notrydoyoda Posted January 2012
The Caregiver & Dysfunctional Families: How are you doing?
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- How do I deal with an emotionally needy mother who wants all of my time and attention?
- I get so angry with my 88-year-old mom sometimes and find myself getting resentful to her and not treating her very good. How can I deal?
- How do I deal with being "cut" from the family?
- My sole mate is sole care taker of both parents. Where do I find help dealing with this?
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For example, OP might be American, but her mother (who needs a passport to go to Hawai’i) might be a foreigner. Not every family member necessarily has the same nationality.
In fact, I have a friend (foreigner) who lives in the US. He’s not a permanent resident; but he’s lived many years in the US. He’s a professor. He recently flew to Hawai’i, needed his passport. He’s not American. His only identity card is his passport. It’s the only way he’s allowed to board any plane, in any country.
(Passports expire. You need to renew them, etc.)
“Hawai’i is part of the US”
Just some history…
It was its own country. In 1893, it was militarily annexed by the US. The Queen of Hawai’i was forced to abdicate and give her country away.
In 1993, 100 years later, there were and still are, independence movements.
I read your profile and can tell you an elder can turn any situation into a crisis.
Here's a good place to start getting some control over your situation with your mother.
STOP PLAYING HER GAMES! The attention-seeking behavior, the negativity, and the threats to harm herself are how she will control you and keep you jumping through hoops, how she will stay in control of her environment as she gets older, needier and more demanding.
My friend, I'm not a therapist but I've been an in-home caregiver mostly to elderly for almost 25 years. The saying 'misery loves company' is the truth especially with the elderly. Not everyone of course, but it's common. This is where some tough love needs to come into the picture.
You cannot become your mother's life. It is not up to you to do everything for her, take her everywhere, be responsible for her socialization needs, or be her constant companion. It is not for you to give up you job, your current life, and neglect your own needs and that of your family to become a nanny-slave to your demanding and manipulating mother.
The next time she threatens suicide call the police and an ambulance. They will take her to the hospital. A bit of time on a psychiatric floor is usually enough to put the brakes on those performances. I called on my own mother. I was looking forward to something she wasn't part of and wanted to make sure she ruined it for me. Her performance started a few days before with the working herself up and threatening to kill herself. I went in the other room and called 911. I called my sibling and left it in her hands then boarded a flight and left. My mother was released. She went home, didn't kill herself, didn't burn the house down, and didn't give any attention-seeking performances while I was gone. Elderly people live to become elderly people because they value their lives.
Stop playing her games. Also, don't ruin going to Hawaii by taking her with you.
Please law down some law here and stop playing her games.
My husband and I care for MIL.
Before we arrived on the scene, there were 9 familial junkies and their friends.
They lived off her, stole from her, tried growing Marijuana plants in the freezer and in the garage, human feces in buckets in the garage, grass 4 ft plus high on her little 3 acre property, 11 dogs, the nightmare goes on.
Hubby stepped in... he turned off power to their camper and old trailers, cut off the phone and cable services. Assisted the police to arrest a few and made it clear anyone
caught doing drugs on the property would be removed.
Mom's back accounts were changed and suddenly there was no money to support their addictions.
They all left and abandoned all their garbage on the property.
His SIS didn't want to stay on the property because Social Services started checking on her small hyperactive grandchildren - (she expected MIL to care for them while she worked - SIS had custody of them at the time) She did not want to deal with SS. -- So she moved out, too.
Fast forward...It has taken 2 years to clean up the land enough to put a new MH on it.
Another year has passed.. we are now paying additional monies to remove the garbage left behind in the old single wides and having these trailers removed also.
Now, these people were very clear they didn't want anything and we should just throw it away... "we should"... "we"...needed to clean their mess.
So far we have emptied a hallway and a part of 1 bedroom...which filled 3 dumpsters...and now THEY are complaining to everyone who will listen how they have been victimized, run off, their dogs given away, and their stuff being trashed after they all TOOK CARE of MOM after their father and grandfather passed away.
Typical behavior for these types of people..yes..but it is still annoying.
Thank you for a safe place to vent.
Instead of letting me be stuck as before in the stories of my trauma experiences, he is seeking to lead me to be in touch with my inner emotions more in my sessions, rather than focusing on recounting the events of the trauma.
My last therapist never tried to lead me in this direction.
I'm learning that focusing on the events and actions in my trauma experiences, acts as an automatic defensive avoidance mechanism (albeit unconscious), so I don’t need to do the messier, more painful, more difficult work of digging around in my messy emotions and connecting with my feelings. Thus, I could stay detached and relatively safe from them. So whilst my trauma story of what has happened to me is absolutely important, getting stuck on that external aspect of my story can mean I don’t get to where I need to go in my healing. This is hard work, but needed to get healing and freedom.
I just got back from California, my brother is not doing well. After having surgery for his broken hip, he is back in a delirium state. He has been on a feed tube and he aspirated the supplement and now has pneumonia and is on oxygen. His kidneys are not filtering out sodium from his blood and he has mid blood in his urine than urine. They are bringing in specials for his lungs, kidneys and a urologist. The concern is kidney failure. I must admit I am scared about his condition. I may have to go back if his condition gets worse.
John Bradshaw On The Family, same author: Healing the Shame That Binds You.
Bessell van Der Kolk's The Body Keeps The Score.
Complex PTSD: From Surviving to Thriving by Pete Walker.ComplexPTSD is what most trauma survivors are dealing with.
Daniel Goleman's Emotional Intelligence.
There's also one titled "It Didn't Start With You" which is about inherited family trauma.
Tekvah - mine too!
yoda and sharyn - what yu both are describing sound to me like a very good way to go. Deal with your present emotions I am glad you both are on this path.
sharyn - how is your bro doing? It must be very scary.
yoda - those books look good. I read Bradshaw years ago..
Hubs went to Colorado to to take some furniture to our son. He got in an accident coming home. The accident occurred about 200 miles east of us. My daughter and I drove there to pick him up as the breaks are not working on the Jeep. A big rig past him on the freeway, it was raining. The wind draft off the big rig pushed him off the freeway into a shallow gully/ditch off the shoulder of the freeway. He is fine but very sore.
I have The Body Keeps Score currently on my laptop, thanks to a recommendation from a friend. She has experienced this extraordinary personal growth in the past couple of years. It was triggered by a terrible assault experience where a friend betrayed her. Her personality and habits have completely changed in the past few years, and she told me that The Body Keeps Score changed her understanding of who she is and why she's behaved a certain way in the past. It's cool to see her on this path to self-discovery and healing.
I read Emotional Intelligence years ago and it'd be great to revisit it. I browsed through a lengthy description of Healing the Shame that Binds You and was impressed by what I read. Reading the summary of It Didn't Start With You inspired me to sign up (again) for a free Audible trial. lol
Great stuff. Thank you.
I have a question, Yoda, Sharyn: Do either of you know any term for this concept of -- not being stuck in repeating trauma stories but instead focusing on emotions and validating your feelings? I'm trying to think of what clinical therapy practice this would be part of. Sounds great. Happy for both of you and proud of the self-work you continue to do. I know for myself that I tend to replay hurtful times from the past on repeat in my head. It's a pervasive mental habit for me, and it's never led anywhere good. Conscious redirection has helped me, but I think knowing how to acknowledge and validate the feelings would be better than just refocusing my attention.
Sharyn, I'm so sorry about your bro. I'm sure it's hard to see him like this—prayers for his recovery.
Hello to others, welcome to any new posters. 💜
You're good to clean up their mess. Kudos. I know it's a lot of work and resources. I also cleaned up a thoroughly hoarded and borderline unlivable house.
Those experiences led me to find AC and start venting/sharing here. It's been invaluable for me. Please come back to the DYS thread anytime to get support as you go through this.
*Edited to remove several paragraphs of some of the crazy things my user cousins did. I'm not dwelling on the trauma stories anymore; I'm learning from Yoda and Sharyn. 😁 It was and sometimes is still so frustrating, infuriating, and heartbreaking for me to think about what happened in my caregiving experience because of my dysfunctional family.
*Gershun, so much of what I struggle with emotionally around my family is resentment, too. I totally get that. It comes up in my mind out of nowhere, and I will think about how unfair situations have been, how hateful some have been, and how hurtful *all* of it's been. It's tough being torn between wanting to reach out to family and also needing to keep the distance. I get that. (((((hugs)))))
Sometimes I'll go to sleep feeling fine but wake up angry at my siblings. You see I was always the scapegoat in my family and still hold a lot of resentment inside. We don't ever see each other and seldom speak. I sometimes think about getting in touch but stop myself cause to them I'll always be the one they feel its alright to belittle or talk down to. Why put myself through that.
I'd like to one day be able to think of them without that resentment inside but am not quite sure how to do this and still have my guard up, and it needs to be up in order for me to protect myself.
You need a break from all the things happening to you and your family!
Hope your husband gets the care he needs, and is now home safely with you.
And your brother.....
Yes!
I could be just minding my own business, sleeping okay, but during awake hours the sibling issues pop into my mind. I suspect there may be some dreams (or nightmares) that I am not recalling when awake.
If I rehearse the thought, thinking out what happened, I get into an immediate rut.
It takes work to let it go, some things happened years ago, but it comes just before I make a stupid idea that it will be okay to contact them. It is not okay, and may never be okay for my health.
I like you feel like it's better for my health to not contact sibs and therefore that is how I'll continue to behave until someone can show me a way I can where I don't get hurt. As for my siblings I honestly don't think they really care one way or other whether I get in touch so there you have it.
I'm happy that what I shared is helpful.
I don't know the term for "this concept of -- not being stuck in repeating trauma stories but instead focusing on emotions and validating your feelings."
It would be part of the trauma-related clinical therapy practice.
I am starting on this journey with my therapist. The previous one where I used to live only let me stay stuck in telling my trauma stories which developed into movies with related pics with captions and then a poem. Those were particularly difficult times for along with what I had memories of past trauma came burried memories from an early part of my life that I hardly had any memory of at all before. In therapy and discussing with others, I've learned that this is not an usual experience but our mind's way of protecting us until later on.
If possible, I strongly suggest you find a therapist trained in trauma recovery.
You are correct that refocussing your thoughts is not enough. Read the books, find a trained therapist and best to you in this journey. It's not easy, but several tell me that is is greatly worth the process.
Our bodies do keep score. Our bodies are so awesomely made that if we would listen to our bodies, we would be safer soon than waiting for our minds to figure things out. Trauma does impact our body, mainly our brain. My own gets triggered sometimes when I'm not aware and thus my body will freeze into a do not touch me anywhere right now mode. This has only happened more recently and I've had to explain it to my wife. I first became aware of this when I led a retreat where our focus was on spiritual renewal, but so many needed to share their trauma stories with us and we listened and sought to adjust our presentations to them. When, I got home, I have no idea how many baths and showers that I took while detoxing, but I had to ask for no hugging or touching for a few days. I never helped with one of those retreats again.
I am totally at peace about having cut contact with my sis. No more tension waiting for the next insult. It's great!
Sleeping at dd's now in a bedroom upstairs - minifridge and all, and spending time during the day at my house. Rocky seems ok staying at the house as long as I keep up her routine. I am sleeping like a log at dd's. Not sure why but it's good. I'm getting a bit more stuff sorted during the day when I am home. More photos trashed today! There is still a little snow on the front lawn - first time in over 40 years! Now we need some rain and warmth to bring the leaves out. None out so far - another first.
Regarding dealing with trauma, I have done and still do spend a lot of time processing feelings, events, thoughts...I think I would be way worse off if I didn't. It's no good letting negative energy build up in you and create physical tension and even illness. It's a work in progress.
Take care all!
Yes, Sharyn I forgot to say that I'm thinking of you and feeling for you. Prayers are being sent your way.
I called the towing company today. This company is also a body works company. They took our Jeep out three different times today with 3 different drivers. They can find nothing wrong with the brakes or suspension. They believe that my husband hydroplaned off the freeway when this wind draft pushed the Jeep off the freeway. We will drive back there tomorrow to get it. Our insurance company wants the bill itemized so they can help us with the towing fee.
💔🌹💔
He truly fought hard with a double lung transplant.