to church on Saturday evenings. I'll bring them dinner sometimes too. But I just.cant.live.here.
Everyone understands this except for my mom, the one I need to understand this. And it really hurts me that I am hurting her. I hate it. It would be awesome if she could just see that this is really too much for me, but she doesn't understand why I think its too much, since she handles most of dads care and I am more here for backup.
Its definitely not the work thats too much. The work is easy. Its the living with my parents while trying to raise my own *big* family.
My husband and I are awesome as far as relationships go. We are one of the happiest couples I know, and I love him so much for doing this for my parents. But we have little romantic life now that we are here, because its just not sexy to live with your parents. Its quite the turn off actually. The pills and my love life are the two concrete things that gave me the courage to tell my mom we were leaving. Both are too important to ignore.
I just wish my mom understood. I hate that she doesn't.
I am 68 and my husband is 73 and yet our home is no longer OUR home. Every time someone calls me or my daughter or grand daughters come to visit me, we can't talk because she has to come in and listen to our conversations. She lived by herself for 30 years because she didn't like being around people...... My husband and I can't even have a private conversation behind closed doors because she has "bat ears" and can hear EVERY thing. She doesn't have enough money to live in assisted living or a nursing home but has too much money to qualify for aid. I shouldn't feel this way as she does try to help and she does help pay bills BUT...these were "supposed" to be our "Golden years" and I just feel STUCK!!
He was pretty sick when we brought him home from the skilled nursing center.
The answer for me is easy. It would be way too much. As much as I'd hate it, he would need assisted living.
If my kids were all grown, it might be a different story, but I do need to be there for them.
And we stepped up to do this because nobody else would. I have one sister who lives 2 hours away and wouldn't be able to just up and change her life, even though financially they are very well off and are empty nesters. They hate this area and my mom hates her area so its not like they could even comprimise. I have another brother who is in the military and who is always traveling. His wife has a full career and helps to take care of her father who also has Parkinsons, so it was us, or nothing. Or rather us and nursing home, and my dad about went crazy while he was in "rehab" so we had an idea of what a nursing home would be like for him. He does much better at home. It took a couple of weeks, but while he is very confused, he is at least in familiarity and lives peacefully, instead of trying to escape in the middle of night or trying to punch the nurses who were trying to help him.
When we first moved in, things were ridiculously difficult. I found out very quickly (within the first two weeks) that if my dad were to stay as sick as he was, that it would be way too much for me. When he first came home, he needed me to help him walk. He needed me to help him toilet. He needed me to change an occasional diaper. He needed me so much. My 4 oldest children basically stayed upstairs in their bedroom watching my then 1 year old and watching tv. Very very quickly I realized that I wasn't going to be able to handle it. I about had a meltdown. Then, as if things were not bad enough, my whole family, including my dad got the stomach flu all at once. It was a huge relief to me that my dad needed to go to the hospital/rehab center once again so I could sort of regain my composure. It was awful.
I learned very quickly while dad was in the hospital, that living with my mostly healthy mother was going to be very draining on me. Mothers never lose that urge to mother their children, but when you are that grown child trying to raise a bunch of children... well... I am sure I don't have to explain any of that to any of you. I suddenly remembered why I was such a rebellious teenager.
When dad got back from that rehab experience, he slept for 3 straight days, so he was pretty easy to take care of. I just had to change his diaper every few hours because my mom was incapable of doing it. After 3 days or so though, he decided to use the bathroom and hasn't looked back. We helped him for the first week or so, but he pretty quickly kicked us out and has been able to mostly handle it himself. He has an occasional accident, but usually can make it.
He is confused. he is slow. But he is steady, and pretty easy to take care of. Really, his only needs are meals and pills and help getting into bed at night. My mom handles all of that. I sort his pills into the proper container and she is able to do the rest. My mom can't take care of her house though. She simply cannot. And she is very very lonely. I think she is an extrovert. i am an introverted person, so being around someone who wants to talk all the time is very exhausting for me. Plus my kids need talking and my husband needs talking and basically at the end of every day, I have nothing left at all.
I had a good heart to heart with my mom on Sunday night. I was able to explain to her more easily why we were leaving. And I told her that if dad got sick the way he was sick before, that I wouldn't be able to handle it in this season of life. I simply have too many reponsibilities, and as much as I would hate to do it, we would probably have to put him in a NH. Because there is just no way.
I think I was a little too optimistic at the start. I want to avoid a NH if at all possible, but sometimes it isn't possible. It would take a huge toll on my family.
I think my mom understands better now why we are leaving. She is still so sad about it, but I think she understands. I told her that I just wanted to be able to raise my family the way she wanted to when she was 36 years old. That seemed to resonate with her. She must have thought about what it would have been like to have her mother or mother in law living with her while actively raising children. She said she won't begrudge me for leaving, but that she is so severely depressed because there is nothing left for her in life.
I WISH she would get a social outlet. I've led the horse to water on that one, but she won't drink.
I do plan on being there 3 times per week to clean and such. In time, I hope to have her hire a housekeeper and such, but right now I think its probably best if I do it since this was such a blow. She is fussing about money. They saved for retirement. My dad doesn't understand why she is so stressed out about it. He has told me how much they get and its about what my husband and I make each month, but they don't have a mortgage or a car payment.. so yeah, not sure why she is so upset about needing a medical alert bracelet and lawn care. Its probably because she just really doesn't want to see me go.
I am thankful that she isn't nasty to me. She can be to my dad on her impatient days, but thats a 55 year long marriage with its own issues. Its not my business. But to me she is very nice. She can be passive agressive towards me and she can give me the silent treatment at times which are usually at times when I just don't need them.
About a month ago, my husband and I were drinking a bottle of wine, and I realized that we were having wine just about every night because of this situation. So I asked my husband if we would ever feel at home here.. if we would ever be happy, and he said "nope. This is it."
The very next day, the pill thing happened.
Maybe it was a sign.
Either way, our days our limited here. Its looking like the end of July or beginning of August.
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