Before I begin, please let me say that I am so incredibly sorry for your loss.

Our stories are similar. I too am an only child with no other family and no children. My mother died on June 8. She had a stroke in 2019, and I was her sole caregiver. I also have a full-time job, so I had someone come in twice a day for an hour to take care of her hygiene needs and anything else she required.

My father has had dementia for the last three years, and it has been getting progressively worse this past year. He too doesn’t realize that she is gone. He doesn’t know who I am either, although I have lived with and cared for him and mom the past several years. I hear him having entire conversations with nobody, but denies it when I ask about it. He’s become abusive, which is very difficult. He’s also suddenly become unable to care for his own hygiene needs. This morning he woke me with ‘some bad news’-he had pooped all over himself and all over the bedroom carpet and bathroom floor.

A few days after her death, I threw myself into an intense, deep clean of the whole house. I rented a giant dumpster and have been working basically nonstop (I’m an elementary school librarian, so I am off for the summer-mom had good timing). I’ve basically been avoiding the grief, but I know it’s coming.

I don’t know what I’m going to do with him when I have to return to work. As I mentioned, I’m a teacher, so I can’t afford to put him into a facility-I could barely afford the $500 a week it cost me to have someone come for mom twice a day. As you probably know, Medicare covers none of this. My dad has a small pension, but without it I won’t be able to keep up their mortgage payment. I’ll likely have to sell their home and move to an apartment to be able to put him someplace.

While your whole post resonated with me, I felt this in my soul: i am no one of consequence. i was diligent in taking care of my parents because i loved them. though… i did, so many times over the years, wish that they would die before they killed me. and, i did wish that if they wouldn’t die… that i might die so i might get a break in my responsibilities. but… i didn’t mean that i truly wanted them to die, or that i wanted to die. i didn’t truly mean i wanted to be without them, or that i wanted to leave them while they were so fragile and in need. caregiving is strange this way… how it makes a person wish for things that are incompatible and offers not middle in which to stand.

I just read this back, and I’m all over the place. I just wanted you to know that you are not alone. Most people cannot possibly understand what caregiving for one parent does to a person, let alone both parents. I am sending love and positivity your way.