Taking care of Mom

Back to the subject of caregivers. Many of you on this mailing list are caring for your spouses who are going through cancer treatment. Others are caring for aging parents. Most of the experiences that I discussed in my letters from Houston are common to both, but for me there are some notable differences.
When I was caring for Jim, I was fatigued but I was so thankful that I was at a place in my life where I could drop everything and devote myself to taking care of him. I am no martyr. God gave me supernatural energy to do what needed to be done. I had it easy—no job to hold down, no children at home to care for, plenty of emotional support. Honestly, it was a wonderful time when I felt safe in the hand of God.
Taking care of my mother is very different. While she is sick my life goes on. I have other obligations—a husband at home, grandchildren to care for. When Jim was sick I never felt torn. I was with him every minute because I wanted to be and because I could be. I did nothing from a sense of duty and I had no reason to feel guilty.

With Mom I do feel guilt. It’s surprising because she never used guilt to manipulate me. Yet I feel guilty when I am short with her, guilty when I don’t want to stay with her, and guilty because I’d rather be doing a whole bunch of other things. I feel like the very bad daughter of the very good mother. My hat goes off to Sharon, who cared for her father who had Alzheimers, and now takes care of her mother and mother-in-law, and to Margaret Anne who stepped up to the plate to take care of her Grandmommy, aunt, great-aunt, and finally moved in with her dying mother to care for her day and night,
to Susan who has spent years caring for her daughter, to Sharyn Owen, Fairfax, Linda, and all of the others on this list who responded to my e-mails with stories of their own experiences. I know that what I am going through now is nothing new or unusual. Im sure that if we had been privy to a family discussion in Bedrock we might have heard a middle aged Pebbles and Bambam discussing what was to be done with the widow Wilma who was found wandering the streets minus her leopard skin.
Really I think I should write a book about this phenomenon in our generation. It’s nothing new, of course but as baby boomers we are more likely to deal with it as life expectancy increases.