Kathryn
It was on fire when I laid down on it.
Augh - I'm not mentally ill but I may become so before all this is said and done!
My 77 year old mother is bipolar, and she also has vascular dementia. She also had a stroke about 12 years ago which left her with some mental impairment (judgment and reasoning), and some visual disturbances. Finally, she broke her hip earlier this year and while she has recovered from that pretty well, she is still frail. She was finally basically forced onto Seroquel after that incident, because part of the reason she fell and broke her hip was because she had become anorexic and at 5'10" she weighed only 119 pounds (she had weighed 155 for about 30 years prior to the eating disorder). She responded well to the Seroquel, and it made a huge difference in her quality of life and overall mental stability. However, she still has the vascular dementia which is it's own dog and pony show.
My youngest brother (45 yrs old) is 100 disabled by schizophrenia and bipolar disorder. He was involuntarily committed about 4 years ago after wreaking havoc on his life, our lives, and his now ex wife's life for decades. He has sponged off my parents for decades as well. Not sure how much of this he is really responsible for due to his mental illness, but I will add that this mental illness manifested after about two decades of regular drug use, including inhalants and meth. So I have some sympathy but limited sympathy if that makes sense.
My dad recently passed away and my brother swooped in on my mom like a vulture. Thankfully he lives 8 hours away in a very structured environment with mandatory treatment so I was able to nip some of this behavior in the bud by contacting the treatment facility and giving them a heads' up as to his behavior.
Anyway, I guess I'm just venting because now all of this loveliness is my problem. No one else's. My dad left my mother in my care, On one hand she is very dependent and needy, and on the other hand she is sort of uncooperative. To top it all off, we are all grieving my dad's death. And their estate is a very complex one, in several states, involving several businesses and all types of property, which my mom is rather blissfully unaware of. Even though I am not even the executor, I have been working on either estate stuff or stuff involving my dad's death or my mom's care at least 5 hours and sometimes up to 12 hours a day since he passed away, not including the days and nights I spent up at the hospital as my dad's medical POA (who had to ultimately make the decision to remove life support).
It's been just awful. I am not mentally ill but even I am starting to feel overwhelmed by the burden of everything. And it's the holidays - family is coming (back) in (just had a bunch of family here, mostly in my house, for the funeral). I want to see everyone, I really do - there are many little kids involved and I really want to see their sweet little faces. But I am moving my mom into assisted living in two weeks and also trying to close a land sale that my dad was half way through, get info to estate attorneys and CPAs, cancel credit cards, deal with bankers and financial planners, etc etc etc.
I'm grateful that my dad left an estate that is capable of supporting my mother, and it's not the factual, legal stuff that gets me down - it's the emotional stuff on top of it, starting with my recalcitrant mother and my suspicious, paranoid brother who really only cares that his cash cow may be affected.
Anyone else ever gone through anything like this? Advice? Strychnine, maybe?
My 77 year old mother is bipolar, and she also has vascular dementia. She also had a stroke about 12 years ago which left her with some mental impairment (judgment and reasoning), and some visual disturbances. Finally, she broke her hip earlier this year and while she has recovered from that pretty well, she is still frail. She was finally basically forced onto Seroquel after that incident, because part of the reason she fell and broke her hip was because she had become anorexic and at 5'10" she weighed only 119 pounds (she had weighed 155 for about 30 years prior to the eating disorder). She responded well to the Seroquel, and it made a huge difference in her quality of life and overall mental stability. However, she still has the vascular dementia which is it's own dog and pony show.
My youngest brother (45 yrs old) is 100 disabled by schizophrenia and bipolar disorder. He was involuntarily committed about 4 years ago after wreaking havoc on his life, our lives, and his now ex wife's life for decades. He has sponged off my parents for decades as well. Not sure how much of this he is really responsible for due to his mental illness, but I will add that this mental illness manifested after about two decades of regular drug use, including inhalants and meth. So I have some sympathy but limited sympathy if that makes sense.
My dad recently passed away and my brother swooped in on my mom like a vulture. Thankfully he lives 8 hours away in a very structured environment with mandatory treatment so I was able to nip some of this behavior in the bud by contacting the treatment facility and giving them a heads' up as to his behavior.
Anyway, I guess I'm just venting because now all of this loveliness is my problem. No one else's. My dad left my mother in my care, On one hand she is very dependent and needy, and on the other hand she is sort of uncooperative. To top it all off, we are all grieving my dad's death. And their estate is a very complex one, in several states, involving several businesses and all types of property, which my mom is rather blissfully unaware of. Even though I am not even the executor, I have been working on either estate stuff or stuff involving my dad's death or my mom's care at least 5 hours and sometimes up to 12 hours a day since he passed away, not including the days and nights I spent up at the hospital as my dad's medical POA (who had to ultimately make the decision to remove life support).
It's been just awful. I am not mentally ill but even I am starting to feel overwhelmed by the burden of everything. And it's the holidays - family is coming (back) in (just had a bunch of family here, mostly in my house, for the funeral). I want to see everyone, I really do - there are many little kids involved and I really want to see their sweet little faces. But I am moving my mom into assisted living in two weeks and also trying to close a land sale that my dad was half way through, get info to estate attorneys and CPAs, cancel credit cards, deal with bankers and financial planners, etc etc etc.
I'm grateful that my dad left an estate that is capable of supporting my mother, and it's not the factual, legal stuff that gets me down - it's the emotional stuff on top of it, starting with my recalcitrant mother and my suspicious, paranoid brother who really only cares that his cash cow may be affected.
Anyone else ever gone through anything like this? Advice? Strychnine, maybe?
