The cow isn't the only one who lost its life.

I don't think either Golden or I said anything hurtful. Noor got a bit hostile, yes. I really don't like being accused of flinging hateful poo when the things I said were pretty mild. Gershun, my initial reaction you writing that people write on here things that make fun of their mothers and how they seem to hate them, so should put them in a home (paraphrased) could have been written to me. It could have been written to half the other people on the group who have parents at home. My initial narcissistic thought was, is she talking about me? The answer was that you were talking about many of us.

Really I thought my answer to you was anything but hurtful poo. It was really just saying exactly what I wrote -- that the truth is often not pretty. We would all love to be grateful that our parents survived a procedure and life went on smoothly. Many times it doesn't.

I liked the analogy a while back about being caught in a spider web. Once we become caregivers, it is hard to get out of the web. What we think will be short-term goes on for years. We quickly learn that everyone is comfortable with us being in the web and are in no hurry to help us get out of it. Our parent can take a turn for the worse, so we decide we'll stay a bit longer. Then they get better. The roller coaster makes the decisions very hard -- they are too sick to live alone and not sick enough for a NH. We can't stick them in a NH. The only thing we can decide is if we will stay or not and try to figure out how the dominoes will fall if we leave.

AC should be a safe place to vent, not a place where people are made to feel ashamed for telling the truth. Many people here knew what littleedie was saying, though most of us would have probably would have said it different.

Jessie, too right, To Sick to live alone (in our opinion of what We know of our ouw parent, even Assisted Living!0, and too Healthy to be placed in Nursing H, as yet. It's a catch 22, and we wait for what is to come, for the greater good of that paren, no matter the costs to ourselves. I hate it, but there we are.

LittleEdie - what really resonated with me about your post was your observation that most people are fine with helping out for a reasonable, natural amount of time, and can even find value in being part of the parent's end of life cycle. When I moved down to Florida to help my mother out, she was turning 80. She was already suffering mobility and balance problems, as well as cardiovascular problems, diabetes, high blood pressure, all the usuals. I assumed she would live another 2-3 years at most. Her own mother died at 82, and she was in much better shape for her age than my mother was.

One day in year one I plugged my mother's stats into an online tool designed to estimate how long a person would likely live, and it said she had a better than even chance of living another 10+ years. I wanted to head for the hills right then and there. When I told my mother about the result, her response was an emphatic "Yes, and I intend to!" I was beyond disheartened. It's one thing to be determined to soldier on with your disabilities, it's another to expect someone else to put their life on hold indefinitely to help you do it. I would be happy for her to live forever if she could do it without my ongoing presence and continued help. But I would like to be living a very different life, in a very different place, and I wonder like many of you if my time will ever come.

Windyridge you said that your folks were taking a whole lot of pills to keep them going. Well I know what you mean when saying that. My Mom was taking a whole pile of pills from her 70's to 87. (Now 92)(She thinks she is the only one on earth) Well I live an hour away so 2 hours round trip! Made the trip weekly to fix her pill box. Well when she was 87 we had a snow storm and I told Dad to get more pills before the snow hit. Told him not to open them but put them UNOPENED on the pink coach. Well he did not listen and opened them& also read the instructions. He gave her the pills in the box plus the pills he opened which caused her to get 4 blood pressure pills a day instead of 2 a day. She has dementia so could not handle this herself. Result was after 3rd day of major snow storm she passed out and hit her head on dresser and was bleeding. Well it took Dad awhile to find her because he was watching TV. Well this was the best thing that ever happened. Let me explain. Visiting nurse showed up and said that she was taking Mom off of all medication to see what will happen. Well guess what?? After 3 weeks none of her vital signs, blood pressure, sugar, stool softeners,heart medication, dementia meds, etc etc Changed. She was on these pill for over 10 years! The blood tests were the same with these pills or without the pills. Another interesting thing happened in which she started to form correct word sentences and sounded 15 years younger on the phone! I did not have to make the trip anymore so what happened was the best thing ever. I was happier. I am also 62 as you are. No I do not want anyone to fall and have their head bleed. But God works in strange ways. Still has dementia, still mean, but now as strong as an ox. When she went into the dementia unit they but her on two types of heart medicines because of increase heart rate.

Okay Golden, thank-you. You make valid points too. I don't want to offend anyone and I'll leave it at that. Different people with different circumstances. I won't pretend to understand what you all go through on a daily basis and you've stated that you don't understand my experience. So we will leave it at that and try to remain friendly. That goes for you too Jessie. I don't want there to be ill will between any of us. I'll still continue to state my point of view cause that is what this forum is for and hopefully won't offend anyone. :)

Dad is 94 tomorrow & still mentally with it & mom will be 91 in 3 weeks - I tell everyone I'm starting to train my 3 children NOW on how I want to be treated in my 90's ...LOL

Cher, that's interesting about stopping the meds. I'm 600 plus miles from my folks. After a hip replacement surgery I spent some time down there and at one point helped her go through all the meds and organize them in a calender dispenser. I was astounded at all the stuff she is taking. Mom can still do her 7 day pill box, makes a big production of it. I wonder what would actually happen if she were weaned off the meds. My guess is she could get by with very little if any.

But it ain't gonna happen. She is of the generation that believes there's a pill to fix anything. God forbid she should have ever dieted or exercised. just take the blood pressure, heart, insulin, Lyrica, oxy, etc, etc. every trip to one of the docs results in a new med or a confusing change of meds.

I don't hate my folks for living so damn long but I do wish they had planned better. They spent their lives with unhealthy lifestyles and Now they are stubborn, refuse to move or accept any help, (except if it's me working my ass off around the house) and with the miracles of modern medical intervention will probably live to be 100.

Until recently I was kinda cocky about being 62 and on no meds whatsoever. That changed about 8 months ago after an extended stay with my folks, trying to get the car away from dad and getting home care set up for mom. No success. But I did come home with a very rapid and irregular hear beat. Now I'm on meds for A-Fib. F....ing great..........

@Gershun - If I'd been offended I'd have said so. Judging by your response(s) though it seems I struck a nerve. I'm not going to open this up again as it looks like Littleedie's thread is nicely back on track. However, I've been out of commission for a few days and have not responded to you, so will do so and be done.

As others, I come here to "be" with folks who are caregivers and to listen, learn, identify, sympathize, empathize, etc. It don't post much - it's not my nature to share private/personal things with strangers - nor even friends for that matter. It took a LOT for me to write/post what I did about my situation. I just needed to get it off my chest to others in the same boat because at that point it was really weighing me down and dragging me under. I felt relatively 'safe' posting here. It felt great to get it out.

What didn't feel great though was your response. Offended? No. Nor was I defensive - I said nothing that needed defending. What I WAS, was put off. I felt like "Ick! I knew it was a mistake to be honest like that. Never again". Put another way, it was like being hit across the face with a wet mop, and I didn't like it one bit. Would you?

AC is one of the few places, FEW PLACES in this world where folks can come and talk openly and honestly about their situation, negative feelings, fears, hopes, poo, vomit, etc., etc., I mean the really rot-gut stuff. They let themselves be vulnerable. That is SO rare these days - and it's very precious. Do you realize how rare and precious and valuable a forum like this is to people? In a world where vulnerability is often mocked, AC is an oasis! I've also been AMAZED when I've seen the kindness that flows from folks in response to some of the posts here - truly amazing and many times a wonderful example of tolerance and kindness which I can only say is an example to strive for (for me).

What I'm saying is, I'll continue to post if/when I need to, because although I was put off - and the 'ick factor' hasn't quite worn off - I'm not that easily run-off. The fear I have though - and my point to all this is - that I would hate for others who may be new here, or hesitant to post/reach out for help here, to be afraid to do so for fear they will be taken to task for what they said. IMHO, THAT would be a real tragedy, and the AC forum and all of us here would lose something very special.

That's it. Thanks.

Go ahead and post. Say whatever you wish and I will continue to say whatever I wish. I never personally attacked you. The statements I made were general. You personally attacked me, though. So which one of us should be offended?

I hope that's it.

Here come the holidays, and I was reviewing my first and last thread.

"I hear people all the time almost making fun of their parents."

Then recently...

"Send, what you said reminds me of the day my "nice" sister and I were getting Mom ready for the nursing home. We were both so tired and stressed we were running on fumes. My Mom had wanted us to bring a particular chair of hers to the nursing home but at that point we couldn't. My sister said we could always strap Mom to the chair and tie it to the back of the truck. I said yeah, and attach a bar of soap to it cause it's raining so she'd finally have a bath."

That is funny. Really. But, being comedic is risky, right? Some people may actually believe you were going to tie your mother to the truck, like Granny in the Beverly Hillbillies pilot, if you didn't explicitly point it out that you weren't actually going to commit a felony and post a description of the deed on line? No, nobody here thinks that. It's a joke! A "good one". Enjoy it. Everyone else did.

"We laughed so hysterically we both peed our pants. Please don't misunderstand. Of course I would never have treated my Mom that way. It's just sometimes you need some comic relief. That whole day, I was walking around in pee panties cause I didn't have time to change them after our laugh. :)"

I wasn't going to assault the cardiologist, do anything unsafe, unhealthy, unkind to anyone. Ehuh.

"I wonder why if these people hate their parents so much why they don't just stick them in a care home and forget about them. It's almost a form of martyrdom, isn't it? It's like a woman caring for the person who raped her. I understand that for some people it's too expensive to place their parent. I get that."

Rape? WTF? (But, on the subject, there's a reason victims do that...google Battered Women's Syndrome, the psyche "splitting". It's a response that is a "lesser of evils". I mentioned a good source and author earlier, applicable to all forms of abuse, and not-good-enough parenting, and how elusive knowing what good enough is.)

It's never too expensive to stick anyone anywhere. Medicaid.

If I were a martyr or felt personally guilty and responsible that all living things age and die, I wouldn't have posted...what I said, in the first place.

"But if a parent was so awful to you when you were growing up and you could afford to place them somewhere, why don't you? "

Because part of why we were treated badly was because they worshipped money. The good news now is that we live in a great community, are $ secure, and want to stay that way, into the next generation. And, not getting ripped off by a CCRC (like the one I did professional accounting for for many years because I wanted to use my education to be of service to the elderly) is one way to keep our family resources intact. Like my father, she may require professional care, and when the time comes, she'll get it. (Because of the exposure to the system and lovely people who cared for him, I went to work in that field.). We're not there yet. It's not worth it yet, all things considered. There's other people to consider.

But, of course, I'm frustrated. I've lost my liberty. These are the last healthy years of my life. My friends are starting to die. People I wanted to see again, people I was going to retire with. Never going to see them again.

And, here come "the holidays" and the band of flying monkeys. A few more days on an even keel. Then a week of Facebook Live! (Listen to how great I am!) too much rich food and activity, but what do I know, right? And then the diarrhea (that the non-monkey wipes up). Then they fly off and the boundary reconstruction begins again, until the next time the band rescues us again. Ugh.

:)

Just out of curiosity why do you feel the need after a whole year to rub remarks I made that bothered some people into my face again. Yes, I agree, they were thoughtless comments but I never intended any harm and I apologized to those people.

You have not posted on here in a while and I've moved on and I think those I offended have too, so let it go.

Oh crumbs! Stay off Facebook, for heaven's sake.

How are things going in general, Little?

Of course it's all right to laugh, even grimly. Necessary, I'd say. I bonded with my nephew over our smothered hysterics when my terribly proper mother farted in rhythm as she hobbled clear across the room - she'd become so deaf she didn't realise quite how audible it was. My sister was so livid with both of us that she didn't know who to turn the fish eye on hardest: she was very punctilious about dignity. But I was the one who did the bottom-wiping.

I think that may have been the last time he saw her, actually.

You need the humour to distract from the pain.

And you can't talk - or at least you won't gain much from talking - *only* to people whose experience is the same as your own. And if one person finds something easier or sweeter or more rewarding than others do, how is saying so a criticism?

A question is not an accusation. The question "if you hate doing this, if it's ruining your life, why are you doing it?" is a reasonable one. The answer may be rooted in factors outside the questioner's experience, but there still are answers, and it's no bad thing to review them from time to time and make sure they still make any sense.

I just read this whole thread. I too actually have a "Gershun" mama. She was a Sunday school teacher for 4-5 year olds for 50 years. Now she is in the middle stages of dementia. Sometimes when she is feisty, in my head I think of her as Miss "Jesus drank wine". I love her to death. Yesterday was ground hog day every 5 min. I'm sure this is because we had a haircut, shot at the clinic, and that changed the routine. Also Thanksgiving is coming. I want each of you to know I have now laughed so hard this morning at the last few posts....I did a cough, pee...damn! I'm still laughing! I'm now going to forever think of the holiday company coming as the flying monkeys! Still laughing. Love you all and thanks for making my day!  P.S. We have dead cow "parts" too!

Good to hear from you again littleedie

I agree with cm that it is necessary to laugh. Sometimes if you don't laugh, you will cry or have a meltdown.

Hope you are coping well. I suspect caring for grandma is not getting any easier.

Religion is for the losers/boobs - take care of your own family and yourself when you can - prayer is a waste of time unless you can deflect a dementia soul with it then it is useful - those who stop to pray while a tsunami comes on shore .... basically drown -

Pick up you own britches & do something positive to help your loved one then you'll be ahead but the family of a dementia person needs to help themselves by maximizing life opportunities including any resource they can go to