I feel like my whole family is in denial over my mother's dementia. I tried to explain it a little to them, so they would be more patient with things like the shadowing. They just brush me off.
Even having me on occasion, second guessing myself. Wondering if I'm the crazy one.
Reeducatng myself on all I learned years ago on mental health and codependency, and including all the new information on fog. And educating myself all about dementia
Mental health is just as important as physical and it's not something you can just neglect, specially when your taking care of the person or people that hurt your mental well-being in the first place
Counselor told me once it is 2 steps forward, one step back, but to keep moving forward, well I took many steps backwards. I'm taking the steps forward now.
You don't need more on your plate.
Give them a few websites and move on from it.
Knowledge is power.
Knowledge can make a big difference to your decision making.
Drive you home from hospital & let you stay a few days? VS Collecting a potentially delerous, delusional, non-complient person you need to watch 24/7.
I almost want a go back to not knowing mom is shadowing, I want a believe that she is just annoying. Lol . I wish I didn't know how easy it is for a person with dementia to know how to small talk.
Not always but there are moments, that I think, ignorance was a little better. Now I know all this stuff and no one else cares, and I have no power because I'm not POA, not at all that I want to be.
By staying unaware of any unpleasantness, one cannot be troubled by it.
No problem here! Therefore no need to help!
Someone wise noted this about family denial on a thread some time back & I thought.. A'Ha! That makes sense! (I wish I knew who to thank).
I now call this *willful denial*.
What’s interesting too, is that a parent can show one side of their personality to one child and act differently when the other children are around.
I suppose that if you wanted to, you could video specific behaviors and show them what you are seeing when they aren’t around.
The 'kids' have batted about their viewpoints about what was really 'wrong' with her. One sib was positive she had dementia, another thought she was just not 'trying' and one just thought she was being 'difficult'.
Evidently, dementia and senility are not the same thing.
Mostly she died because she was 93, she was starving herself and that was actually the cause of death. "severe malnutrition". Who knows if that made the 'crazy' worse.
Copy down a few good websites. They can access or not.
You can't change other people.
What I could think of right now is to continue expressing your concerns to them in a calm, non-confrontational way. Perhaps let them know how their denial is impacting everyone's ability to provide the best care for your mother. And most importantly, be sure to prioritize your own well-being by taking breaks and seeking professional help when needed!