The Caregiver & Dysfunctional Families: How are you doing?

Upset, going by your history, you will do it too!! Shameful these two young men.

Stacey, good to see you posting and happy your health is good with no heart issues. You better keep posting, we need you here.

Stacy, We do need you. Your decorating sounds fun.

I think breaking from here, is somewhat normal. I too, feel as Stacey does. Part of leaving all the caregiving behind. I have found I am especially triggered by, no offense upset, because she is a therapist, as is ts1. All of the manipulation and narcissistic behaviors from a therapist twisted! She thinks she is all of that and more. Still no communication with ts1, which is a good thing. And now I find even writing here, I sometimes get the twisteds confused. ts2 is the executor and communicates, somewhat. ts1, not at all.

I never could believe a word ts1 said, so much to make herself look good to others, and her magical way to suck everyone in.

I, like Stacey, read every day, just do not contribute nearly as often as I used to. Worn out from caregiving and changes completely.

Watching Book's Pentatonix Christmas special. They are good, but this show is a bit over the top and seems too contrived. Maybe it will help with the xmas spirit which I have not felt in many years. I think of you all, all the time.

Oh guy's, I'm not going anywhere, just not feeling compelled to give input too much these days as my issues with Narcissistic parent are now resolved, except for the ongoing internal pain and struggles that my husband still deals with, though he isn't very demonstrative about his feelings on this too often any more, in fact he doesn't speak much about his parents hardly at all, which is confusing, but again, part of his own feelings and grieving process, and I believe that everyone works through this in their own way, so I do not press him to speak about it very often.

It is still early days (2+ months) following a very long and exhausting 13 years of having my FIL in our home with us, and the harrowing end of his life while on Hospice.

It just takes so much out of you, and your mind and body does go through some interesting changes, all the while trying to find your new normal, and we're still not there yet.

I personally am still struggling with the fact that he died in our home, and am still uncomfortable going into that bedroom that he passed in, and now my husband who originally intended on using that particular bedroom as his "collection" room, no longer wishes to use it, opting for the smaller bedroom, so delegating me to use and to set it up as our guest bedroom, and I have resigned myself to this, understanding his feelings on it.

Will anyone ever wish to sleep in there in the future? As everyone knows this was where he passed, that is the question, but for now, it sits as a storage room, housing things we've yet to decide what to do  with, hopefully I'll feel better about it in the spring, when more time has past and I'm compelled to decorate it. It's weird, I know! We've never had a guest bedroom, and I had such high hopes for one, but it's no longer an exciting venture, to set it up, does that sound weird?

Please know that I think of you all often, but it seems silly to only talk about myself, and the exciting changes we are making post caregiving, sounds like bragging to me, and that's not how I want to come across as doing, not at all!

Even post caregiving is Stressful, though we are for the most part, over the hump, and are finally beginning to concentrate on our own wants and needs, and feeling better. 

Hubby and I are doing Great btw, even if he drives me crazy and talks none stop all day long! He's So needy, Sheesh! Lol!

I hope that I've explained myself a little bit better, and I do wish you all the best, Always! Stace ❤

Stacey and Glad, "Glad" you're still here! I'm not exactly caregiving yet; only helping out now and then with mom and inlaws, but the info and laughs on these sites are soooo helpful! Why would you want to quit? Lots of us appreciate you and value your comments... and sounds as if  you enjoy it, too?

Ahh, Mally, I will be here too. I have made so many friends here that helped me through such difficult caregiving years, and twisted behaviors. I do not know what I would have done had I not found this site.😄 Can't even find an emoticon that fits.😕

Sorry I'm a trigger

It's okay, don't be upset!
It may just be an over-generalization.
Twisted is a therapist, therefore I hate all therapists sort of thing.......?

I have only hated a very few therapists in my entire life, but if my sister was one and treated me like Glad's sister treated her, I may hate the word therapist even. She has a valid point. But I doubt that Glad hates you.

Great apology Upset!

Sorry, I don't even know why I responded at all, since I have been reading the art of not giving a f.
(That was a joke, lol, funny to me, laughing my roflmao.....)

Oops, returning to my space on 'Caregivers Behaving Badly'.  It was getting lonely over there.

Today, I felt bad in afternoon. So I went home, laid down. I was surprised I was tired enough to want to sleep, so I figured I'd take a nap. Again, the adrenaline surges started happening, and I couldn't sleep even though I would drift off. It's not a jerk, but I feel a warmish surge in my heart, and my fingers and toes start wiggling, like I've just been given a shot of adrenaline. 

This symptom didn't happen for very long period in my life before, only when I was very sick, and hasn't happened for years. Why is it back? And I don't know. The only thing it seems to be related to is -- high level of cortisol, and levels being too high at the wrong times. 

I took 5mg diazepam to reduce the symptom so I could get to sleep and rest because I think that would be best. But... it's not working this time. Ok, that's fine, I'm not terribly uncomfortable, I just wish I knew what was going on.

Thanks for letting me share. This isn't good, that's for sure. But... as long as it goes away soon, I'll be ok. Just weird. I'm drinking the alkaline water to try to combat stress/cortisol effects. I don't know if that has basis in actual science but it's something easy I can do to try to even out.

My body is being a big, whiny baby lately. It doesn't want to sleep right, then I feel bad most days, and it's a cycle right now.  

The best answer might be that I stop other things for a couple of weeks and focus on exercise and health stuff, get more self care things going on for myself. I feel "sick" right now but not any particular thing, just headachy and dry coughing.

WAAAHHHHH :-P Thanks for letting me Whine even though it's not the whine thread. These adrenaline surges when I want to sleep are the WORST. They went away for several days then came back today. Oh, well. :-(

Upset, that's really messed up about the center break-in. Of course you can't drop the charges yourself. The police are going to pursue that, it's not YOU per se pressing charges, it's the judicial system.

I hope you can somehow get the phone system back. I think that's how it works: it's stolen property so the person who bought it is out the money they paid for it. It rightfully belongs to the center.

Glad, Stacey ~ This thread has new people regularly who come along and need input on their DYS situation. If people like us don't stick around and give to them, then there are too many people who need help, not enough people to give the help. Make sense? Good for us to hang around here, continuing to get support in our own lives, but also I know you guys would be helpful to newbies, too. You serve a purpose in the thread for many years to come.

Hey Send. Don't be lonely over in Behaving Badly. The fires are upsetting, eh. I can't believe the videos. I've never seen large fires that close to urban LA areas. :-/

Hey, everybody else. :-) Hope you're having a decent night.

Ali, thanks for understanding that I may be disturbed about the fires.

Dh has a sinus headache, really bad-he went to bed all day. I thought he had the day off, but when he got up at 6:45 p.m., after missing his start time over two hours.... (work was 4:30 p.m. -9:00 p.m.) he decided to call and go in (7:45p.m.).
Places of business were closing early today due to the poor air quality from the fires.
He should stay home, imo. Authorities are saying stay home if you don't have to go out.

This surprise last minute trip out, he had not eaten, the check list/ready for work, the whole dysfunction-forgetting to go to work-so sick he could not do anything at all at home....trying to cure his headache with oregano oils....napping all day. The winds a n d over-working these past two weeks, I fear an impending meltdown by him.
The "M E L T D O W N " can be observed on 'The Good Doctor' last t.v. episode.
It is real, it really occurs people.

Took a 2nd Valium, which is HIGHLY unusual, but it's now 1:50am and I'm wide awake though I was ready to drop at 5pm... to the point I came home and got in bed. Hopefully the 2nd pill will help for tonight's sleep. If this doesn't ease up in another week, I'm going to cry. And then I'm going to find out if I can get a sleep study. I ain't got time for this. Grr.

Am I a heinous person that I am looking forward to my orphanhood?

That was rhetorical.

Maybe.

Last night I had one of those nights where weird dreams kept waking me up. You know how you have to get up for a bit to shake it off? Yeah. So I was tired today. So after I brought mom back from dialysis I crashed for 3 hours. Now I am up, it's 3 am.

Mom came in here (my "office") a half hour ago, she's wide awake too. She asked me if I wanted to have some friends over. I said, best guy friend was here last night but you slept through it. Then she started launching into this thing where she's apparently "sensing this overwhelming sadness" in me and won't shut up about it, no matter what I say!!!! Won't leave me alone. She is convinced I have this overwhelming sadness. And oh the cat, she says the cat seems sooooo sad, there is just this overwhelming sadness she senses in her, too. 

Three minutes later she doesn't even believe it's December or that she's been here for more than a few months. Um.

The cat might indeed be sad because she misses our home and now there's a kitten to compete for my attention, but the cat has also been the way she is for all 13 years of her life.

I'm not sad. I am many things, but I am not sad. I am angry at mom a lot, and trying to supress it so I don't set her off. I am bored as h*** because I'm stuck here being a caregiver and there's not very much to do all day once the chores are done, except play with cats and go online. I'm frustrated and writing letters because my backwater city council is trying to shut down the medical cannabis dispensaries via zoning and licensing, even though medical cannabis is legal and recreational cannabis will be legal in Canada next year, and I have friends who rely on medical cannabis. So I'm POed about that and this week, I'm speaking up about medical cannabis for the first time in my life.  I'm bored...I said that already. I'm re-thinking everything about my family so I'm confused and also angry at that. I'm impatient because I want to make soap for Christmas presents and I'm waiting and waiting and waiting for my soap supplies to arrive.  I'm trying to figure out how to work a smartphone for the first time in my life, and that's a little frustrating. 

But I'm not sad.

I WAS sad, when I dug up that pic of Dad and Stepmom. Which was - what, 2 weeks ago?  But I'm not sad now.

Mainly I'm bored.  Even smartphones turn out to be kinda boring. 

And I'm realizing this might be a pattern from my mom, where she is ten thousand kinds of moody, and she can't ever leave you alone until she provokes some kind of DRAMA. She can't give you space, she doesn't understand what space is. This "overwhelming sadness" thing is maybe another trick of trying to push a person into an argument they don't want to have.  It's like she can't accept life if there's no DRAMA in it. 

Maybe that's the problem since she moved here.  I live a pretty drama-free existence, and have a pretty drama-free friend group.  Maybe mom can't fathom a life that is steady and simple and not full of drama. 

Literally 3 hours ago we were comfortably watching TV together and I was entering phone numbers into my second-hand smartphone (because the 10 year olds at the cell service store couldn't figure out how to transfer the address book from a flip phone), and that's all that happened tonight. Now it's 3 AM and I'm playing a video game and watching yesterday's Morning Joe online, hoping that sleep comes soon. That's all there is. WHY CAN'T SHE JUST LEAVE ME THE **** ALONE!? Why does everything have to be some kind of drama??????

DRAMA!

Sorry for this long and incredibly self-centered post. I'm just really irritated and confused and frustrated right now.

Dorianne I think it might be time to reach for the Citalopram - for your mother, not you. She's projecting, isn't she? And this kind of text book acute depression is classic in vascular dementia, not sure if that applies to your mother.

Countrymouse, she is already on Zoloft. She has been for 20 years. Though the doctor reduced it from 10 mg to 5 last fall because mom was sleeping all the time. Maybe it needs to go back up, though?

She might be projecting, though. That's probably a good call.

I think you need to have a talk with her prescribing psychiatrist. She may need an adjustment in medication; more, different, or an add-on.

Maybe mom needs a little "medical cannabis" herself.

There was never a psychiatrist, Barb. There was that 10 question questionnaire the GP gives out and then BAM! Prescription. Seems to be how it works a lot of the time.

Well, can there be a psychiatrist?

In my mom's journey through vascular dementia (and earlier, with Mild Cognitive Impairment, it was the psychiatrists who saw the "whole person" and not just that her blood work looked good. It was the first geri psych who told us that mom wasn't ready for Assisted Living, just needed a good Independent Living environment where there were people around, and us to manage meds.

It was the second geri psych who started to actually manage mom's anxiety with carefully prescribed meds, to "get ahead" of the anxiety, and who pushed me to get mom a neuropsych evaluation. Which led to the dx and which showed the rest of the family that what was going on with mom wasn't "something she's doing to herself"--my brother's term.

It was the third set of geripsychs at the rehab and the NH who got mom on antidepressants and who managed her increasing dementia-related anxiety as her mind grew dimmer.

I would not still be sane if it weren't for these wonderful folks. I hope you can find one.

It's about a year long waiting list to get into a psychiatrist in these parts. I think that's why prescriptions are so prevalent. I know because I asked to see one a few years ago when I was going through some bad anxiety, and I had a scrip shoved at me "in the meantime." All I wanted was to work out my stuff about my stepmother dying, and also a person in my friend circle turned out to be a pedophile and that was weird and ugly. (Fortunately, finding out a friend is a pedophile turns out to be a free pass to see a sexual assault counselor at no cost, and she was FANTASTIC.)

We have a doctor shortage in general outside the big cities in Canada. There are 30,000 people in my town who can't even get a GP.

Not meaning to throw up roadblocks, 'cause I think y'all are right in that her meds need to be adjusted. Just got to figure out how to make that happen.

Aha; no, that's not a roadblock, not of YOUR making, anyway.

Will her doctor listen to your input about this? Did her sleepiness resolve with the reduction of the Zoloft? Maybe a bump up to 7.5?

I think I'm gonna try to get some sleep....wish me luck. Lol.

Thanks for listening and responding, you guys.  I appreciate you all so much.  Big hugs!

I think the doc would listen if I can get my mother there, Barb. She has repeatedly refused to go to the GP a number of times for a number of things.  I might have to make the appointment and tell mom we're going somewhere else....

Edit:  no, it didn't resolve the sleepiness.  Nothing has really resolved that, I think it's just the kidney disease.  Mom didn't get up AT ALL yesterday. 

I met with staff this am. Most of the female employees do not feel safe after the break-in. Their other comment was they feel they are being used by the caregivers. In addition, a letter was delivered to me this morning. It was signed by 13 of the caregivers. In essence, they said that if I really wanted to help, I should give them the money, instead of wasting it on the center. I ended the meeting. I told everyone to come back at 2:00 and I would have final checks ready with their current payroll, accumulated paid time off and two weeks severance. PJ is going to complete his group session as scheduled. I guess this was a good idea that just didn't work. Or maybe a bad idea and I wasn't smart enough to see. I guess my next few weeks will be getting things packed up and repairs made to the building.

My brother called me last night. He found out the real reason for the visit this weekend is that the children's guardians are looking for financial support short and long term and also 6 weeks of respite care each year. I called them and cancelled the visit. I told them not to call me further and that I had no financial obligation. 

I will no longer be posting on this thread. After last evenings revelation that I trigger adverse feelings  for another poster,  I believe the appropriate decision is to leave. I do not want to be the cause of someone else's upset.

Thank you for all of the support I've been given over the last year.  Again, I am sorry for any upset that I have caused. It certainly was not my intention.

Upset, do not leave this thread. You are taking the comment too much to heart.  It was not meant as an offense.  

Upset..those caregivers actually have the nerve to tell you to give them the money instead of using it for the center?? Talk about having a Sense of Entitlement! ... It reminded me so much of adult children asking their elderly parents to give them their inheritance now instead of waiting until they die. Well, it shows that perhaps they’re not really interested in attending caregiving support.

There’s really no need to avoid this thread. And no need to apologize for being a therapist. I’ve had my 1st therapist loudly confirmed to me repeatedly that my family didn’t love me. OMG! I was attending my 1st therapy because I was seriously suicidal! I don’t know if he was using reverse psychology, but now it’s very hard for me to Not believe that they don’t love me... My 2nd therapist kept forgetting our appointments until I text her asking how late she’s going to be. Sometimes, she was an hour late... I’ve decided therapy is just not for me. But my fave sister had a successful therapy. So I know that therapists are different. I just had the bad luck choosing them.

(((Upset))) "No good deed goes unpunished." I've felt that way often enough in my own life, but it's a bad feeling. I can't relate to why someone would want a little bit of money more than they want to have continued services given to their community. That's not something I understand.

I hope you continue to share here. So much about your experiences relate to dysfunctional families and how they interact. You're needed here. I hope you stay. You've had a lot thrown at you lately, so if you need a day or two (or three) to let things settle in, to take time to focus on yourself and take care of yourself, please do that. This thread will still be here, open to you, always. (((((hugs)))))

Upser, I so hope that you'll give us the benefit of your caregiving experiences as well as your professional perspective on other threads.

upset - please stay. I don't think there was anything personal in the comment.You are going through a lot - more betrayal by family and also by the caregivers. I think that asking for money is just horrible - by both the caregivers and the caretakers of the girls. Obviously money will not solve the problems of the caregivers. That letter from the caregivers must have been quite a blow. I trust there were some who appreciate the services they got. I can understand female staff not feeling safe after the break in.
Somehow I am not surprised that the family of the girls wanted money and respite. It is not your job, not at all and I am so glad that Jay found out about it before it got any further.

ali - hope you get your physical issues sorted out. Adrenaline surges can't be fun.

dori - hope you figure out something with mum and meds.

lack of sleep is the pits. I struggle with it often too. Wish I had a solution.

The case meeting went well yesterday. No big changes except they will try stopping the risperidone. It may make her more alert and want to join in. Also they will increase mother's pain meds a little as pain is her most common reason for not engaging in activities. She is going to activities once or twice a week. A little more would be good. She occasionally feeds herself, but mostly they feed her. However, her appetite is great still and she eats her plateful and more sometimes. I know once her appetite is gone that she will be on her final decline. Another hearing aid bit the dust. This time on the dining room floor. I guess they aren't putting them in properly or something. She has worn them for years without problems. I need to follow up in that.

IWe have a couple of apptmts later today and will look at two or three condos. One has sold and one is taken off the market as they have a long term renter. One step at a time!