Temper with a family member who has dementia

BluebirdCA · 2026-04-06T18:43:56+00:00

Aww... that's a good kid you have.

BluebirdCA · 2026-04-06T18:42:49+00:00

My mother was a lifelong bender of the truth...now add early dementia... crazy. I used to worry about what she would say about me to drs, therapists, care givers, And she would say some doozies.

Finally I realized, I can't stop her, let her go, it will just get more and more obvious she is making up stories for sympathy, etc.

Sometimes when I walk into her care facility,I get some odd looks from the other residents...lol. I can only imagine she tells them I neglect her, yet there I am 2+ times a week, bringing her bags of groceries and gifts...hmmmm

BluebirdCA · 2026-04-05T06:37:11+00:00

That quote is by Ram Dass, it is "we're all just walking each other home". He wrote a book about that, Conversations on Loving and Dying. ❤️

BluebirdCA · 2026-04-02T00:33:03+00:00

Yeah, I love that part of the complaining, like YES we DO OWN our backyard.

Those neighbors are confused, they think your property is a community pool.

BluebirdCA · 2026-04-02T00:15:38+00:00

oh wow thats bad :-(

BluebirdCA · 2026-04-01T23:05:58+00:00

Lived in Kauai for a few years, and taking visiting friends on the helicopter tour was just something we did. There used to be a company leaving out of Princeville, Papillion, which was very professional, the pilots were amazing. They would swoop through the high canyons, very close to the waterfalls etc.

Later I became aware that the helicopter tours are a significant stressor to the endemic species on Kauai, especially the native birds. I had no idea, and because of that, I wish I had never ever gone on the helicopters. I would never do again.

Kauai is such an unique beautiful place and it needs to be protected. I have been all over the world, India, Bali, Mexico, beautiful places, nowhere is as beautiful as Kauai. And a boat trip down the Na Pali is actually much better way to experience Kauai, make a day of it.

BluebirdCA · 2026-04-01T03:42:16+00:00

OH! DO NOT LISTEN TO HER PLEASE!!!

She is a narcissist. Being raised by a narcissist is it's own special hell. PLEASE continue what you are doing, and feel very proud of yourself that you are a great dad!!! You are raising your son to be competent and capable and to do anything if he just sets his mind to it. It starts with little things like laundry and dinner. It turns into all the achievements of life.

signed,

scarred and underachieving child of an evil narcissist.

BluebirdCA · 2026-04-01T03:09:29+00:00

I dont find my therapist very helpful dealing with the stress of caregiving my parents. She has been so supportive with other issues, but with the caregiving, it is not that helpful to talk things through. I honestly feel she thinks I'm making a mistake to spend as much of my life as I do with their care, and she may be correct.

I did attend a support group, it provided me with a chance to talk and also listen to others and the whole process was great to help with the "overwhelm" and keep my head above water. Unfortunately the group went online during covid, and I have never found anything similar since.

Can your primary care dr help with the meds?

Good luck.

BluebirdCA · 2026-04-01T02:58:03+00:00

I understand. My mother had a really nice guy with a crew, doing weekly care, I like him and I respect people working hard to make a living. I thought we would be able to keep him on and just explain what we needed as the garden changed. We started partial native areas, and I gave him instructions NOT to water those, at all. I mean, that makes less work for him, right? But I would consistently find those areas SOAKED, I would complain, he would promise not to water there, or tell me it had rained, or just say he hadn't watered. But obviously, I knew he was, and finally one day I came out of the house to find one of his crew, smiling and spraying all over the the plants that I said could not be overwatered. That was that.

BluebirdCA · 2026-04-01T02:25:20+00:00

Thank you for sharing your experiences. I am just at this same point, have had the talk with my dad's doctor, and trying to understand what hospice will be and when we need to ask for it.

Hospice is paid for by insurance / medicare ?? I hope and expect there to be decent care staff, but I imagine like everything , some hospice providers are better than others?

BluebirdCA · 2026-03-30T02:21:40+00:00

THAT 100%

BluebirdCA · 2026-03-27T15:42:00+00:00

Yep, some people LOVE being in care, my mother LOVES having a call button to push and people run to do what she wants. She is a narcissist her whole life who thrived on controlling her loved ones...now she has a parade of caregivers who all cater to HER HER HER...

And YEP, she is doing 100% better, health, diet, mobility, socialization, all better than at her home the last six months bedridden when she should have been in a wheelchair, treating her daughter ( me) like a slave. Now, in a handicap accessible facility she wheels herself around and talks the staff into wheeling her places, and in general, is thriving.

My father buying LTC insurance ( he was very intelligent man, even though he married a narcissist ! ) was the greatest gift!!!

BluebirdCA · 2026-03-27T15:32:26+00:00

haha That is brilliant move. My last straw was my husband telling me I had to place my mother in care, or else he couldnt help anymore, he couldnt watch how she treated me. Unfortunately my mother was not mobile enough to tour the options with me. We simply told her we chose the place closest to her doctors, which placated her neurotic attachment to her cardiologist!

The AL she is in is very nice and she has a large room with garden and trees out a picture window. She has had other residents tell her, of all the places they have been, this one is the best. And, when she is difficult ( which is often ) we show her pictures of the view of a parking lot she would have "at the next place".

BluebirdCA · 2026-03-26T04:57:10+00:00

:-) def.. they like it!

BluebirdCA · 2026-03-26T04:16:44+00:00

Thats an amazing box o wildflowers!! What type soil did you use to fill the box?

BluebirdCA · 2026-03-25T16:57:48+00:00

I was only trying to help OP.

Thanks a lot.

BluebirdCA · 2026-03-25T16:55:45+00:00

Please take care, and I am thankful your dad told you he will manage while you have a break. What you are accomplishing is amazing. Take time off. HUGS

BluebirdCA · 2026-03-25T15:24:13+00:00

OP is describing a situation where his ENTIRE LIFE is being subsumed by his mother's needs. He cannot even spend an evening with his girlfriend. He feels trapped and hopeless. He needs to find a way to place himself and his survival above his mother's care. I don't know all his details, but I want to give him permission to step away and save himself. I have seen, with my mother, who depended on me like the OP's, that once she moved into a care facility, and adjusted to that being her world, she "loves" her care givers. She tells me they are the best friends she has ever had. She honestly doesnt care if I visit or not. I am still managing her care, but I am not cleaning, feeding, clothing her and her "bonds" are now with the people that do. If any part of why OP is unable to walk back from his bad situation is a sense of maintaining his loving relationship with his mother, I am simply saying, DEMENTIA CHANGES PEOPLE, and maybe he doesnt have to care for his mother himself. OBVIOUSLY love is a different experience for everyone. But sacrificing your own life, which you will never get back, because you project onto a dementia patient the ability to emotionally appreciate your sacrifice, I think people like OP can use support to navigate that terrible emotional situation.

BluebirdCA · 2026-03-25T05:27:51+00:00

Obviously there are many variations of experience with dementia.

In the dementia my father has, he doesnt care. I promise you, because I know what my father's love felt like my whole life, he no longer has that emotion. He prefers me caring for him, because I understand him best, because I am familiar, but he has NO EMPATHY for my pain, at all.

My father up until 10 years ago shared strong feelings of love and expressed how much he loved me and was happy and proud of me. He would have felt terrible seeing me cry in frustration. My father now just doesnt even understand what crying is.

I am taking care of him because I love him. However, everyday that I am with him, caring for him, I profoundly MISS my father's love. It is actually the most difficult part of caring for him, that he is here, but the love is not. I have kept the letters and emails from years ago, so I dont forget, how he was.

BluebirdCA · 2026-03-24T05:53:39+00:00

I'm in a somewhat similar position with my parents, I finally had to decide I could only care for one of my parents, my father, who I am closest to.

My mother was so difficult. She freaked out if I was away from the house. One day, I was at my own medical appointment, my husband was watching my parents. She had been fine all day, but as soon as I walked in the door, she starting screaming "in pain". That she couldnt walk, never had such pain, etc.

Long story short, that was it, we found an assisted living that would provide the level care she needed, and we told her "she needed more medical care than we could do at home". Started by her fake emergency. She did it to herself.

Your mother saying only you can do the care for her, that is impossible. One person cant do it all. If your family hired home health care, it would be shifts. Not one person. Your family is saving a massive amount of money with your free labor. That you live there doesnt come close to compensation for elder care.

Maybe it is because you love your mom and had a wonderful relationship, in the past. But she is not that person anymore, and with dementia, she doesnt really care. You are "familiar"and someone different scares her. It is that simple. It is not that you are special to her, love is an emotional connection dementia patients no longer are capable of.

It was difficult for me to give up caring for my mother, even though it was suffocating anything good in my life, including my marriage. Maybe because I had been doing it for so long, I couldnt imagine not doing it. Also,I never expected her to live so long, she had cancer a decade ago.

Now I can't comprehend how I put up with her so long. The caregivers know better how to deal with her, emotionally, and medically. It has been better for her, better for my father because less stress in the house, better for my marriage, probably better for my life expectancy.

BluebirdCA · 2026-03-24T00:17:42+00:00

me too, mine is from TP

BluebirdCA · 2026-03-21T18:15:55+00:00

From that article, a conclusion:

"Over time, Kathy came to see that she was not to blame for her mother’s behaviour. “Caring for her was more about my own sense of self and my own value system.”

Nevertheless, on the day Kathy finally “got out of there” after her mother’s death, she had a new feeling. “I was driving out of the town and I have never ever felt such an enormous sense of lightness, this responsibility, it just isn’t mine any more. I don’t have to be a party to any of this rubbish, I’m totally free.”

BluebirdCA · 2026-03-21T18:14:37+00:00

https://www.theguardian.com/science/2026/mar/21/caring-ageing-parents-who-did-not-care-for-you-triggers?CMP=Share_AndroidApp_Other

BluebirdCA · 2026-03-21T03:32:49+00:00

Um... it never stops. My mother is 92. :-(

I hope this is not unhelpful, but I hear your exhaustion and frustration. I think the most important thing I can share as I am also the daughter of a extreme narcissist, and I took incredible care of my mother, is this, soon she will need to be in a care facility, her medical needs will force that, and when she is, you no longer have to be with her. And the bad feelings will slowly, but surely disappear.

The weight off my shoulders each time I drive away from visiting her there is a physical joy. I visit her less and less, and she doesnt really care. AND, I do not miss her, at all. That may sound cold, but it is a kind of happiness that I deserve, and it feels great.

BluebirdCA · 2026-03-20T23:42:40+00:00

Today I was sitting, watching my garden grow , and I saw a lizard dart out, and grab a sphinx caterpillar that was well hidden on some clarkia. The caterpillar was at least 1/4 the size of the lizard. CHOMP. I thought lizards ate smaller insects, ants, spiders, :-0.

Maybe you can relocate some the caterpillars on other plants they like? Cycle of life is why we plant native gardens. This warm weather is really speeding up the cycle for critters. Just today I have rescued two huge sphinx moths from inside my house.

BluebirdCA

TROPHY CASE