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I wonder how many caregivers think, their situation is a punishment from God.

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At home caregiving is a choice. As such, it's not a punishment from God, and certainly not to you, who can choose to place your husband in managed care if you're at the point of collapse. This is the free will we're given.

What choices can you make now to lessen your burden and free you up a bit? Help you get the well deserved rest you need? Do consider in home help, at a minimum, so your entire life isn't devoted to caregiving.

Best of luck to you.
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Ha! Why wouldn’t a just God get the punishment over with a merciful lightning strike or maybe a heart attack? What’s with this five years of changing Depends and pushing them around in wheelchairs?
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waytomisery Aug 2024
To earn our wings I suppose .
For some reason God thinks I need more than one pair of wings . 🤔🤔🤔
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I’ve never believed caregiving comes about as a punishment. To me, it’s simply a life circumstance like any other. There are trials, rewards, and lessons in it as there are in so many things
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My only concern here is you because as you said in your profile if it wasn't for your son living with you, you would kill yourself. That is a very scary place to be and I hope and pray that you'll reach out to the Suicide Hotline at 988.
It sounds like you've reached the breaking point and that it's time to make some major changes in your husbands care. So I hope you'll start looking into placing him in the appropriate facility where you can get back to just being his wife and advocate and not his burned out caregiver who wants to kill herself because she's so overwhelmed.

My late husband had a massive stroke at the age of 48(a year and a half after we were married)which left him unable to walk, talk, read, write and paralyzed on his right side.
Our lives were turned completely upside down. Now my husband did relearn how to walk again with a brace on his leg, but his speech only returned slightly and he was never able to use his right arm, or read or write again.
He then developed seizures caused by the damage done to his brain by the stroke, and had many ongoing health issues, including developing vascular dementia towards the end of his life.
It was a constant rollercoaster that we were on until my husbands death at the age of 72, and had it not been for my faith and my caregiver support group, I wouldn't have made it.
And I can tell you that with everything that I went through in my life and with my husband that it has made me a much stronger person, and for that I am grateful and give all the glory to God.

God loves you and doesn't want to punish you. He wants you to seek His face and trust that He will guide you with what needs to be done next. You just have to ask.
But from what you've said in your profile, it definitely sounds like your husband needs to be placed in a facility. And if money is an issue you can apply for Medicaid. There is help out there for not only your husband but for you as well.
I wish you well in finding it.
God bless you.
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My non-religious, uninvolved brother tells me I am “earning my wings” by helping my mentally ill narcissist mother. I am also not religious, so I don’t find his statement helpful. I do think hard caregiving situations are a combination of many things, bad timing, financial issues, family dynamics, the messed up US healthcare system, being at the mercy of either a mentally ill elder or someone with dementia who never got a POA assigned when they still could etc.
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It’s not a punishment from God .

It’s the unfortunate price we are paying for people in general living longer in a dependent state of needing care .

All I’ve gotten out of it is fear that I may lose my mind to dementia and drive my children crazy . I don’t want them to go through what I did .
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ElizabethAR37 Aug 2024
Yes, that's true. Longevity in and of itself is NOT the be-all and end-all, IMO. What's the point of continuing to exist in a dependent state while draining one's family of energy, joy and possibly $$$ they will need for their own elder years?
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I understand the exhaustion and the mental load. And no one can understand unless they’ve been in this situation.
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If your God is a punishing God I am terribly sorry for your choice in gods. I would search out a kinder god. Not that I think your question is unusual. As an RN I saw parents loose perfectly BEAUTIFUL innocent little babies to brain tumors, leukemia, et al. Imagine THEIR problems with THEIR gods, if you will? We have then Roger Rosenblatt--that very kindest of men- who wrote of completely losing his strong faith upon the sudden death of his marvelous daughter. I am an atheist, actually, so I've no one to blame for the many trials and losses we encounter in life; I consider that a "blessing", if you will.
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ElizabethAR37 Aug 2024
Agreed from a fellow atheist (atheist-leaning agnostic to be strictly accurate). I don't buy that any god--if there is one--cares much what happens to me, so that makes me responsible. And when I make my Final Exit, I'm gone. That's it. I have no problem with that.
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My father is in a NH and mom is now gone and I am going back and forth and it is mostly my choice.

It is a different set of concerns at the NH from when my parents were home. Here you need to be sure his needs are being met consistently and advocate if you don’t like something. . I am just grateful I don’t have to cobble together 24/7 care and I am not bathing or toileting my father.

I am grateful for what we have in place for him at this facility because it would be a hell of a lot worse if he were home.
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I agree it FEELS LIKE punishment from God when you reach those totally exasperated times...but in reality, usually being too nice got you stuck in a dark place. Your profile tells a long and difficult journey.

Caregiving for 18 years is soul crushing.
Time to place your husband and get your life back, instead of want to end it.
Wishing you strength and courage,
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