Yesterday, I missed 6 phone calls from Mom while I was working. I debated with myself, do I return her call or not. I was still upset with her from the night before when she acted irrational and childish. In my head, I reasoned why I should not return her phone calls. But in my heart, I knew that I had too. When she answered the phone, she was in a happy mood. She had already forgotten about her bad behavior from the previous night. I went to pick her up to take her to the grocery store, I could not help looking at her and knowingly hold a grudge against her, no matter how hard I try. I love my little lady too much.
The funny thing about love is that you can love someone with all your heart and at the same time you might not like them. I guess you can say these days Mom and I have a love/hate relationship. It doesn't matter that the last 30 years we have had a wonderful adult relationship. Those days seem long gone and have disappeared. Today, our relationship seems to have reverted back to my teenage years, but only with our roles reversed, where I am the parent and she is the teenager.
Life is strange indeed. How can I hold a grudge against my Mom? I didn't want to see or talk to her but yet when I am apart from her, I have "caregiver anxiety" when I am not with her. It is difficult enough that her short-term memory is poor and that she repeats her questions over and over. But it is even more difficult that she is stubborn and uncooperative too. Topple that with complaints, demands and insults, then I become a bundle of nerves with very little patience. Sometimes I feel that the stress of our relationship is becoming too destructive and that I can't take another day with her again. I try not to take it personal, but it leaves me with mixed emotions. I have to remind myself that my real Mom would never say this words to me. I realize that she cannot control herself, it is her disease that causes her misbehavior. But frequent episodes like this can wear me out. And the more frequently it occurs, the less tolerant I am. It is easy to feel overwhelmed from the duties of a caregiver. The reality of life as it is today, is really difficult to understand and accept. A person with an incurable disease can become angry and irritated when things do not go their way. It seems like she remembers her feelings longer than she remembers the situation that caused the feelings. She is insensitive to others feelings, which creates tension in my household. When she becomes upset over something, she will nag and nag and nag and nag, did I mention nag, me like crazy. She becomes fixated on the situation and will not let it go. Explaining and trying to reason with her does not help. If she doesn't get her way, she is not happy. When she is not happy, I am not happy. When I am not happy, nobody is happy. You get the cycle. It is neverending and destructive at the same time.
I have found that as her illness progresses and her personality changes, I am experiencing grief. I am griefing over the lost of my relationship with my Mom. I am griefing over the "way she used to be." I find myself feeling very sad and sometimes discouraged. Sometimes, little thing make me cry often. I feel the tearfulness and sadness is welling up inside me. My experience with grief has only been assoicated with death. However, grief associated with a chronic illness like Mom's seems to go on and on. I guess I am griefing over losing the wonderful qualities of Mom that I miss so much and I know that I will never see them again.
