You Guess Is As Good As Mine

[poliphilo]

The carer arrives a little earlier than usual and my mother keeps her waiting while she pours herself another cup of tea and drinks it. I read this as bloody minded self assertion; Ailz reads it as an inability to deviate from routine.

"Are you happy to have Lauren stand here watching you drink that cup of tea?" I ask, trying not to explode.

""No." Says my mother, "But what else can I do?"

Comments

[poliphilo.livejournal.com]

You're right. I'm too close. Ailz finds my mother's foibles considerably more endearing than I do.

[splodgenoodles.livejournal.com]

In my own experience and in what I've seen with people around me, adult children are often the least able to adapt to a parent's illness.

Other people are better able to interact with them as fellow human beings, rather than be plagued by the overwhelming sense of loss of role (theirs and yours).

I find care sessions (usually) work better when they are time related rather than task related. Not a universal rule, but more of a guideline.

[poliphilo.livejournal.com]

"Loss of role"- I can identify with that.

She was the parent and I was the child and now it's something like the other way round. And then, of course, this is the final stage of a relationship of 60 + years which has gone through many phases- not all of them particularly friendly.