I am so angry and I can't help it

kyjacob13

Forgive me for the ramblings but I don't know what else to do. I used to write on these boards about this but haven't written in a long time. My last email was breached so I'm writing under a new email.

I am a religious person and believe that God knows what he is doing but I am still so angry and sad and full of grief. I am the youngest of 13. My dear Mother has advanced Alzheimer's (she has a peg and a trache) and has round the clock care from an aide and a nurse and still lives at home.

I have always been upset that even though my mother has helped thousands of people in her life and she is the nicest person in the world, she is all but forgotten. My father died 10 years ago and I only have my mother now. I "forgive" my siblings who live out of town unless they are near my mother but don't visit (that seldom happens). My sister lives upstairs from her and I have 2 brothers who live a few blocks away from her. I live about a 45 min drive from her but try my best to visit her a few times a week. My mom has 2 siblings that have all but forgotten her....they say that they don't want to remember her like this (what a BS answer). My brothers visit once in a while but have to be prodded to go into her room to talk to her. But their children never visit her.

My brother's daughter got engaged tonight (after looking for a long time) but I told my wife that I am not happy for her. She visited my mom once in like 3 years (probably more years). How can I be happy for her? I know that anger is a poison that you drink and expect the other person to die but I tried not to be angry. If it was done to me then I can forgive and forget. But how can I forgive and forget something that was done to the kindest person in the world....my Mother? I am so angry and so sad and so full of grief that I don't know what to do.

I have heard people say that I shouldn't let others dictate how I feel and that it is their loss. But how can they do this to my mother?! Their mother?! Their mother in law?! Their grandmother??!!! How can they never visit???!!! I don't understand it! I have heard some of them say that my mother won't remember the visit but I told them that that thinking is wrong. Who said the patient needs to remember the visit forever? My mother still smiles and still tries to interact with the visitor. She loves when people sing to her and she loves music and she loves loves loves children.

Her brother and my brothers and niece's and nephews don't believe me about her interacting but that is because they don't see it themselves. My brothers don't force their children to visit. Many times their wives are to blame for their children not visiting. And their wives don't come at all either.

Lastly, I am soo angry at God for doing this to my mother. For taking my father and my mother away from me and not allowing me to have my parents see my children and not allowing my children to see my father and my cognizant mother. I hardly remember my mother from before Alzheimer's. Everyday is a struggle. I know that I said that I'm a religious person and God has a plan but I'm still human. Why would He do this to my Mother?!?! How can He allow everyone to forget my mother?!?! How can my religious family forget my mother?!?!?!

How can I be happy for my niece's engagement after seeing how she doesn't visit my mother?

Will my sadness and my grief dissipate?

I'm sorry for the ramble but I honestly didn't know who else to ask.

SusanB-dil

Hi kyjacob - I get it.

A lot of frustration and anger, and yeah, not without cause… would you consider some therapy? just for yourself?

All of 'this' IS hurtful, frustrating, and a lot of other adjectives you can think of. You go ahead and ramble. And unfortunately, lack of care and concern from others, even siblings and other family, isn't uncommon. I think some might not care, but I think that some just don't know how to handle it.

((HUGS))

harshedbuzz

@kyjacob13

Hi and welcome. I am sorry for your reason to be here but pleased you found this place.

The pain and the anger in your heart is palpable in every line of your post. I am so sorry for the way you feel right now.

I feel like one piece to your anger is being cheated of time with your mom in her prime by virtue of being the youngest. I saw my mom experience this as she lost both her parents and her oldest sister in her 20s which was much younger than her older siblings. It was as if her older sibling accepted the death of their parents as a very sad but natural order of the human experience while my mom wasn't there yet. I felt cheated on behalf of my son when my dear MIL died. She'd been a doting grandmother who'd lived long enough to see her older grands launch into adulthood compared to my then little guy who was a first grader.

Mom also struggled with being sidelined from important healthcare discussions regarding her parents which added to her general frustration and upset. I wonder if some of the absent sibs disagree with the care decisions being made for your mom. The choice to use artificial means for breathing and feeding in end-stage dementia is somewhat unusual and even controversial. This might explain the daughters-in-law and their children not choosing to visit.

Another important piece to this is that there seem to be two distinct schools of thought regarding the "personhood" of those in late-stage dementia. I don't see this reaction, which seems hard-wired, to be related in any way to either faith or affection.

FWIW, I felt the way you do when my dad was in the later stages of dementia. The essence of who he was, which was not always good, remained to some degree although the physical changes at the end were so profound that they were disturbing. My dad was unusual in that he was verbal and knew mom and I until her died from aspiration pneumonia, but the physical changes where his gender wasn't apparent were more than mom could bear at times. I felt badly that she couldn't be more present for him, but I do not judge her. At some point in his progression, the man she had married vanished on her even as his body remained her on earth.

I have a friend who was living in dementiaworld when I was. We used to meet for a long chatty lunch monthly and compare stories. Her PWD was her mom— a lady who like your mom was a force for good in the world. Friend was an only who built a home to provide mom with her own suite of rooms and provided the bulk of the caregiving with a couple hours of aides most days in the last year of her mom's life. Like you, this friend is a woman of deep faith and the experience of losing her mom in this way was devastating. About a year before her mom died she shared with me that "the lady who lives with me is a nice enough little old lady, but she's not my mom". She felt her mom had left her over a year before she passed. I don't judge her either as one feels what one feels.

It sounds as if you don't have children or that they're very young compared to those of your siblings. I'm assuming based on your somewhat catty remark about a nice engaged after "looking for a long time". FWIW, it would not be appropriate for you to expect them to parent these adults by forcing them to visit. Either they feel compelled and have the time to visit or they don't.

Dementia can destroy even the closest of families. It sounds like you might mentally be in a place where you'll need to decide if that's a choice you want to make.

HB

H1235

My mom and mil grandchildren don’t/didn’t visit as often as I think they should. I struggle with it. I think society today does not put the value on our elderly that it should. We are a society that looks to our own individual needs and gratification. I also think that some people are just emotionally weak. My bil was of the mindset that he just couldn’t take seeing his mom that way. Is that a cop out? I don’t know. The good person in me wants to say- who am I to judge what another person is emotionally capable of. But I must admit I sometimes judge. It is heartbreaking to see someone who has devoted their life to family be ignored and cast aside when things get rough. I try to tell myself that I can not control the actions others, only myself. It’s not always as helpful as i would hope. I hope you can find some peace.

psg712

My heart goes out to you. It is painful enough to handle your own feelings about your mom's dementia. Adding the feelings about your family members' choices and behaviors lays on another layer of emotion, as you have so well expressed.

My mom has two siblings who occasionally make contact with me but have not seen my mom in at least five years. To be fair, they both live in other states, but they have had opportunities to make visits and have chosen not to do so. I believe that they do love her, but they fear seeing with their own eyes the shadow of herself that she has become. It makes me sad that she has missed out on time she could have enjoyed their visits, but it is their loss even more than hers at this point. Yes, I have felt angry, to the point that I'd like to ask them not to come to her funeral if they can't come to see her while she lives. But I have to let this go, for my own peace of mind as well as for the relationship I still hope to have with them. It truly is too hard for them, and like your mom's siblings, they want to remember her as she was before Alzheimer’s began to steal her from us.

You are doing the best you can for your mom. You possess the courage to sit face to face with her confusion and look at her trach and still spend time with her. You are battling your grief and anger directly. The brothers that you have to "force" into her room are also suffering, so much so that they can't face her (or their own pain) for long each time. Reach out to your faith leader or find a therapist or whatever it takes so that when your dear mother is gone, you and your siblings may be able to love and comfort one another. Each of you will have suffered a huge loss. Each will deal with it in his or her own way.

Being angry with God ...that is real and scary, as you are a person of faith who has likely been raised to trust God. You are wrestling with questions as old as humankind: why do bad things happen to people we love? Why did mom develop Alzheimer’s? Without getting too deep into theology, please take this from my heart as another person with faith who struggles for answers to questions too big for us: God did not do this to your mom and your family. This world is broken, and we all feel the natural consequences of bodies and minds that don't last forever. Pour out your anger and grief to God. He stands ready to provide comfort, even if he doesn't hand out the answers that we want. He is still trustworthy.