A lot has happened since I’ve last had a chance to sit down and put my thoughts together. I still can’t quite put my thoughts together so if this seems a bit wonky there is a reason for that. My mother-in-law moved in, lived here, did her best to ruin my marriage and then moved out. Thank God! Once she moved out the general feeling between myself and my husband was that hopefully things would improve and we could pick her up for sleepovers and barbeques and go back to having fun, short-lived visits. The exact opposite of that happened. She ended up renting an apartment with, of all people, my mother. Can you imagine!? Obviously, since you don’t know all the players here this might not actually sound like that bad an idea, but let me assure you, it was one of the worst. Two days after my mom got to the apartment they were to share my mother-in-law was calling and telling me I had to get her out of there, quite rudely, I may add. Long story short, my husband confronted her mildly on her rudeness and the next time she saw me she went on an absolute tirade and threatened me viciously. That was the end of our relationship. Whether or not it is the end for real remains to be seen, but depends entirely on my husband and his feelings about her.
The real issue now is my mom. Last summer, I might have mentioned it before, she became ill and ended up in hospital a couple of times. She has had diabetes for years now and last summer told me they had diagnosed her with congestive heart failure. Around the same time, they advised her that her kidneys weren’t fully functioning, she had about 30% kidney function. After a couple of very strained and distant years in our relationship, the congestive heart failure made me realize I didn’t want her to pass away with this huge distance between us so I started to let her back into my life. We’ve had visits since and she spent Christmas with all of us. I really didn’t know how sick she has been. When I went to pick her up to move her up here, I was picking her up from hospital. Again, I still didn’t know how sick she was. All she told me is that she went to hospital because she was having some trouble breathing. The hospital discharged her and claimed she was stable. Five days later I had her back in hospital. The first day she was in emerg here at our local hospital they said she had about 20% kidney function. The next day they advised her that she would be starting hemodialysis immediately and that this was going to be permanent. By the time she was discharged this time (about 10 days), she had started dialysis and was in end stage renal failure. A week after being released she went to the hospital for her scheduled dialysis treatment and forgot why she was there. Once we finally found her two and half hours later, after calling a code yellow at the hospital, she returned for her treatment. Excellent! She came back, had dialysis and went home again on the bus. Problem was she couldn’t remember where she lived. Eventually, after I don’t know how long wandering around in -15 degree weather, she called me and told me she was lost. My husband was able to direct her to knock on someone’s door so she could get inside while I went to go find her. After that we decided that it wasn’t feasible for her to continue to live with his mother. I wasn’t welcome in the apartment and my mom wasn’t able to live unassisted. So we moved her in here.
I will admit that I have been overwhelmed by this string of events. It’s quite a lot of work to suddenly be in the position of having to organize someone’s entire life with no knowledge of how things worked before. She has appointments 6 out of 7 days in the week. That’s just her, that doesn’t include appointments, activities and parties for my kids or appointments for my husband who just underwent a second surgery, his follow up or his continuing treatment. I haven’t been able to go to work since she came up here because of all that has happened and at this point, I can’t leave her alone so I can go back to work. Her life and affairs have now become my full time job. I have so much information to gather and am spending so much time on the phone, my husband and kids are suffering because I am not that available to them right now. That hurts me. On the other hand, as much as I want to be with and there for them, I also want to be with and there for my mom.
I always thought I was super close with my mom, all my life growing up. I wouldn’t have thought there was another mother-daughter duo closer than us. Then, when I was 27 or so, I decided I needed to change some things in my life. I began seeing a medical intuitive. I have never been one to be terribly open to traditional therapy and this seemed like something I could get into. During one of my first meetings with her she asked me about issues I had with my mother. I was completely baffled. I had always believed that any issues I had stemmed from my relationship with my father. What was she talking about? She was wrong. Or maybe not.
There had been the beginning of separation between us when I began dating my husband. Everything I had ever done up until then, my mom had been there. Not as much when I was a teenager because I wasn’t about to take her clubbing with me. But before that, I used to skate and she was always there, with me and my friends and then later on, once I was living on my own and going more to restaurants than clubs, she would be there with me also. Until I met my husband there had been no real serious relationships that could come between me and my mom. Once we started dating I wanted to spend more of my time with him than with her. I guess that’s when the cracks started to show. First came the question from the intuitive. Strange! Then, the odd remark would be made. I always thought people were crazy. My mom was an angel. The best person ever. As I tried to learn about myself and maybe figure out why I was the way I was, I tried to pull away from her a bit so I could do it on my own. She was there for everything and this was something that I didn’t want her there for. I needed to get to know my own motivation and the reasons why I behaved in certain ways. The learning I was doing was very personal and I wasn’t comfortable sharing that with her. I ended up bringing her along, which I resented. My own fault. I decided to take a workshop on Reiki. I brought her along. Then she came along for the second level training. During our course, we did group treatments on each other for practice. When we were walking home on the first day, she informed me that while I was being treated, I mentally “kicked her out” of a certain area and she disregarded my request. She quite frankly told me “I figured I’m your mother, so I kept going anyway”. Hmmm….ya, that doesn’t sit well with me. The divide became a little bigger and the level of distrust crept up.
When I look back now, after 10+ years of looking at myself and my behaviours etc, I feel that on some very basic level I have always held a deep belief that it was incredibly unsafe to be open about my feelings. Not my thoughts. People who know me know I am ridiculously forthcoming with my opinions. I’m working on that, by the way. No need for everyone to know every little thought I have. But when it comes to my feelings I knew I was very vulnerable if anyone were ever able to see how much I feel. I could never expose myself like that…not even with my mom.
So now, I come to the hardest part of this current chapter of my journey. I am taking care of my mother. I am watching her face her mortality. I can’t talk to her about it. I want to. I try. But how do you ask someone to tell you how they’re feeling? About dying? If I’ve never felt safe truly exposing my identity to her, how can I expect her to expose her thoughts and fears to me? There are things I want to ask her or ask her to do. It’s not really my business though. I want her to really look at her relationship with my brother. I want her to give him some resolution. They don’t speak. His life appears to be quite unsatisfying. I think it’s pretty safe to say there is a direct correlation between his life and his relationship with her. I believe my brother is one of those people who never moved past his childhood. Maybe none of us have, some of us just hide it better. What do I know? Nothing! I’m certainly not trained in any way. It’s just my opinion. The only thing I know is that I have been lucky enough to have gained some perspective and have been able to expand and change my thought processes. I’ve been lucky enough to learn from my experiences and also from the people I’ve been involved with and have involved in my life. Probably, I’ve learned the most from becoming and growing into a parent. I find it quite sad to see the relationship between them. I don’t know if it would help either one of them at this point, but could it hurt?
It’s funny to have spent so much time trying to separate myself so that I could figure my own stuff out, only to end up back with this woman, living with her, in what most would call a complete role reversal. Not so much for us. I’ve taken care of my mom in many instances during our time together. I’ve generally behaved more like the mother than the daughter. I want to do everything I can to help my mother during this time. I want to make this process less scary for her and get her the medical help she needs as well as the emotional support she needs. I am doing everything I can do make sure that happens. I hope my family will forgive me the time I am taking away from them to give to her. I hope we have a lifetime together for me to make it up to them. I love them all so much! I know they’re not really suffering irreparably. I just hate to take any time away from them. I need to spend this time with her and I need to see it through to the end. I know I have had many lifetimes with my mother, in a variety of relationships. I also feel that this is my final lifetime with her. I feel like I am done with this sacred contract and ready to move on. There is a part of me that is so sad to feel that way. I love my mom very, very much. There is another part of me that is just done. I’m done with the dynamic and the energy. I don’t feel like I owe her anything more. I hope I do her justice and honour her throughout the rest of her life.
It’s so complicated.
