Did your feelings about your elderly parents change?

[Anonymous]

I had a great relationship with them in adulthood until the last few years. Since having to get my mother to face reality about my father and all the things I've had to help with, it has changed. I have become the scapegoat for her frustration and she had no problem lashing out at me until I set limits. While I am grateful to them for planning financially for aging, I am resentful they didn't make any plans otherwise. They assumed the would age in place with no nurses, no assisted living and that I would just clean up their bordering on horders house when the time came. I am the one who lives closest and the ones who live farther get better treatment. No they are not going to help me. They like their role as the good ones.

So here's what has happened. I still love them, but I don't particularly like them. I am sick of having to insist on respectful treatment. I take breaks and they call me more. I resent the fact I am in a new role as the bad guy. I feel like they have little appreciation in part because they did NOTHING for their own parents. However, as I said I still love them and my kids do too.

I hate having to keep firm boundaries. I hate that I have to insist on respectful treatment when it used to come so naturally. I basically have to mourn the old relationship. I am in a constant balancing act between pulling away and making sure they are safe and don't endanger anyone else. Just thinking about them brings me stress, so when away from them I try to think about them as little as possible. I am much happier the days I don't speak with them or see them.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote: I had a great relationship with them in adulthood until the last few years. Since having to get my mother to face reality about my father and all the things I've had to help with, it has changed. I have become the scapegoat for her frustration and she had no problem lashing out at me until I set limits. While I am grateful to them for planning financially for aging, I am resentful they didn't make any plans otherwise. They assumed the would age in place with no nurses, no assisted living and that I would just clean up their bordering on horders house when the time came. I am the one who lives closest and the ones who live farther get better treatment. No they are not going to help me. They like their role as the good ones.

So here's what has happened. I still love them, but I don't particularly like them. I am sick of having to insist on respectful treatment. I take breaks and they call me more. I resent the fact I am in a new role as the bad guy. I feel like they have little appreciation in part because they did NOTHING for their own parents. However, as I said I still love them and my kids do too.

I hate having to keep firm boundaries. I hate that I have to insist on respectful treatment when it used to come so naturally. I basically have to mourn the old relationship. I am in a constant balancing act between pulling away and making sure they are safe and don't endanger anyone else. Just thinking about them brings me stress, so when away from them I try to think about them as little as possible. I am much happier the days I don't speak with them or see them.

yes. exact same situation. moving away to let siblings step up.

[Anonymous]

What are they asking for? Can you just leave them to manage themselves?

[Anonymous]

You're only now realizing who they are, OP.
Some of us aren't so blind.

[Anonymous]

Amen, sister! My mom likes to do passive aggressive stuff and cause an argument. I too am much happier on no mom days.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:
You're only now realizing who they are, OP.
Some of us aren't so blind.

If you don’t know that people frequently go through personality changes as they age you don’t know much about the elderly.

[Anonymous]

My parents both experienced dementia for a few years before they passed. My feelings did not change but I just felt terribly sad that they didn't recognize me.

[Anonymous]

My mom loves to complain about my dad. The thing is she is in several clubs and pretty much put's him last on her list. He needed help printing something out for a board he is on and she berated him for it. She also nit pics him. I hate it.

[Anonymous]

They are lashing out at you, just like a toddler or teen, because you are safe. Whatever they do, you will love them. Hopefully unconditionally. They are in decline, and because they didn't make a plan or don't have enough money to make a plan happen, they are scared. And, losing control. Try to be compassionate. Try to remember that your children are learning from your interactions with your parents. One day, you will be old and your children will be interacting with you in hopefully a compassionate way.

It's hard. And physically and emotionally exhausting. And, worth it.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:My mom loves to complain about my dad. The thing is she is in several clubs and pretty much put's him last on her list. He needed help printing something out for a board he is on and she berated him for it. She also nit pics him. I hate it.

I hear ya! My mother complains incessantly, during agitated rants about him. If you are to the point of saying such awful things get therapy and meds. She has a right to vent, not to be so nasty.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Amen, sister! My mom likes to do passive aggressive stuff and cause an argument. I too am much happier on no mom days.

Yes, this. My mom does this too. She is way more into stirring the pot these days than she was years ago. I think she wants everyone to be as miserable as she is. I keep thinking on going on antidepressants to cope with them all my other stressors, but the days I don't communicate with them in any form, I am totally fine! I can't talk to them when I am sick because I will suddenly get much sicker. True story. Happened with a cold and with bronchitis. I was doing better, listened to rant and the next day I was sicker than I had been since the illness began. I get back issues or other physical issues when I help them out sometimes.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:They are lashing out at you, just like a toddler or teen, because you are safe. Whatever they do, you will love them. Hopefully unconditionally. They are in decline, and because they didn't make a plan or don't have enough money to make a plan happen, they are scared. And, losing control. Try to be compassionate. Try to remember that your children are learning from your interactions with your parents. One day, you will be old and your children will be interacting with you in hopefully a compassionate way.

It's hard. And physically and emotionally exhausting. And, worth it.

Yes, we also want to teach our kids boundaries and HEALTHY interactions. It is NOT a good example to allow emotionally abusive behavior from a elderly parent because I don't want my child to think...oh it's OK for a significant other or family to behave this way.

My parents saved enough money. They just won't spend it or deal. They want to live in denial.

[Anonymous]

Change? Not really BUT (and there's a huge but) things are getting difficult. I spend all last year trying to get them to move closer, only to have them be totally resistant. They want to stay in their house but aren't really understanding of the fact that if my sister did not live with them, they would have been forced out by the state.

While my sister is excellent in some regards, she's also very much a child in others, and suffers from OCD that limits her ability to help with things like medical appointments, etc. My aunt (who is physically disabled) goes with my mother to appointments now as my mother doesn't always understand what she should/shouldn't do, or ignores the advice.

She's type 2 and eats a ton of sugar and now her legs are swollen, one to the point where she almost has to drag it and she gets sores on it. Her primary care finally sent her to a vein doctor and changed her medication. My father had a big stroke a couple years ago, but I'd say does better than my mother, especially physically. Getting in extra help is nearly impossible do to a dog that doesn't welcome strangers. My aunt has tried to work with him, and she gets called 'mean' by my mother and sister. She's by no means mean at all - she loves animals and is great with the dog, and he adores her.

If my mother goes first, my father and my sister will probably move east to our beach place, so that my sister can settle into the area for her own (later) retirement, and my father can have friends visit. My brother has essentially checked out by taking a job out West (3000 miles from his own three boys I might add) and while he says he'll go and help, it's not reliable.

All this said, I've learned that you can't do much until the state steps in if your folks are not cooperative. One too many falls, the one time a doctor recognizes a parent's inability to understand self-care anymore, etc. I'm planning on being there when I need to pick up the pieces, but all intervention was doing was making me stressed and hated.

[Anonymous]

I totally hear you OP. I have not spoken to my mother since Aug 27 and feel totally liberated.

Before this, I spoke to her several times a day and she lives in the UK.

Plus we were obliged to visit her at our expense.

No more. No more (I want to quote Edgar Allen Poe here but I forgot it - ha yes, Never more, never more).

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:
You're only now realizing who they are, OP.
Some of us aren't so blind.

This is true. I just realized who my mother really was and haven't spoken to her in months. I feel much better, and the time has allowed me to examine destructive patterns in my life stemming from an abusive narcissistic mother.

I am an only so I can't rely on siblings to step in, but unless something really bad happens, I'm limiting contact and setting boundaries.