February was painful for all, and I didn't want to let this old post go unsaid, since it documents a lot of what was happening. So I finished it, and here you are.
A number of things happened during the time that mom stayed with us. First, I was 100% pissed that after we were trying to get additional caregiving, which was on the slow track due to various things including foot dragging and a refusal to work with a care agency, there was no plan b. I ended up being the plan b.
I had a conversation with my sister in which I yelled at her for approximately 50 minutes. I have never done that before, no matter if she's calling me a bitch or being unkind or letting her emotions get the better of her and then apologizing. In response to this and the deep unhappiness it has caused me and mrguy, and the fact that I'm now in therapy to deal with my family as an almost 60-year-old, I don't yell. But this time I did. Not sorry about the things that I said, just that I yelled.
Mom stayed for almost two weeks, then my sister came out to take over. It's only the two of us siblings available to help now, since my brother is very unwell and my other sister was in the middle of treatment for cancer. When on the phone I referred to myself as the last man standing, my sister countered that there were two of us, and she does a lot. This is one reason that I don't yell. She does a lot. So much. Too much. Everything, really. How can you counter someone who does everything?
Anyhoo, this is a run down of a typical day with the mom during this stay.
9:00 -- medication, coffee, paper, hearing aids. She complains about the weather
9:30 -- looks out at the view and remarks that her two best friends are dead
10:00 -- we get dressed, or we shower (mrguy and I leading mom and her walker down two flights of stairs while she argues with us about which foot should go on a stair next, and whether it should go forwards or backwards. Argues about temperature of shower. Complains about the portrait of her mother that hangs in the bathroom (every single fucking time). Mrguy helps us get back up the stairs.
11:30 -- lunch. Glass of water, which is either too warm or too cold or too full ("I can't drink that much!") or too empty ("didn't you think I was thirsty?").
1:00 - 3:30 -- afternoon is spent watching the newspaper, wanting to wander around the house and not wanting to be bothered, while simultaneously doing something that is dangerous, like wearing her belt around her neck fashioned like a noose.
4:00 -- agitation hour. Looks out the window across the bay and complains that her friends who lived there are dead. Insists on the fantasy that she and her caregiver are buying a house "over there" (i.e. Minnesota) to live near my sister (who she also complains about) and taking care of other people. Asks when she's going "home" (in air quotes, because nothing is home since she left our home town). Talks about wanting to buy back her old house. Asks when her caregivers will return. Conversations about why the caregivers are not available.
Repeat. Repeat. Repeat
In addition to these topics there are also conversations about how my dad is a bad person. Or "I have a husband out there, somewhere," which leads to an approx. 10-minute conversation about my dad, how and when he died, and how he did not just disappear. Eventually I take a photo of my parents and hide it so I don't have to see my mom give it the death stare as she passes.
7:00 -- dinner, HGTV, cajoling Mom to take her meds, getting her into her jammies, bed
Overnight -- wake up via the motion sensor and care for her when she moves around and leaves her walker in her bedroom when she goes to the john. Make heating pads for her during the night.
After almost two weeks of this, my sister was able to take over for several weeks, get Mom back into her apartment and find us some agency caregiving help. Our caregivers returned, but the flexibility we once had because of the husband who is now dead, is also gone. This has been hard on my sister, and easier on me.
I feel guilty. And I am no longer ready to kill people, as I was in February. One of those things is pretty good!
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