Caring for 91 year mother

cavework

Love you need to look after yourself otherwise your Mum will end up with no one to be there.
You need to start being a little bit selfish.. have a go at the Warden , get help from everyone and anyone you can.. get on the phone to them and tell them you need some help NOW !
Be firm but fair, you are doing more than your fair share but you still have your life to live and there are avenues out there to give you the help you need. Unfortunately it's a who shouts loudest gets what they need situation.
:A

newleaf

I feel your pain Supersusie50. I'm an only child, and my mum is in her 80's, also living in sheltered accomodation and grumbling about it - and everything else you care to name. It's a thankless task being the main carer, but one I feel I unable to avoid. It's always those closest they snipe at. I just keep telling myself it won't be forever, and when she has passed on, I hope I will feel satisfied that I did my best.

poppasmurf_bewdley

I agree with Limana68 above. Get in touch with the local Social Services for help. I got it for my late Mum and they were absolutely great in all aspects. Get in touch at the local town hall. They will first come out and assess the situation.

PasturesNew

They're worse than very naughty children, because you feel the complete sense of responsibility, while being loaded with guilt, yet you don't have the authority to make their decisions for them and tell them what they're doing is "because you say so" like parents can do. And then you're emotionally blackmailed or abused whenever you see them

My sympathies are with you ...

margaretclare

PasturesNew wrote: »

They're worse than very naughty children, because you feel the complete sense of responsibility, while being loaded with guilt, yet you don't have the authority to make their decisions for them and tell them what they're doing is "because you say so" like parents can do. And then you're emotionally blackmailed or abused whenever you see them

My sympathies are with you ...

Oh good heavens. My late MIL was in a council care home at the end of her life (n.b. when she was younger than I am now!!!) My first husband refused to visit her and was always getting phone calls from the home about why he didn't visit. She would have a go at him every darned time he showed his face. She mistook him for his grandfather, her FIL, who had apparently 'interfered with her' i.e. sexually-abused her when she was a young bride. Either that or he was a politician that she didn't approve of. The abuse came from her, the emotional blackmail from the home.

tich2

My wife and I live with my Mother in Law. I am the main carer for her even though apart from angina and general old age there is nothing wrong with her. She is always the first one to moan at me or my wife and my wife's two brothers never get a bad word said against them. Luckily one of my brother in laws visits every time he has a week off work as he has no other family and enjoys seeing us. The other brother lives some distance away and visits once or twice a week over night.
You need to contact social services and get a carers assessment and a carers grant should be available to give you some time away or you can use it in lots of other ways.
You should also have local charities to help like care for the carers and care uk.

Try everything you can to make things easier.

pineapple

A Carers Assessment is a good idea,
But in defence of wardens - their job has changed substantially in the past year or so. In most cases wardens no longer have the time for a neighbourly chat with tenants or their families. Full time jobs have become part time jobs and sometimes made peripatetic into the bargain. The warden job I used to do had the hours cut in half and has been reduced to caretaking/disaster management. A quick morning call with the rest of the time spent making phone calls and doing paperwork. You spend more time doing health and safety checks than with the tenants.

sophistica

Involve the doctor and adult social services. These burdens are too big to deal with by yourself. I have just gone from a living nightmare of an abusive cranky disabled mother and a confused 90 year old father at home to having my mother in a lovely funded nursing home, bathed, tranquil and cared for and my dad at a day centre and supported by carers...none of this would have been possible without heavy involvement from adult social services.

blossomhill_2

Supersuzie, you have my empathy, its a familiar scenario and so hard to go through
I believe Age UK or another charity do a telephone befriending service where someone will call an elderly person by phone at a set time each week, this could take some of the pressure off you

John_Pierpoint

monkeyspanner wrote: »

Case of "familiarity breeds contempt" I'm afraid.

And "absence makes the heart grow fonder". The ones who do the caring get abused, the one who has emigrated gets fondly remembered as the 20 something, they were when thy left.