How do people do this: caregiving, kids, jobs, etc

[Anonymous]

I wanted to get some insights as to how others have handled similar situations. I the sole relative of an elderly person, who I moved here during Covid to an ALF. The person’s personality has always been very challenging, so I never considered seriously moving them in with me. I also have stairs, which would be a physical challenge, and both myself and my husband work full time outside the home (though I TW frequently for now).

The ALF is very nice. Clean and with good loving staff. And they seem to be able to manage the personality issues even though my relative has really been awful to them (calling them stupid, etc.). I have spent a lot of time there, and have experience with others, so I don’t think I’m wrong when I say I think it objectively is good (though none is perfect).

My relative has been miserable there. My relative complains constantly about literally everything, but the main real issue, as far as I can tell, is that there aren’t enough activities or socialization. Many of the other residents have memory impairments, but the staff really does their best and there are some activities. My relative refuses to participate. My relative wants me, and only me, to come and take them out shopping, for car rides, to my house, etc. My relative has absolutely no concept of what modern working parent life is like and thinks I should just leave my kids in front of the TV on weekends so I can take my relative out.

I visit on average a few hours every week and try to take my relative out when I can or take them to kid things (like our birthday party or holidays). Relative is quite frail and has mobility issues and it’s hard for me to manage unless I can either bring my husband or leave my kids at home with him. I can’t manage getting both relative around and small kids around by myself. I do call almost every day.

The problem is it’s not enough. Every conversation is how awful it is, how lonely, how sad. I have offered and tried to hire someone to come and sit with my relative or take them out when I can’t. My relative refuses and becomes extremely angry that I am spending their money. Relative has more money than could ever be spent.

I honestly don’t know what to do. I simply don’t have the time to spend doing the level of visits and activities my relative wants. As it stands, I wake up with pressure on my chest from the stress of trying to balance what I am doing with my job, small kids, and house upkeep. I feel like I’m one step away from it all collapsing. I don’t have money to contact our my child or home care, which I would have to do in order to free the time to take relative around more.

I feel so sad and really depressed like I’m failing my relative, kids, husband, job, home. Maybe I picked the wrong ALF? I just don’t know how people do this. I’m in year 4 and I had 4 years of a parent before this in a similar situation. To make matters worse, neither parent nor this current relative were really great to me along the way - borderline emotionally abusive at times - and when I stop to think about it, I get really resentful….and then feel worse about being resentful of an elderly sick person who is totally alone. How do people do this?

[Anonymous]

They detach emotionally and manage the physical health and practicalities of their parent's final years, without accepting the responsibility of caring for their emotional needs.

This is what my husband did. He had lots of practice because his father had been bipolar his whole life. I have a distant albeit loving relationship with my controlling and hypercritical mother. When the time comes, I know I won't feel any guilt over not spending enough time with them, or whatever your parent complains about... because I decided in my teens that my mother's mental anguish was her own concern, not mine.

DETACH. You are allowed to not spend your weekends there. You can choose not to visit AT ALL. Experiment and decide what's a good frequency and length of visit.

You can try to persuade this person to consult a doctor to assess cognitive function and which dementia is developing. Meds could help.

[Anonymous]

Having been down this road, the only thing I can advise is to budget X hours per week for the relative, and try not to think about it the rest of the time. There is no way you can make your relative happy, no matter how many hours you spend with him/her. It's simply not possible.

[Anonymous]

This is a non-parent relative. You are taking more personal care of them than many children do of their parents.

You have not earned any crushing guilt. If you fell over tomorrow you have placed them in a place where they get interaction and food and good care. You need to detach, as PP said, and prioritize your own health and your own family.

If your relative wanted a long-term companion, they should have planned better and treated you better. When they complain about you spending their money, point out that you are trying to spend their money ON THEIR OWN COMFORTS, as opposed to trying to increase whatever inheritance they may be trying to hold over your head. I'm sorry you're going through this. Some people cannot be made happy. I'd decrease the amount of time you spend with this person for a while until you recover your equilibrium. I feel like you've been in the maelstrom too long.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:
They detach emotionally and manage the physical health and practicalities of their parent's final years, without accepting the responsibility of caring for their emotional needs.

This is what my husband did. He had lots of practice because his father had been bipolar his whole life. I have a distant albeit loving relationship with my controlling and hypercritical mother. When the time comes, I know I won't feel any guilt over not spending enough time with them, or whatever your parent complains about... because I decided in my teens that my mother's mental anguish was her own concern, not mine.

DETACH. You are allowed to not spend your weekends there. You can choose not to visit AT ALL. Experiment and decide what's a good frequency and length of visit.

You can try to persuade this person to consult a doctor to assess cognitive function and which dementia is developing. Meds could help.

This. You have to detach emotionally. I am one of the many people who let this sort of thing do in my physical health. Hire a case manger with her money to visit her, assess and advocate for her as needed and visit much less. When you do visit and she gets too negative try to distract/change subject. If that doesn't work, make an excuse to leave. Don't feed it. Let her vent to the case manager.

I wasted too many years letting guilt and duty get the best of me for an incredibly wealthy mother who had no problem hiring 9 year olds to babysit me and drop me as baby. She had no problem leaving me with a sitter who locked me in the basement so she could makeout with her boyfriend or one who hit me. In fact she hired them again and again until someone witnessed the abusive one with me out in public and spoke with my mother.

Keep in mind you not only risk harming your health, but you risk losing it and telling her off if you don't figure out better boundaries. Calmly inform her work and family life have gotten more demanding and you will be visiting less. Let her know you hired someone to check on her and all complaints should go to her because she is a pro at navigating these things. The case manager may actually have some good ideas to engage the elder more at the facility or may be able to advocate to adjust meds or something.

[Anonymous]

I’m going to start by telling you how sorry I am OP. I am going through something very, very similar with my mom. Reading your post and I could have written almost the same thing. I’ve started referring to myself as her dumpster because all she does a lot of the time is dump on me. It’s hard having an old person who refuses to take any personal responsibility for their own happiness. It’s hard having an old person with a difficult personality. In my case I think my mom partially fabricates her issues for attention. She has no concept or care of anything in my life that isn’t her. It’s mind boggling to me.

What I’ve done is set up my work schedule for a four day work week. It makes for longer work days but I have every Friday off and in the past year I’ve given her every single Friday. I set up all her doctors appointments, visits with old friends, grocery shopping, clothes shopping, lunches, etc on those Fridays. She was creeping into my weekends for several months and I literally had no time for other responsibilities so I finally had to establish some boundaries for my own mental health.

I have been visiting one night a week after work as well but I’m planning on stopping those as I don’t think those visits are beneficial. When my mom starts to complain about how bad her assisted living place is and how she wishes she could get out more I always respond that I’m happy to hire someone to take her out and spend time with her as much as she’d like. She always declines. I knows she’s waiting for me to volunteer to do more but there’s no more I can give her.

Take care of yourself OP, prioritize your own life. I’ve had to choose between her happiness and her safety at this point. She can be unhappy if she chooses, as long as she’s safe.

And as far as assisted living activities go- mine barely participates as well. They’ll have a whole day on the agenda but often no one will show up. My mom won’t do it alone. That’s an issue she’s going to have to figure out, like your loved one will.

[Anonymous]

Honestly, I understand why this is hard, but I think you're doing amazing. Truly. Hours every week? DAILY phone calls? The best ALF you could find? And this person wasn't even great to you when they were young and healthy?

I understand why you feel guilty, but I honestly think you should try and find some pride. You're doing amazing work. I wish I could give you a hug and a high five and, I dunno, a plate of cookies or something.

[Anonymous]

I already posted, but am going to go out on a limb here. Yes, we all want to do right by our elders and feel guilt, but I am wondering if part of the guilt is, you will likely inherit a lot? I say that because my mother actually used that guilt on me and it just made it all worse. I truly wanted to do right by her, but the money piece was like stabbing me. Then as my health declined I realized better that we spend it on getting people to help her who will cater to her because I cannot anymore.

Also, I reminded myself she never spelled out to me prior: ....You will inherit alot, but I expect you to be my personal verbal punching bag. No matter what you do it will not be enough. I will make threats too and I will constatnly tell you why everyone else's adult children and your own siblings are far better than you. And I will treat your kids like second class citizens and play favorites with grandchildren and I will scream at you at the drop of a hat, but refuse to stay on my meds...The list goes on. I spent my entire life jumping through hoops to please her, the bar kept getting raised and I still ended up garbage in her eyes. If I do inherit-lovely. I will use it for therapy, the kids will inherit more, put it toward college, donate to a charity and save for medical expenses. I will give myself permission not to feel guilty. I never signed up for abuse. If I don't inherit that is fine. Nobody owes anyone their soul for money.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:I already posted, but am going to go out on a limb here. Yes, we all want to do right by our elders and feel guilt, but I am wondering if part of the guilt is, you will likely inherit a lot? I say that because my mother actually used that guilt on me and it just made it all worse. I truly wanted to do right by her, but the money piece was like stabbing me. Then as my health declined I realized better that we spend it on getting people to help her who will cater to her because I cannot anymore.

Also, I reminded myself she never spelled out to me prior: ....You will inherit alot, but I expect you to be my personal verbal punching bag. No matter what you do it will not be enough. I will make threats too and I will constatnly tell you why everyone else's adult children and your own siblings are far better than you. And I will treat your kids like second class citizens and play favorites with grandchildren and I will scream at you at the drop of a hat, but refuse to stay on my meds...The list goes on. I spent my entire life jumping through hoops to please her, the bar kept getting raised and I still ended up garbage in her eyes. If I do inherit-lovely. I will use it for therapy, the kids will inherit more, put it toward college, donate to a charity and save for medical expenses. I will give myself permission not to feel guilty. I never signed up for abuse. If I don't inherit that is fine. Nobody owes anyone their soul for money.

Well said. Or if you do all these things for money, it will be the costliest thing you ever do.

[Anonymous]

You have to realize that this person will never, ever be happy no matter what you do. And then detach and don’t worry about making them happy. And cut back on what you are doing now.

[Anonymous]

Keep doing what you are doing and try to compartmentalize the nastiness, which could be a result of dementia etc

One weekly visit and daily phone calls is fine.

Bring magazines and books when you visit. Make sure they have appropriate reading glasses.

What about tv? Movies? Do they have a good set up for that? At the end of their visit, try to out a good movie on so that they at least get to watch one good movie a week.

[Anonymous]

Thank you everyone. You’ve given me some perspective and good for thought. I’ve been mired in this for so long trying to get through week by week day by day that it’s hard to see daylight sometimes.

[Anonymous]

I have had to have a pointed Come to Jesus discussion with my own relative.

"Listen - you are not senile. You are a fully capable, grown ass adult. I have my own family and a job I need to take care of. Your job, right now, it to manage your own happiness and your own entertainment. You have money that you earned in your life, at your disposal. It is now there to help you manage your own care needs, and your needs for entertainment and social life. I can help you connect with people, or research things, but it has to be YOUR job to actually reach out and make connections with people and find things that are enjoyable. It can't be me all the time. Again, you are a fully capable, cogent adult. I expect that you can and will manage your own social life."

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:I have had to have a pointed Come to Jesus discussion with my own relative.

"Listen - you are not senile. You are a fully capable, grown ass adult. I have my own family and a job I need to take care of. Your job, right now, it to manage your own happiness and your own entertainment. You have money that you earned in your life, at your disposal. It is now there to help you manage your own care needs, and your needs for entertainment and social life. I can help you connect with people, or research things, but it has to be YOUR job to actually reach out and make connections with people and find things that are enjoyable. It can't be me all the time. Again, you are a fully capable, cogent adult. I expect that you can and will manage your own social life."

When they're at the stage of Never Happy, And Sometimes Angry For No Reason... they have dementia. I'm not sure OP's relative can change for the better, even with your pep talk. They'll probably start to cry or pout, and make themselves out to be the victim. And then OP will be either forced to apologize and make-up for her offense, or walk out and enforce her boundaries. If you get there, OP, choose the latter.

[Anonymous]

I’ve just started reading the book Being Mortal and it’s pretty eye opening. I haven’t finished it yet but it’s providing some additional perspective to my own situation.