I care for my wife who has severe dementia and clinically blind. My question is, her family are distancing themselves from her is this typical for family to do this. Is it a human instinct to do it?
I think this is very common behavior. And all those excuses, like "it's so hard to see them like that"? Well, what do they think it's like for us? For a while it helped when I realized it wasn't just our two families that were behaving like this. But then my poor husband, who was still pretty aware at the time, said, "I guess to them I'm already dead". That's when my patience ended with both families. Anyone who makes my husband feel like that... And what can you possibly reply to that? Both of us knew it was true.
What kind of relationship did your wife's family have with her before she took ill?
I do NOT think it is normal human behavior to distance yourself from someone you love, when they become ill.
However, I do think it is normal protective behavior for a person to distance themselves from someone with whom they have had a difficult unloving relationship.
For a while it helped when I realized it wasn't just our two families that were behaving like this. But then my poor husband, who was still pretty aware at the time, said, "I guess to them I'm already dead". That's when my patience ended with both families. Anyone who makes my husband feel like that... And what can you possibly reply to that? Both of us knew it was true.
I do NOT think it is normal human behavior to distance yourself from someone you love, when they become ill.
However, I do think it is normal protective behavior for a person to distance themselves from someone with whom they have had a difficult unloving relationship.