How to deal with loving a family member, when not wanting to be their caretaker?

After dealing with my husbands cancer & care for years and then my father died a year later, next my cousin 2 years later, I was toast, done or so I thought.

I now have 2 in facilities, one AL the other MC, fortunately both are receiving good care so my brother & I still have a life.

I am/was the PR for all five, so the stress is still there long after they die.

It is all too much, I do not want to be involved in any more of these situations, the caregiver in me now says "NO...no more"

I understand and wish you the best..

You’ve reached your limit . No guilt feelings is warranted . You did nothing wrong . You will have to tell your brother you can’t physically do this anymore .
Offer to help him find caregivers to come to the home or an assisted living facility. If he needs to sell his home to pay for his care in a facility you will need to find a new place to live . You can be his advocate without doing the hands on caregiving .
Good Luck .

I sort of shut down when I had Mom to care for. I didn't want the responsibility but had to do it. I get overwhelmed easily. If I hadn't hardened myself, I would have been crying all the time. It was all up to me and I was the one who had to make all the decisions. I too pulled away. I did not take Mom into my home thinking it would be forever. It was 20 months. I then was able to place her in an AL and later LTC. She did very well. All I needed to do was visit and keep things stocked up while in the AL.

At 68 there are just things we cannot do any longer. For me, I would not toilet or bathe a man not my husband. I would not even try to help a 200lb man up. You have to be honest with ur brother, you can't do it anymore. He needs to hire someone or go into an Assisted living.

Oftentimes, being a caregiver to a loved one winds up ruining the good relationship you once shared. I didn't do any hands on caregiving for either of my parents (I have no siblings) because I wanted to preserve what relationship we DID have. I knew I'd be resentful if I had to perform caregiving services for them, recognized and acknowledged it, and arranged for Independent living for them, then Assisted Living and Memory Care. I didn't beat myself up for it either. I helped them plenty over a 10 yr period, just not in a hands on way.

Accept yourself for who you are and that's it! You're not abandoning your brother......you're just not wiping his butt! 😊

I was an RN and I loved it. Worked mostly with elders as elders are mostly the age group that needs hospitalization. I love it and I loved them. I worked four days a week down to three toward the end, had five weeks vacation, 12 sick days and 12 holidays every year. So yeah, I could do it at that. But the one thing that being an RN made crystal clear to me was that this was not something I could do 24/7 no matter how much I loved my family. And I did have about the best parents and brother on the face of the earth.

I think that those of us who cannot recognize and honor our own human limitations have a sort of grandiosity in all truth. An feeling that we are god-like and omnipotent. That we CAN do it and we SHOULD do it and anything less is failure.

Nope. I embrace my human limitations. They are mine. While I might have wished I was a fairie with a wand, a god with a lightening bolt at times, overall I am fine with saying I didn't create this suffering and I cannot fix it. I can do what I can and I best take care. This is my one life. I was TAUGHT that, by the way, by my parents. And my own daughter is WELL AWARE that she must NEVER EVER consider such a thing herself; we speak of it often.

So that's me. Only you can decide you for you. But throwing ourselves on the funeral pyres of the generation before us does nothing but rob us of our own life.

If you do not want to be caregiving, you should not be. There's nothing wrong with refusing. Your brother will just have to accept other people, most likely paid help meeting his care needs. You have every right to say no and not have a moment of guilt about it.

I was an in-home caregiver for 25 years as employment and was good at it. I now operate a homecare agency.
That being said, I refused to continue being the caregiver for my mother. I have refused family members and even family friends who wanted me for their loved one's care because I'm a professional and have experience.

The answer is always a hard NO. I know better than to be a long-term caregiver to family or anyone I have a personal relationship with.
It's very different than doing it as a job where you go home after your shift.

Tell your brother no more and help him find the care help he needs.