Family

My mom is 67 years old and not in very good health. Her current issue is a cyaic nerve being pinched in her back that is creating an overwhelming sense of pain from her hip down to her knee. I once suffered with the same issue so I know how much she is in pain. When I was going through my back issues I was in so much pain I had to go to the emergency room several times trying to get some pain relief. Not much works. Weekend before last my mom called me at 4:45 a.m. Sunday morning crying hysterically because she couldn't stand the pain any longer. I stood next to her bed in the emergency room as she screamed in pain begging for them to "put her out" because she was in so much pain. For an hour and a half they tried to start an IV in her arm but after nearly 50 years of smoking her veins are just too hard and resistant to get a needle successfully inserted. (I'm sorry folks, but if you are a smoker do your family a favor and stop now). They eventually gave her an injection of morphine and it alleviated the pain enough for her to walk for most of the rest of the day but it didn't take long for the pain to begin again.

My brothers and I are in the process of trying to sell her condo and have moved her into a retirement community less than a mile from my house (as I am the only daughter in the family--with three brothers--I am the main caretaker of course). The new place isn't an assisted living facility just a fancy (and frankly really nice) apartment complex for seniors. All of this is forcing my family to interact with each other and it isn't going well. Funny, just because you are older and have all moved away from each other doesn't mean that the dynamics change. Therefore, in addition to dealing with my mom's health and move I am having to relive many emotions from my childhood which was not a pleasant time in my life. I hadn't been able to get in touch with my mom all last week and knew my brother's had physically moved some of her furniture and her to the new place so I visited her on Friday.

Turns out my mom had been left without a phone for an entire week which meant no communication with anyone including her doctor. She couldn't get online which meant she couldn't pay her bills, view her bank account, answer emails or order her medications to be mail delivered. When I went on Friday she didn't have any groceries, had only one of her heart pills left (she had a heart attack a few years ago and now has a stint in her heart and yet she keeps smoking). Both of my brothers had left town for work and just left her there either assuming that I was gonna take care of everything or that my mom would somehow take care of herself (which she refuses to do). Not only do I get left with the day to day care taking, I get zero respect or recognition for it (from my brothers, much less my mom).

My point in all of this is that I spent the entire weekend moving boxes, unpacking boxes, doing laundry, washing dishes, cleaning, lifting, shopping, chauffeuring, cooking, sorting through papers, entertaining and providing moral support to my mother (not to mention giving her my cell phone so she can have access to the outside world). While I wouldn't mind doing that once in awhile (she is my mother by the way) I can't stand the fact that it is just assumed by my family I will do it (or frankly mostly assumed that my mother does it herself and that I don't do anything). I was completely disregard by one brother, lied to by another (the third doesn't talk to either of my parents), yelled at by my dad (who my mom divorced 24 years ago and nobody requested play a role at all). I hate the drama. My role in our family for so many years was the scapegoat, the drop out, the radical left winged ignorant liberal (my family is all very homophobic, racist, conservative and --other than my brother who has an engineering Master's degree from Stanford-- uneducated). I am an outsider and it is clear that my assumed role hasn't changed even now that I am an adult.

Needless to say my weekend is over, my dishes aren't done, my laundry isn't done, my papers haven't been sorted, my back is now killing me and I am an emotional wreck from being manipulated, yelled at and misunderstood all weekend, just in time to go to work for one of the busiest days of the month. Ugh. For those of you that have cohesive families please appreciate the heck out of it because those of us who have a big, fat wreck of a family that only deals with each other in emergency situations (that God, I couldn't handle much more) are more envious than you know.