Left to take care of Mom (lifelong strained relationship) TN

by ED
(USA)

Youngest of three , only daughter, I am 57., Dad,and two brothers suicides before they were 45. Mom remarried when I was 10 - divorced him when I was 39. Had lots of money from divorce, other family members took advantage, money gone. Remarried for 6 yrs now, to man who has no other family (no kids, brothers, sisters), which makes me his closest relative. Mom has dementia, mom angry about money and doesn't remember how all of that was given to her and lost by her.

Thinks now after 19 years she can still get money from ex husband, Current husband drives her to attny (because she has gotten lost several times on her own) to see about getting money from ex. Now I believe they have both lost it. By the way, I live 5 hours away, work full time and trust no one to check on them.

My 2 children do not live in the same town as the (one is 10 hours away).

Current husband appeases her, or just get tired of it. She doesn't always remember that she is married to him. She calls ex husband several times a day, me several times a day, Granddaughter several times a day, It's always about how he didn't give her anything in the divorce. She wants the house they lived in.

She did give her sister a house and a car and now she says that she stole them and she wants them back. Years ago all of this happened, to her it is almost like yesterday. She does know I moved away 4 yrs ago and that I have a grandson. (Grand baby).

Today she called my daughter 10 times, me 5 times. I got 2 voicemails and they were for her ex husband. (I guess she thought she was calling his phone). The messages were that she wanted to move back into their old house because current husband and her were disagreeing about money.

The relationship between mom and me strained from age 12 forward. She never trusted me - the men in her life were more important than me. Everyone was more important than me.

My husband accused of stealing jewelry from her but she gave everything to everyone else. She became alcoholic and I kept my kids from her. She lied to me constantly about trivial matters. She is manipulative, conniving. Appearances were important to her, Being important was a goal of hers.

Being better than everyone else, holy-er than thou was her attitude, still is.

I am baffled and don't know where to go, what to do. Because they didn't have anyone else they both have given me Medical POA.

Any suggestions are welcome.

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I'm Recently Emancipated
by: Anonymous

I was the only child of a strong-willed woman with no real friends and no other relatives. The last 15 years of her life were, um, difficult. She lived alone and refused to move from her home, or to let me bring in anyone to help.

Those phone calls you talked about? I got all of them. 8-10 per day. One day, I got over 20. I lived 10 miles away and she'd think up ways to drag me over there.

Once in the last 12 months, she pulled out all the power cords and connections for her satellite TV service and made me come over to fix them. Said she couldn't just sit there with no TV. I realized I'd been set up, and it turned out I couldn't fix them.

I too was accused of stealing from her (for the purposes of "keeping a man"). Uh-huh. I'm 65 years old. On top of a few physical problems, she also smoked two packs of cigarettes a day and her house reeked.

A streak of her basic personality made her like to start fights (recreation?). These would turn into screaming matches that I didn't quite understand until much later.

Doctors and social workers eyed me as if I wasn't doing my job--letting her cancel medical appointments, not *making* her move, etc. One of them said, "YOU have to be the mother now."

And I thought, you have no idea what this is like. A physician friend of mine told me that she would break a bone or have some accident in the house that would take her to the hospital and force her into a facility.

That inciting event, as she referred to it, finally occurred this last spring of 2017. My life didn't become easier, just different. My mother's total lack of reason and cooperation made things a new kind of difficult.

After a month in the hospital (she broke her arm at home), she was forced to live in a dementia facility. She lasted 24 hours before they told me to come and get her. She'd set off every fire alarm in the place, called the police, and told them she was being held against her will.

While she sat in a different hospital, I managed to find another, more expensive place for her.

After that, things began to improve a bit. At last, she was given appropriate medication for her advanced dementia. I had a bit more freedom. And she had NO TELEPHONE!

And that's the particle of hope I have to offer you. At first I said I didn't want my mother zombified. I came to realize that "zombie" is GOOD. I don't mean to imply she stared off into space and drooled. Whatever they gave her calmed her WAY down.

She didn't make anymore sense than she had before, but she wasn't so combative.

She was at that facility for about three months. Five weeks ago, I sat at her bedside when at 90 years old, she finally decided to leave this earth. I know we're both happier.

Get help. Don't let this consume and ruin your life. For at least six years I was so bitchy and miserable, even my friends tended to avoid me. We cannot sacrifice our very selves to tend a person who will not get better. This illness has no happy outcome. Save yourself.

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