Tuesday, October 2, 2007

Today is my 53rd birthday. It is my first birthday without Dad. I spent the first half of the day with Mom...having breakfast, going to the store and bank. She told me the story of the day of my birth again. She tells me the story every year. Dad was so excited to have a baby girl. He came to the hospital to see me...I was born on a Saturday in 1954. Of course he took the guys cigars at the office. He brought home all kinds of clothes people had given him at work and put them up against me to see how I would look. Mom said he acted like he was the only person who had ever been a father before...he was that excited.

After I dropped Mom off I went to the DMV to renew my driver's license....which was a complete exercise in futility. I sat there for one hour and forty five minutes before I gave up, took another number and went off to therapy. My hope was that I would get back in time to use my second number which was 229. When I left they were on 167 and by the time I got back they were only on 199...so I had to sit for another half hour before they called my number. Of course the picture the woman took is horrible...I look like an aging chipmunk who just put a pound of nuts in her mouth. I was just glad to be out of that hellish place.

Later I went to REI to exchange a fleece jacket for another size and buy Pamela a fleece sweater and some shoes. Home finally by 5pm.

Today in therapy I talked a lot about how difficult Mom can be sometimes and discussed ways of coping with situation. One thing I am going to do is start pulling back a bit so that I am not available so much. I really want her to go into assisted living and one way to help her see her need for that is by not being her assistant all the time. Pat suggested I get someone to come in and help her..but I don't think this would work at all. I am going to ask Mark to take on the whole moving thing with Mom...she wants to move when her lease is up. This is her pattern..I really don't think it makes sense to move unless it is into an assisted living facility.

I finally made sense of something today that happened a couple of years ago with Dad. Mom and Dad were here for a visit, staying with us as usual. Dad and I had an opportunity to go off together and spend some time. I took him to a really cool hardware store called ReJuve. We also went to have donuts and coffee at Krispy Kreme. He seemed very anxious about getting back to the house by the time he had told Mom he would return. I didn't think it was such a big deal and encouraged him to come with me to Lowe's to do some more shopping. At the time I remember that I commented to Pamela that I thought Dad had Stockholm Syndrome. Stockholm syndrome is a psychological response sometimes seen in an abducted hostage, in which the hostage shows signs of loyalty to the hostage-taker, regardless of the danger (or at least risk) in which the hostage has been placed.

A more accurate description of what I think was going on follows:

Adult physical abuse: In lay terms, this is a reference to any person who, because of constant and severe domestic violence usually involving physical abuse by a partner, becomes depressed and unable to take any independent action that would allow him or her to escape the abuse. The condition explains why abused people often do not seek assistance from others, fight their abuser, or leave the abusive situation. Sufferers have low self-esteem, and often believe that the abuse is their fault. Such persons usually refuse to press criminal charges against their abuser, and refuse all offers of help.

In some ways I think Dad was Mom's hostage, and I definitely know that she abused him both psychologically and physically. I asked my therapist today why he didn't tell me what was going on. I would have gotten him out of that situation immediately. She said she thought he probably didn't tell me out of shame or because he knew that I would take him away from Mom. He felt so responsible for Mom that he couldn't imagine who would take care of her if he didn't do it. I know he loved Mom because I sat in on the session last December with them and Mom's psychiatrist and social worker when she was in the hospital for hitting Dad. He sat there and cried and said he loved Mom. I will never understand their relationship. It just makes me sad that he suffered in any way. I know Mom must suffer too...I know she is so lonely without him now. The entire situation just makes me sad.