All dressed up, but nowhere to go.
I was going to take Mom out to eat tonight. She took a shower, but instead of getting dressed, she put on pajamas. I asked her why and she was said it was because her back hurt. She said she would go get dressed. I got dressed and ready to go. She just came back in my room, still in pajamas, saying she had a problem. Her blood sugar was 94. I told her it was no problem, to just eat some crackers.
Then I added that if she didn't want to go out to dinner tonight, we didn't have to.
This can be so exasperating, especially after I just wasted half of my day looking for a new bed that she had to have RIGHT NOW. I found one and she said I shouldn't worry about it, because she didn't need a bed. Maybe she will in the future. Talk about feeling totally jerked around. See if I ever look for her a bed again! The woman is beyond.
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For example, my brother tells me our father needs a cell phone. I ask my father, do you want a cell phone? He says yes, he would like one. I spent MONTHS getting him a cell phone through the elderly/in need free cell phone providers. I spent MONTHS getting the documents together, trying to get it all sorted out. Finally the phone comes, I try to teach my father to use it. He doesn't take to it at all and says he doesn't want it. I call my out of state brother and say, "Do you really insist Dad have a cell phone?" Bro acted like he didn't know what I was talking about and said, no, dad didn't need a cell phone. I sent the stupid thing back.
This is just one example of how my father (sometimes other people) says he needs something, I spend time and effort working on it, then turns out he really doesn't need/want. Its frustrating. "Jerked around" is a good way to put it. I also feel completely taken for granted.
In my young and free days I would have gone out to dinner by myself. But now someone has to cook for da mom. If you ever see me in public you'll know me right away. I'll be the one with the crazy look on my face.
I'm really kind of glad my mother decided she didn't need a bed. When we get anything new she is never happy with it, so wants to return it. And any new thing we do or buy gets blamed for her symptoms. So I knew that a new bed would perhaps have to be returned, and the replacement would become the new reason for her bad back. It is impossible to make my mother happy.
jesse, that crazy look isnt just a look, its a condition.
this is just too easy -- you just described an athiest in a casket. ( smirk)
boni - you can cut back.
mother takes it a step or two further - begs me to do things, says they are urgent, then asks 2 or 3 other people to do the same thing, then usually does it herself, then tells me off with real nastiness for interfering. The last time she did that I reamed her out - remember she does not have dementia - and told her to NOT ask me to do things if she was going to do it herself or ask others, to NOT give me people's phone numbers and emails if she does not want me to contact them, as this ends up in a lose-lose situation and I was NOT going to engage in those. And if she got nasty to me she could expect that she would not see me for quite a while. That last one would not work if you are living together. and is one of the reasons she is not with me. I drew those lines last Christmas and did not see her as often as usual last year. One reason was that she said she would see me but not Gary. Well, if we were driving by I was not having him sit in the truck while I visited her. If I was in town by myself or he was otherwise occupied fine. I suspect if she could break us up she would. She must come first. - the narcissism.
Often I say I will look into it and see if she forgets about it or does it herself. That usually works. I look into it for about 5 minutes, as in the past I have wasted hours and hours and hours. No more!
if you were 80 + yrs old, nearly blind, and had diabetic neuropathy so badly you couldnt feel your feet, you would probably be pretty negative too. hell if i get a little bit of temporary summer n**rash im to be avoided.
God, grant me a vacation to make bearable what I cannot change,
A friend to make it funny,
And the wisdom to never get my knickers in a knot because it solves nothing and makes me walk funny.
Actually I got a thank you today for saying I would look into something for her. I have and found a couple of options. That is all I am doing for now.
I find it hard when the mood swings are so extreme. The total crazies this morning and pretty rational this afternoon. It's like Chinese water torture. You are waiting for the next one.
cap, I don't excuse bad behaviour as easily as you do. I have know seniors with pain and debilitating conditions who retained a their normal personalities, didn't complain, and were not hard to be with, in fact were nice to be with. I am not talking dementia here. Like they say - Just because you have a pain you don't have to be a pain. I remind myself of that one at times.;)
were all different.
One thing I have tried to start doing is making my mother do SOMETHING before I will help her. For instance, she can make her appointments. I will take her, but I make her call. You need groceries? You figure out what you need, make me a list, then I will go when I do my shopping. She used to have me stop every time we were out and just lick up a thing or two. I don't do my shopping that way. My time is valuable. I finally told her I would be happy to go once a week, when I do my own shopping, IF she has her list ready. She's very passive aggressive and it used to be I would go over to get the list and she hadn't even started it.
I know this seems petty and I don't deal with the things a lot of you deal with. But, I do have a job, a husband, 2 daughters, and 7 grandchildren I would like to spend time with as well. If you give someone more than you want to give, you become resentful, as you know. My parents refuse to hire anyone to help them. That shouldn't mean I do it all! I just have to learn to say 'no', which is very hard.
I am not a taxi service or a personal shopper. I don't think it hurts anyone to put effort into things they want or need. My mother would be happy to have me do everything for her, but I can't do it. I can't keep up the pace.
I thought about why this group is so nice. In the outside world, all sympathy goes to the elder. We can't even talk about what goes on. It is so nice to have a place where sympathy goes to the caregiver.
I hope we all have a good day today. My mother is sitting in the living room now with a shawl wrapped around her head and a sullen, dazed look on her face. I have the feeling she won't be with us much longer. I don't think anyone can continue to live and be this unhappy.
She undos what I do for her every time with no appreciation at all, as I only exist to serve her. When I set boundaries she blasts me, or has a million abhoring behaviors. The result? yeah, like Emjo, less and less. More and more of my boundaries. I've had it! This is not burn out. This is natural behavior for us! And the elderly behavior is mashugunah. (crazy) You wonder what is going on in the brain to make this behavior?
My Mom has always been off anyways: but she had other qualities that we loved to cover up the crap. I really miss that person that I often could enjoy. Now those moments are less and less.
My Mom loves to enlist others in her banal causes. Strangers are her best choices, of course.
Carve out your life however and whenever you can in spite of all this stuff. And again, I don't see how I can help a person who doesn't allow it. We can't all be like Teepah Snow, God Bless Her!
Similar to your pajamas/dressed story, she will take a shower and put on her dirty clothes instead of her clean ones. I think she doesn't remember which are which. She will get a little bit undressed with me around but is mostly pretty modest and I try to respect her privacy as much as possible, so she is willing to take off her slacks while I'm there. Then, to help her remember, I put her dirty slacks all the way on the other side of the bathroom as far away as possible and it seems to help her know that the pile of clothes further away are the dirty ones, the ones right next to the shower are the clean ones. There's something about seeing both piles, this way, that helps her figure out.
By the way, she never puts on her dirty Depends instead of her clean one. I think it's because she can see which is the clean one. So, right now, some of these visual cues help her, but I know they wouldn't help everyone else, necessarily.
Sometimes, she remembers to thank me. Other times, she just gripes. One of these days, she'll start forgetting to thank me, so I'm trying to store the memories of gratitude as if they're in a jar and I can take them out when things start to go downhill -- so that I can remember that when she was in a better mental state that she really was a sweet and appreciative person, not the one she might (or hopefully not) become.