More: From bad to worse

Mom told one of her doctors last Sunday that I had thrown her down the stairs. Completely untrue, but still an allegation of abuse. He charted it, now the State of Washington is involved through Adult Protective Services. What this means for me is that I not allowed to be in a room alone with her. I can only see her with another adult present or in an open public space at the rehab facility.

It will also most likely mean that she will never get to go back to her apartment as I am her only caregiver. She would never allow a stranger into her home to care for her because she is just too paranoid. Her care options have been dramatically narrowed by her actions...not that she will ever see it that way.

This news is both a relief and devastating at the same time. The relief comes in knowing that others will now be charge of her fate. The devastation part is that she so wants to go back to her apartment, to her furniture, her locked up foot chests filled with what she sees as her treasure.

I talked about all this in therapy yesterday. It helps a bit to talk about all of this with another adult. My therapist made the point that I had chosen to take care of myself, my bipolar diagnosis, and be in charge of my own health and life. Mom, on the other hand, has always fought any effort to ameliorate her health problems. Her efforts have gone into trying to be in absolute control of everyone around her. She is more out of control of her fate than ever, but I doubt anyone can make sense of all of this for her. Her doctors now believe she has some mild form of dementia that comes and goes....kind of like a flickering light bulb.

I am grieving the downward spiral of her life. I am grieving how she has fought everyone in the last month who is trying to help her. She focuses just on what she wants and cannot see the broader horizon. Now by her own actions, her horizon is narrower than it has ever been.

My therapist pointed out that she spent 60 years with my Dad, who spent those same 60 years trying to do whatever he could to help her be happy, despite her paranoia and impulsive nature. She has traveled a bit, always had beautiful clothes, homes or apartments, been cared for by me for four years, never really had to deal with much in the way of health problems until her late 80's...so a pretty nice if somewhat small life. But she chose to be manipulative her entire life...and has always been pretty unhappy. Now she has painted herself into a pretty small corner that will make her more unhappy than she has ever been in her life.

I wish my Dad was alive to help me with her. He always found a strategy to work around her difficult personality and peculiar thinking patterns. I know he must have prayed for 60 years for strength and guidance. I do the same now, but find myself exhausted, in despair, and completely overwhelmed by the complexity of the current situation.

Poetry has always been a source of strength and comfort to me. I found this stanza from Maya Angelou's poem, "Still I Rise" and it seems to fit for me right now.

You may shoot me with your words,
You may cut me with your eyes,
You may kill me with your hatefulness,
But still, like air, I'll rise.

Maya Angelou