What I’m Not Supposed to Say About Caring for My Elderly Mother

She won’t read this, so I can be honest

Photo by lilartsy on Unsplash

I rarely write about my mother, honesty being the ultimate writer’s block.

She’s in her bedroom right now, sitting in her comfy chair, reading. It’s too breezy outside on the patio where she usually sits with her feet propped in the sun. She prefers no wind, which is a rare day considering where we live in Mexico, five minutes from the beach in a condo with a pool view.

It sounds nice, and it is.

For her.

That’s the first thing I’m not supposed to say.

What I should say is how lucky I am to live just steps from a Mexican beach in a furnished two-bedroom condo for only $900 a month, which my mom’s Social Security covers.

What a difference from the nearly $7k I was paying for her assisted living facility a little over a year ago. And why I ended up in Mexico in the first place.

All of my own money gone. Poof! Just like that, to her care.

Now we’re here. And I am my mother’s full-time caregiver.

Viva la Vida

To be clear, I know I’m lucky. Mexico isn’t an option for a whole lot of people. And it’s a short drive to Arizona, my home state, so I can go back and forth relatively easily.

Though I don’t ever get to go alone. And the only reason I go at all is logistical, for my mom’s doctor’s appointments, prescription refills, new glasses, etc.

I used to love driving. Turning up the music and singing at the top of my lungs. The freedom of an open road tempting me to go here, there, everywhere. Location: unknown.

But I don’t enjoy driving with her, not even a little bit.

I’m not supposed to say that. I’m supposed to find the little things to enjoy. Or be grateful for her company.

Yet, she’s not good company. She’s not unpleasant; she’s just…there. Void. We don’t talk because I hate small talk, and small talk is all she’s ever been willing to offer.

I don’t mean we don’t talk at all.

I ask her if she needs to stop at the next rest area. She makes random comments — the same ones in the same spots on the same road: I’ve never seen so many cactus or is it cacti, and I guess we’ll be on this straight road for a while, and We’re making good time.

Then I answer, Yeah there are a lot of cactus or cacti, and Yeah it’ll be straight for a bit but then it’ll curve, and Yeah we’ll be there soon (courtesy of my 9-mile over the speed limit pace).

I’m bored just thinking about our next trip in two weeks when we have to travel again.

My mom is 91 years old, so the way we are around each other is nothing new. Every behavior, every interaction, every dynamic in our mother/daughter relationship has been the same since I was young.

No depth. Just…meh.

You can blame me if you want. I should try harder blah blah blah.

But I did that already. For years. I spent the better part of her 60s and 70s trying to get closer, trying to find a realness that I figured must be there somewhere inside of her.

I thought, She must want to be closer to me, too. Didn’t she want to know about me, the real me, what made me tick, what my dreams were, what my fears were?

All of that.

But no matter how hard I tried, it didn’t work. I ended up getting hurt, or disappointed, or invalidated. So to protect myself, I had to stop trying.

Around this same time, a therapist she saw for a few visits (what was the point of therapy, she wondered) told her she had no empathy. My mom then shared this information with me over lunch one day.

Without…empathy.

Though it felt like a punch to the gut, it was sort of a relief because it explained why every time I tried to get closer to her, it felt like getting closer to a fire.

This is how it still is. When I’m with my mom, I can’t help but get a little burned. Or at least singed.

And now I live 24/7 near that fire.

I’m not supposed to say this, but it sucks.

This isn’t an attitude problem; this is a mental health problem.

I’m utilizing every available self-help tactic available; I’m self-aware as fuck; I know how to manage the anxiety that seems to worsen with every passing day; and I take measured steps to stay in the present moment, find the gift in it, appreciate the positive, and remain in gratitude for every single little thing.

But it doesn’t change the fact that I don’t want to do this.

I’m not supposed to say this, but I’m just not that into her. While I love her, I often don’t like her.

Deeper than that, it’s the mothering of her that I wish I could get out of.

You wouldn’t know any of this by looking at us. There is no arguing or anything that spikes anyone’s blood pressure. I do raise my voice, but that’s only because she can’t hear what I say if I talk in a normal tone.

Not that she’ll ever admit to being hard of hearing. The problem is everyone else:

I mumble. Her grandsons talk too fast. Anyone on the phone has a bad connection. The doctor has a mask on. The nurse has an accent and my mom can’t understand “Mexican”.

Wherever the blame lands doesn’t bother me; it’s the volume of my own voice that throws me off balance.

There is something emotionally destabilizing when having to answer “How did you sleep?” three times in a row, first thing after waking. Especially when the question is posed only so my mom can tick the box of “What you should say when someone wakes up”, instead of out of any real care.

Kind of like “Hi, how are you?” when asked by a stranger in passing.

My mornings, which in the past were my quiet intro to the day ahead and determined the energy going forward, now start with

Mom: Good morning. Me: Good morning. Good morning. GOOD MORNING. Mom: How did you sleep? Me: Good. Good. GOOD.

Pause. Deep breath.

How did you sleep, Mom? How did you sleep? HOW DID YOU SLEEP? I slept really well, thank you.

At least one of us did.

My mother is not unpleasant. Everything I do, she is grateful for. And because I do so much, “thank you” makes up a large part of her daily dialogue.

I’m not supposed to say this, but none of this means much.

Her gratitude is rote. Thank you pops out of her mouth because it’s the easiest way to be polite without giving a real shit about the person you’re thanking.

That sounds harsh, and it is. But that’s the reality of my mom, and if you don’t witness it firsthand, and if you don’t have a mother like this, it’s understandable that you won’t understand.

Perhaps you’re tempted to “correct” me in my bluntness, “help” me see her in a different light, or scold me for being an ungracious daughter.

I can’t stop you. If you’re one of those people who likes to kick people when they’re down, comment away.

But here’s what I keep coming back to: some parents shouldn’t have been parents. Some mothers shouldn’t have had daughters.

Yet here I am. Caring for her in a way she never cared for me, only because that kind of love is unfamiliar to her. She has never seen who is standing in front of her, only that whoever it is can meet her needs, whatever those needs may be.

This isn’t love. This is soul-sucking.

It explains why only one of us has anxiety. Only one of us can’t sleep because of the stress. Only one of us gets stomachaches and headaches and clenches her teeth and has phantom pain as a result of unresolved trauma from childhood.

Only one of us is disintegrating, disappearing, collapsing from the strain because only one of us feels anything below the neck.

And I’m not supposed to say this, but the one with the longer life ahead shouldn’t be that one.

None of this gets in the way of how I care for her, of which she raves about to others.

I make her three delicious and nourishing meals daily. I clean everything and wash everything. I give her showers, dry her hair, change her bed, vacuum, scrub her toilet, stock her cupboards, manage her meds. Any problem I find the solution to. Any pain I alleviate (or try to). I make sure she has clean clothes, books to read, crosswords to puzzle, cards to play, fresh water to drink…

And wine, which I pour and portion after she had another fall, another ER trip, which, along with traumatizing me some more because apparently I haven’t had enough, pushed me over the edge and I drew a hard line:

If you want to live with me, I told her, I will no longer tolerate Drunk Mom. If you want to drink yourself to death, I’ll drop you off at Scott’s house.

I wasn’t surprised when she chose me over my brother, who wouldn’t have answered the door anyway, and who has been MIA from helping care for her.

Fucker.

I think I was supposed to say that.

Though I’m not supposed to say how some days…I wish she would’ve chosen differently.

Recently, a woman I know sent me a message on Instagram after reading a piece I wrote about asking ChatGPT for help in dealing with the trauma I had with my mother.

“Hang in there!!! You’ll NEVER regret this time with your momma!!! I know it’s hard but you’re strong!!!”

Her obscene use of exclamation marks enraged me. Her message a direct contradiction to the feeling of losing my shit at any moment.

Because I am hanging in there — I don’t have a choice, and I’m Gen X, so hanging in there is what I was trained to do from a young age.

Yes, it’s hard. And I’m strong. All true.

But (and I’m not supposed to say this) I will regret this time. I already regret it. Some of it. A lot of it. Because I don’t want to be doing this.

Not because I don’t love my mom. Not because I don’t want her to be taken care of and shown the respect, dignity, and attention every human deserves, especially older humans who are more vulnerable to not getting these things.

I don’t want to do this because it sucks. It’s draining. It chips away at my mental health to the point where some days I’m one swear word away from walking toward the sunset and never coming back.

(I’ll take my dog, though)

Some people don’t think this is okay for me to say out loud. But they haven’t walked next to my mom’s walker. Or they had a mother whom they felt safe with, whom they felt unconditionally loved by, or whom they liked to be around.

I’m so unbelievably grateful (my gratitude laced with jealousy) that some children have awesome parents.

But this is not and has never been my story.

Last month, I took my mom to get her new shoes so her feet wouldn’t sweat and swell as much as they had been. After parking her on a bench at the end of an aisle, I browsed the 8½ section for only minutes before my eyes glazed over and I dissociated into the shoeboxes. My nervous system working overtime to regulate itself.

It was then that a woman about my age walked up to me.

“That’s your mom,” she whispered. It wasn’t a question.

I stared at her, nodding.

“I care for my mother, too,” she said, tears pooling in her eyes. “I want you to know I see you and I’m really sorry you have to go through this.”

She took a step closer, and I collapsed into her open arms, where we cried together.

I don’t remember what I said. The dark circles under my eyes and the pain within them saying everything for me.

This was the moment that affirmed my fear of what I physically looked like, and how being my mother’s full-time caregiver didn’t only affect me on the inside.

Two women. Two strangers. In a shoe store. Holding onto each other for dear life.

That’s not fair.

And fuck a country, a government, a system that puts people in untenable positions, then normalizes it, and gaslights them into thinking this is their fault.

We didn’t plan well enough. We should’ve seen it coming.

And I’m definitely not supposed to say that I’m angry at my mom for…I don’t know what. Some of it? Part of it? Any of it?

Everything she didn’t do to prevent her only daughter from having to give up her life for her.

And when I tell you that this does not keep my mother awake at night with compassion for me, or bother her to any real degree, I am not exaggerating.

So there’s that.

I just turned 58. I used to be excited about being in my fifties and all that’s still to come.

Now, I’m too tired to get excited about anything.

I have a friend my age who cares for her mother (they don’t call Gen X the Sandwich Generation for nothing), and who doesn’t think she (my friend) will see 80. Or if she even wants to live that long because of the condition she’ll be in if her mother lives another decade.

And she has a beautiful relationship with her mom.

She doesn’t know how I do it with the trauma attached. Yet I know other people have it worse.

But this isn’t a competition.

And there aren’t any other choices here.

I’m attached to my mom until one of us detaches in the only viable scenario in which one can detach.

Look on the bright side. At least she’s mobile. At least she can go to the bathroom on her own, get dressed by herself. She doesn’t have any cognitive decline. For 91, she’s in incredible health.

I’m glad for that. Because I don’t want her to suffer. I want her to feel good. I want her to be okay.

But this isn’t the bright side.

There isn’t one. There is only reality — the loss of my autonomy, my spirit, my will to push through, and the hope that things will get better.

I should clarify that it’s not a complete loss, since I’ve never been one to cry Uncle and give up. And I won’t now, you have my word (plus, I promised my dog).

The decline of my optimism is palpable, though. It’s unnerving. Unsettling.

Un…me.

And I don’t know what that means exactly, but it scares me a little.

So I won’t focus on that. I’ll just keep doing what I’m doing.

Dissociate when I can dissociate, bite my cheeks instead of clench my teeth to save more enamel from being shredded, keep up my mental health walks on the beach, breathe deeply through the anxiety that attacks without warning, talk to my friends on the phone, love up my dog, hug the horses that are on the next sandy street over.

Check out more books for my mom to read from the local biblioteca, play Gin Rummy every evening at 5, take my mom on walks around the pool to keep her legs nimble, buy her favorite cookies from Trader Joe’s on our trips to Arizona, buy her a glass of wine at the beach bar where she can watch the pelicans do fly-bys, schedule her a pedicure with the lady who lives in our condo complex, pour her a glass of wine at lunch and a glass and a half at dinner.

And write all the words down that I’m not supposed to say.

But that I’m going to say anyway because it helps me get through another day.

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