Caring For Mom

   

                                a painting I made a while ago and used in a previous post   

                   Hello there,  Its 1 o'clock in the morning and i just got home from my Mother's apartment. She is sick but refuses to go to the doctor or ER. She has been living near me for 14 years and for 14 years I have cared for her. 

Next day: I did get her to go to the doctor and tests were given.

This past year has been the hardest. I don't know if you have been or are in the same boat, but being a caregiver is hard. I mean I knew it would be hard, but I didn't count on it being often lonely, heart wrenchingly sad, suffer with feelings of abandonment, jealousy and anger .

                               

I get told by my siblings "Hey, keep us posted" when things with our mom's health go wrong... and I wonder what does that really mean? In the past year I have grown to hate that line and I have grown a bit resentful of the ones who send it.

Almost everyone I know is currently a caregiver or has recently lost a parent after a long battle.  My best friend got married and shorty after the wedding rented a home where both her Mom and her father-in-law came to live as well. Both parents have chronic illnesses and one of the parents has proven especially difficult as his behavior has regressed to the point of hateful actions and these are a deep concern for my friend.

In the last year a woman has attended our church with her wheel chair bound Mother. Her Mom is fiesty and has some comical quirks...like at times wheeling her chair to the front where the pastor is preaching and for all intent and purposes tries to run him down......(Ok, I may be exaggerating a bit) She sings her own worship songs in her her own key and has snuck a few cigarettes in the woman's bathroom. Her daughter doesn't let her mom's physical and other issues stop her. She has found a sort of balance in her life and decided that staying home and living a life of a hermit martyr is not for her. She goes to church. She attends women's functions and even went on the women's retreat...all with Mom lovingly in tow. 

My other friend who has bad health issues and a full time job would go everyday to take care of her mother...even though there were two other siblings living in her mother's home who could have helped.Later she moved her mother in with her and cared for her until her Mom passed away.

Yet another is caring for a elderly friend who has family, but are not very involved .

and there are so many others.

I gain strength knowing that they have been through or are going through this too.

I try to find moments of happiness and small blessings

I pray and tell all the stinking thinkin' thoughts and self doubt to take a hike....

Like Glinda said to the Wicked Witch..."You have no power here, be gone"

I cry...a lot

I pray...a lot

I push myself to spend time whenever I can with friends or at the very least keep connected through texts and phone calls. If I get an hour free... I rejoice and use every second for something that will lift my spirits. I'll read, watch a favorite episode of an old tv show or I take the time to write.

 I care for my Mom as best I can and remember to find the joy in doing so...and when I see that smile on my mom's face... I praise God that she still feels joy.

For as long as She has left in this world...I want her to be happy. and if I can be a bit responsible for that happiness ...well then that will be a blessing I'll hold with me for the rest of my life.