Hi.
I've been taking care of my mom since 2016 when her health declined. She isn't particularly in tune with this reality, she is in denial about it.
She is incredibly temperamental and emotionally and verbally (sometimes physically) abusive.
I'm looking for a 3rd job to get myself away from here. I've had a nervous breakdown last year due to her behavior with me during the pandemic, where we both lived side by side 24/7 for the whole thing. She became increasingly aggressive and the police were involved.
This has been incredibly difficult, I'm taking medication and doing 2 therapies. My family says I can't leave because she can't be alone. I think that if I leave, I can support at a distance and do not plan on not going too far away.
She is compulsively lying to everyone that I'm insane (that I have schizophrenia, to be exact). It is actually anxiety and ptsd, and she is well aware of this. She pretends to be okay and to be taking care of me because of my supposed schizophrenia. Some folks in my family and her friends believe this narrative.
She even tried to get me to believe in it, lying consecutively about my mental health, exaggerating, and blaming/guilt-tripping.
It was actually the first time I noticed compulsive lying, albeit she's not very good at it, thankfully.
So because of all this, I'm under constant stress and I can't be for the sake of my mental health. It came to a point that it's either my mental health or lack of my health in general. I can't do this anymore.
So, if anyone's been in a similar situation, please let me know what you did, how did you help yourself when no one was there and how can I actually detatch myself from this situation so I can think clearly.
She fell in 2018, around Christmas, and spent 2 weeks at the hospital. Since then I've been told that I can't leave her alone.
I talked to her and asked her to make arrangements "for the future" in case she needs care that I can't provide as she prefers to make these types of decisions on her own. To date, she hasn't done so.
She is in therapy, but with all the lying I think it's not really making anything different, or that will have any impact on the situation.
Besides her medication for her COPD, she also takes an antipsychotic and an antidepressant.
Her violent behavior isn't new, she was like this when I was a kid too, but has become worse with age.
Thank you.
6 Answers
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You are smart, find out your rights. Since she has a mental problem, maybe she can be placed in a facility. No one should be made to care for an abusive person. Hopefully, you have proof that it is effecting you physically and mentally.
Here in the States we can walk away. Call Adult Protection Services and tell them there is a vulnerable adult we can no longer care for. Or if the person we are caring for winds up in the hospital or Rehab we can say we are not going to care for them any longer and discharging them would be unsafe. The person then becomes the Ward of the State.
You were not born to take care of your birth until her natural death, OR YOURS.
Of course she isn’t willing to have “the conversation”. She hasn’t HAD TO.
In a slightly different scenario, I found a beautiful residential setting for my mother, and placed her.
She thrived there, and I resumed my busy life. I visited every day, but that was MY CHOICE.
Find YOUR CHOICES, explore existing options FOR HER, and move forward. Whoever is trying to manipulate by guilt is wrong, duplicitous, unkind, and unfair.
Why are you choosing to pay ant attention to such people?
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Thank you.
Best wishes and Godspeed! 😊
I live in Portugal, so I really need to look into services, like Adult Protective Services.
Thank you
Are you a troll?
I'm in Portugal, there is a high incidence of abandoned elderlies. She is considered an "unable" person by law, so there are contingencies.
But tomorrow morning I'll make the appropriate calls to know my rights.
I will be calling an association tomorrow to know the legality of my leaving and her being elderly and abusive. Here it's illegal to leave your elderly parent, but I think there may be exceptions given she is abusive.