I have unlimited opportunities for employment back at my home 3000 miles away...my mother needs help according to friends and family here on the East coast, but she will not admit it. Therefore, in her mind, I am probably seen as leaching off of her in my efforts to help her. I can return to the West coast and allow her to fall again (July 2015, emergency surgery, 12 weeks in rehab; my father with advanced cancer, his health in serious decline, I returned from West coast after only being there about 8 weeks after spending 9 months here on East coast nursing my mom back from death after emergency surgery, hospice for cancer; and a long physical rehab). In other words, I have been here on East coast caring for both mother and father who has since passed, and all I get for doing so from my mother is yelling and abuse about not having a job, being worthless, ugly, filled with hate (which is a projection of how she feels-- I take antidepressants for my depression and anxiety; she has undiagnosed depression and serious anxiety all her life but refuses to admit it.) mY mother's undiagnosed mental health has destroyed our family. My father and brother have both passed on. My mother wants to outlive me and she just might do so. My health issues are a lot worse after being here. (I always suspected that if and when I returned 'home', I would die...due to the extreme depression and anxiety I grew up with-- without the benefit of medication-- due to my mother's abusive behaviour. My mother does not want help. She is in denial about needing help. She has money but last month abruptly and randomly capriciously cut me off of any money whatsoever. She refused to help me with my health insurance premium of $50, yelling and screaming all the while that I was not wanted or needed here, to 'get a job', etc. I have applied to about 30 jobs in the past month, to no avail in small town southeast depressed economy where everyone needs a job. I have a home back West.
What can I do?
There is a vacation home she owns where I could get work, and possibly save enough money to get me home to the West coast, but I fear her reaction when and if I make the move to do as she demands and 'get a job' and 'get out!'d
I am beside myself with anxiety and fear due to all of the abuse I have lived with since my father passed.
Please help me with any suggestions you have regarding my situation.
I have been used by my parents for the past two years as a caregiver so that my father could pass away at home and now my mother denies she needs my help and wants me to leave. Friends and family tell me to not leave her alone.
She will refuse help from anyone, I am sure.
What am I to do?
She abuses you financially, verbally and emotionally. Go. If she won't allow or accept your help then you are just spinning your wheels there and in the process destroying your own physical and financial health.
Does she have the right, with her undiagnosed and treated mental illness (per your conclusion) to destroy your life too? Why do you put no value on your own mental health and happiness? Is her life worth everything and yours nothing?
She has other resources, you don't have to be the one to save her. You need some counseling so you're not her next enabler, like you say your father was. Those patterns run very strongly in families and it takes a lot of work to break them. You need some professional counseling to help you understand how you can honor your mom but live your own life too. The two are not mutually exclusive.