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[quote=Anonymous]For my fellow peers dealing with an abusive elderly parent in whatever capacity-ranging from in your home to barely having contact...what helps you cope? Here is what helps me in varying degrees. I also just want to send out love and support. Some blame us for the abuse we suffer, they gaslight us, they shame us for sharing our experience, and they push us to have even more empathy for the abusers. Some call us ungrateful and just don't get it. Some say our generation is too sensitive or I am. I get it. I live it. It's painful. I still blame myself. I still hold some degree of self-loathing. I still am broken even with all the repairs I have done.

1.) Therapy-helped for a while, but after many years I am over all the techniques

2.) Giving what I don't get to those who deserve it. 
I go out of my way to thank people, nominate people for awards, talk to managers about helpful people. I want to be that person who lifts others. If I see someone treated poorly, I speak up. I find it strangely therapeutic to work hard to be the opposite of my mother.

3.) Forming healthy relationships. 
I made a good choice in a husband. I realized in my previous relationships I was drawn to poor treatment because of how I grew up. I worked hard to break that cycle. I got therapy to make sure I could break the cycle with my own kids. It is so important to me that they feel loved and appreciated. I am nothing like my own mother with friendships. I don't compete with my friends, I don't trash them to others. i don't gossip about them or undermine them.

4.) Strong boundaries
She hates it. She basically told me she no longer loves me and as much as that hurts, I remind myself she never really did even when she used the word. She loved that I was a people-pleaser. She loved that I tried to morph into whatever she needed me to be. She has trashed me to the few friends and family she has left and I remind myself, even when I did much more, she was not pleased and she complained. It's easier to do less and be unappreciated than it is to do more and be unappreciated. I have to learn to be comfortable with not pleasing her. When she insults me I do listen and try to see what I agree with and what is trash, but I won't let it knock me down the way it used to.

5.)Eat healthy and exercise.
It makes it easier to cope and not lose my spirit.

6.) Give myself permission to save myself. 
My father, the one parent I think loved me and cared is gone. He was the buffer. He would call her out when she went too far. There are no living relatives who care. My sibling is just like her. My husband cares, but I am the only one who can truly save myself. I don't want him getting a barrage of abuse from her. I have a right to defend myself verbally. I have a right to set boundaries. If anyone tries to guilt trip me (which so far none of the people she complained to have) I have a right to defend myself. I owe it to my kids to survive and be the best mother I can be. I will not let myself sink into depression. It's OK if my mother hates me.

7.) Take the high road as best I can
There are some really ugly things I could say back to her, but I don't. I try to be "professional" when I defend myself and not sink to her level. I don't yell like she does. I don't demean and belittle. I don't hurl insults like she does. I try to be respectful.[/quote]

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