Why do I dislike my mother so much?

Very normal. A small bit of resentment at having to provide so much care for someone who may be angry at you regardless of what you do. As in my mother there is probably a bit of manipulation on their part to induce guilt upon you. You have to just forgive because they do not know what they are doing. If they DO know what they are doing then "it is what it is" and you are doing your best. You are also very close to her now and each request at this age becomes demanding and you feel a loss of personal freedom. You need some personal time to get out for a day. Find a caregiver who can watch for you to take a long break and do something you really enjoy. You deserve it and have a right and need to relax. These things will help you because your "dislike" is probably more resentment. Rest assured you are NOT alone in your comments!

I'm so glad someone else has this problem. I was beginning to think I was the worst child in the world. I love my mother, I just don't like her anymore. At 91, she can lie like a teenager. She taught me to always say please and thank you. But she seems to have forgotten those words. I know it's not really her in that body anymore. I've felt that same contempt and a huge amount of guilt for it. But I'll start taking your advice mrtex01 and try to get out some. It's been over a year since I've done anything other than really fast errands. I was about to ask my doctor for something for anxiety. Maybe all I really need is a play day away from this house. Bobbi48128..I hope you get a break. If I lived close, I'd trade stop by and let you free for a while. Thanks you guys.

Yikes! I know exactly how you feel!
My 90 year old mother irritates the heck out of me, staring at me, watching me, following me around sometimes. I hate it.
Perhaps we are unprepared for this caregiving role because of the very people we are caring for. My own life experiences with my mother were poor at best. She didn't have time for me, pushed me off on others for years, was completely unloving. We were never close, but partnered up when my kids were born. It was good but still lacked the roots that other women seem to have with their moms.
I broke the cycle with my own sons, and that was so healing. I was proud that I paid attention, did not strike out, didn't hurt and criticize.
Now she's reverting to her childish self and she is clingy. I feel smothered and surrounded.
So, maybe your true symbiotic relationship is revealed. Maybe she was stressed or angry or too tired to parent you, and that's why you feel the way you do. Go back to your early childhood and take a look, also look at hers. Ask her some question and keep her on topic and let her unwind some childhood stuff. You may be startled to hear the roots of her behavior now.
For me, never being allowed to cling, even as an infant, this clingy woman has no idea what she is asking me for.

Mommie Dearest admitted she didn't want children hanging on her skirts, she just wanted to go have a good time, so she threw me away and had a good time. It was always "go away, go out in the street and play, get away from me" from when I was a small child. She knocked me about, split my head open and put me in a hospital "because you cheeked me" ... I was 6 and it never got better after that. My besotted father enabled her and busted his chops to provide anything her narcissistic self desired, except when she got whatever it was it wasn't good enough and she didn't want it any more. His heart gave out in 1999.

I grew up totally alone. no role model, no direction in life and made so many mistakes along the way as I was so naive. She was a control freak, drove away any boyfriend (because he just wanted her money), was always throwing me out of the house for some imagined indiscretion ... once I went to a party and as it was so late stayed at a boyfriend's house. The next day she threw me out and went round to his house, standing in the street, screaming and yelling. I was 22!!!

She's beaten me up emotionally forever and I've always been scared of her but, despite her, I emigrated to Canada (she had to follow dammit) had a decent career and bought my own house. After my father died in 99 she bought a huge house she couldn't afford to keep, thinking it would make her popular, but, apart from the grocery store and library, she hid in it 24/7, all the while wailing about how lonely and bored she was.

I shoved my boot up her arse for more than 15 years to get out, volunteer, go somewhere, meet people but it was always met with excuses. She developed Parkinsons and dementia long ago and has had numerous strokes. I gave up my home and career to live in her freezing basement to care for her for four horrendous years.

She's been in a NH now for 2.5 years. Screaming at me on the phone every day, setting the government on me because she thought I stole her money ... on the edge of a nervous breakdown ... blacked out doing 85 in my truck ... I changed my phone number, made it unlisted and she's never had my address or she'd send the cops around to check on me ... done that before.

My mother is now close to 89, bed ridden and barely able to speak intelligibly. She has no friends, except one that comes about 4 times a year, having run off everyone she couldn't get something out of over the years. One house she lived in she hated the next door neigbour because he was black ... when he started shoveling her driveway he was an angel lol. That house was egged one day and it wasn't even halloween so I guess she royally pissed someone off.

I'm POA, preserve her money, pay her bills, run her errands and make sure she has all she needs. I visit about once a week but she wants me to come all the time. Not happening... threw me away and tormented me forever but now old, sick and alone she wants me? After 60+ years? I'm sorry, no can do.

I'm rebuilding my life. Bought a tiny run down cottage with some land, getting into growing and canning, volunteering at the local hospital and driving for local dog rescue. It's my turn now.

You all have some life left, those you care for have had theirs ... Mommie Dearest traveled the world on exotic vacations (without a kid hanging on my skirts of course), had a lovely home looking out to sea and a weekend house ...the best of everything.

The staff in my mother's NH take wonderful care of her but she sometimes tries to get out of bed without help and falls ... been hospitalized a few times. They call me right away. Any time the phone rings I let the machine pick up and listen before answering. 3 a.m. and what would they like me to do? She's in a hospital where she's getting the best of care ... I live (with some physical issues) in the middle of nowhere up to my ying yang in mountains of ice and snow. Believe me, whatever it is it can wait until tomorrow.

It may sound harsh but those you care for should be in at least assisted living, if not in a NH so you can rebuild life for yourself, your spouse, children and grandchildren.

Oh, these feelings are so natural.and normal. I feel them too - definitely resentment, feeling "put upon", etc., etc. I never wanted kids - don't do well around them - and here I am, caring for a 92 y/o toddler who can still push my buttons if she remembers how (and why IS it that she can remember that but nothing else? :) )

I thought I had a clue what it would be like - I gave up everything and moved across country to care for her; she will NOT allow anyone else in the house - but I really had no idea how isolating it is to be here, how lonely.

Fortunately, she's in pretty good shape right now, which DOES allow me to get out for an afternoon here or there...but without friends to share that time with, it's not so enjoyable, really.

But do what you can to get yourself out and about. Is there an adult day-care nearby that you could try? (I've tried, my mom won't go but maybe yours would)

Good luck to you and all of us. :)

I can relate to every one of these scenerios. It amazing how things change. I have had my 75yo mother, living with me for the last 6yrs. She was my best friend for life. Now, not so much. I have truly mourned the loss of my mother. I am just taking care of the leftover. She has no social skills. She is no longer worried about hygeine. She is rude, manipulative, needy and dillutional. I have no time to myself and she requires my undivided attention. I spent three days with chest pains. That's when it really kicked in. I need to let go. I now don't care anymore. I do what I have to do and let go of any negativity. I have and still am doing the best I can do. Probly more than most. But, now she is being rude and mean to me. I don't deserve, nor will I take it. She raised me to be strong. So, she brought this on herself. Its my version of "tough love". I suggest to the rest of you....stay strong. Give it to God and find some inner peace. You are not a bad child for having these feelings. I have found I love all my friends and except as many invites out as I can. I have really enjoyed dinner by myself. And my connection to my family is awesome. I sneak away and go visit them by myself. Its hard to except these feelings. But, I promise, in the end.....all those feelings wont matter. You still loved your parent.

Well, my mom is the opposite. Was a wonderful mother and a good person. But I think I know why I resent her so much. She puts all her energy into her appearance. The only thing that makes her happy is when people tell her she looks so good. When she gets a new outfit (which I help her pick out) she'll stand and pose infront of the mirror, waiting for comments. Don't get me wrong, she looks very good at 94, very stylish. So much better than me, her dumpy overweight daughter, who she sometimes treats like her caregiver. I guess I'm mad becuase she has it pretty easy. Doesn't have to do any for herself, unless she wants to. Has my fathers pension, my fathers saving, lives in my house practically for free. She rents out her old home to my housekeeper, who I pay, who pays my mom..,I just resent how easy things are for her, and how unappreciatative she is. It's all expected. She brags about how my dad left her comfortable. Well I worked for 30 years, have MY OWN pension, and my own house, and I did it myself. There will be no one to help me when I grow old.., I have sons but they don't live near me. So I guess I'm kind of jealous and that's why I am so angry all the time. I'm spending my last good years taking care of her...does that make sense?

Perhaps your mother has changed over the years. In my experience I found that as my mother aged she changed drastically. She became horribly manipulative, selfish, and spiteful. Her health was poor, but it had been poor from the time she reached her early forties (she died in her late 70s). She did not suffer from dementia at all. She just changed.

You say that you used to get along with her well. Does she seem the same way now as she did when you got along with her?

So it's possible that she, as did my mother, has had significant personality changes that have turned her from a person you liked into someone you don't and can't like. In that case it's she and not you who has brought about these unaccustomed feelings in you.

Oh man! I really felt so guilty because I have those same feelings. mom and i have had a pleasant relationship thru the years...i had never lived near her since i left for college. Now, 40 yrs later i had her move in with my family. Big mistake! I should have had her move close by in her own space. She does not have dementia and is totally recovered from the illness that caused this move. Just this morning she was upset with me because there was a cloth napkin on the floor under the dining room table and I had not picked it up yet and she had TOLD me it was there. I was so perplexed, why didn't she just pick it up? She wants me to wait on her and acts like such a pathetic victim if I don't respond to her the way she wants. She speaks in baby talk sometimes and acts in ways I would not accept from real children. I work in a skilled care facility with elders who are senile and frail. I love my job, but some how mom can irritate me! i don't get it!!! I guess a mother/daughter relationship comes with baggage! sigh. It eats ;me up inside because I want her to get her own place in a senior community, but she is adamantly against that. She wants to live with me. It is hard to change the situation with out tremendous ( and I suspect irreparable harm) stress. Some days I am better than others. I do get breaks, but I feel guilty for wanting my private life back. I feel selfish.

Equinox, my mother went through a time of confabulation. She would tell a story that might have happened in some way, but change the timing and details of the story, usually casting herself in a competent role. After she created the new story, it replaced the old story as truth in her mind. She still believes that on the day my father died, she ran up and down the hospital halls, looking for a doctor, and that my father died quickly, squeezing her hand when he left. She tells how she checked his pulse and knew he was gone. None of this happened. My father ate a hearty meal, then went immediately into death rattles. I thought he might be choking, so I called the nurse. She told me what it was, so we stayed with him 1-2 hours until he passed. My mother was really out of it, since she had taken too much lorazepam. I don't correct her story, though, since she takes comfort in her imagined scenario. It was much more romantic than what really happened.

People can imagine a reality and to them it can become the truth. I have a feeling the people at the facility are right in saying she would have to have help getting up. Your mother probably created the story, but to her it is true.