My daughter is my caretaker. I have lot health problems. Her dad, my husband passed it be 2 yrs on 27th Oct. She did cpr for over 30 mins until medicine got here. I was beyond devastating. It was fast and unexpected. I don't want ask her to do anything for me. It breaks my heart that she's been thu what she has. Lost our daughter, my sister, my precious grandson and more in less than 6 yrs. She's wore out. I try help her. Her adult daughters don't. They just want to put their little ones on her. My kids say I'm never going in nursing home. Yet they aren't e as I'm only going to get worse in time. Grievance has taken its toll on her and me. She blames her f cause her daddy. No one would have been able to save him. I'm worried crazy about her but don't know what to do. She needs surgery and constantly has bad pain. I don't want to add to her pain and stress. I rarely ask for anything. She makes small meals, washes clothes. .main things. I'm writing this as I know this is for care takers. But not everyone wants to be like they R. I don’t want be a burden. It's very sad to
Read how some caretakers talk about their parents. I wonder if y’all will be relieved when parents are gone. Just heartbreaking. I could tell a lot about nursing homes that most ppk don't know. I wish I had someone my age to talk to but I don't. God bless all.
I'm a married only child who is PoA for 3 relatives ages 93, 100 and 103. My husband has his own 88-yr old mother to oversee in a facility 3 miles from our house. His step-father had Parkinsons and assumed our family (us + 3 young sons) were going to be his "solution" while we worked full-time and had kids in school (he is now passed away, after we allowed the county to acquire guardianship of him because he didn't want to accept the only possible solution for his care when he was in debt and had no money and lived in a house with stairs, was 6'5" and his wife had cognitive decline at the same time). Adult children can only do so much. He became a burden because he wasn't at all interested on what the impact of his care had forced onto our family. I'm glad his care burden was handed off to the county. He was fed, protected and getting medical attention. It wasn't the solution he wanted but it was the only possible.
Do we love all these relatives? Yes. Can having this much responsibility feel like a burden? Yes. Would we want to be relieved of it if it was grinding our family down to a pulp mentally, physically, emotionally and financially? Yes.
The answer in our case was to find alternative solutions for them that took the burden off us as much as we needed. They may not have liked the solutions but I couldn't l@@k my family in the eye if I allowed us all to go down with the ship. And if we did, then who would be left to help our elders? It's not selfish to put on your own oxygen mask first in order to help those who are less able.
FYI facilities are not the end of the world. My MIL is in LTC gets excellent care in a wonderful facility on Medicaid. Even has a private room, gets taken out on their pontoon boat to fish, has field trips, activities, events, etc. I worked for a solid 1-1/2 years every day to get this solution for her (while I had kids and was working full time). Did she want to go into a "nursing home"? No. Did she ironically put her own mother in a nursing home? Yes.
Plan your own care solution now so that you can avoid "being a burden". Even those with humble financial means can still have a plan. Talk to a Medicaid Planner at the very least. If one doesn't plan now, this would be 100% foolishness since we will all experience age-related decline and then death.
Yes getting old sucks and is hard. But do seniors have to make everyone miserable because they refuse to face reality about their limitations and make arrangements to spread the jobs to help the senior around to multiple people and agencies.
By the nature of being a "caregiver Forum" this will hear the moans and groans of the generation that chose and undertook care of some kind, in some manner for their loved ones. They have a right to this private area to come and vent. And as do YOU, and we appreciate for certain hearing your side of it. But trust me, there is guilt and pain enough to go around (I always encourage the other G-word, grief, in stead of guilt. _) Life is, tough, as the old adage goes, and then we die. Hopefully between the tough times are moments of grace and beauty; we kind of have to pull them out kicking and screaming often enough.
You ask if some will be relieved when the parent is gone. Yes. They will be. When my Dad first died, in his 90s, I felt NOTHING but relief. He was so ready to go and so often had told me he was tired and only wished to "nap" forever. For my Mom it was more a mix of relief and pain, as she was so intent, even in her 90s, to live and draw joy from life. But mostly it was RELIEF. That they had good lives they loved. That they never had to suffer again. That they were at rest. That I never had to live in fear and pain for them and what they had to suffer. Pure relief. Lives well lived. Lucky lives I could celebrate for the rest of my own, and know they were/are always with me.
My father did end up in AL for nearly 4 years. The place looked like a fancy hotel. He was monitored 24/7. He was safe. He was never 100% happy but his happiness is on him, not me.
When asked to stop paid work (to be an unpaid step n fetcher) I at least received a dumbfounded look when I asked Do you want the Grands to go without shoes?
I too don't want my lack of planning to be my kids' problem.
Quit making excuses about nursing homes, apply for Medicaid, and find one for yourself where you'll have lots of people your age to talk to every day. 🙄
If you know you need care and that you're going to get worse, make some arrangements for yourself now while you're still able to.
Move into a senior living facility now that can also meet your needs as the increase. Take care of business now so your daughter doesn't get stuck with having to later.
If your daughter wants you to stay with her and doesn't want you to move out, hire a homecare aide to help you out now. If you can afford it hire a cleaning lady to clean the home once a week.
I believe that there are seniors out there who actually mean it when they say they don't want to be a burden to their family. It's unusual but they exist.
Unfortunately, there's nothing you can do about your granddaughters using their mother as a free nanny and daycare center. The only one who can put the brakes on that is your daughter. She has to be the one who stops allowing her daughters to take advantage of her, but you can relieve some of that burden too. Pay for the kids to go to daycare if you can or hire a babysitter.
There are things you can do to help your daughter and not become a burden to her.
My parents don't care that they are a responsibility and sometimes a chore to me and my husband. They look at that it is my duty to care for them. Neither of these people cared for their parents or helped their siblings out when they were begged. Their excuses were a mile long.
The fact that they never went to doctor consistently hasn't helped either. My mom's healthcare maintenance never ends.
My father's anxiety never ends. My mom is now asking who will take care if something happens you. So I said the truth you will have to move where my sibling lives or become a ward of the state. She was speechless. The past couple of months have been terrible and it won't be changing soon or ever at all. So yes
I will feel some relief when I am no longer expected to be the end all to them.
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