I’m so thankful for this place to discuss my guilt!!! I had been the main caregiver for my dad for the last couple of years of his life . He mainly needed help to dr, someone to help him with my mom and to stay with him while he was in the hospital then to care for him at home with hospice. The day of my dad’s funeral, my quadriplegic brother that I helped with as much as I could had a major medical emergency and was placed in ICU. I then immediately had to leave my home to stay with my mom and help her with everything. My brother never made it out of the hospital. He died 2 months to the day my dad’s funeral died . Half way between that 2 months, I found out I had a recurrence of breast cancer. I had to put off surgery, radiation, chemo until after my brother passed. Going on 3 years later, I am still in treatment.
My mom has stage 4 (some call it end stage? COPD. At first, she wasn’t too clingy and was just a little anxious when I would go anywhere without her. She is safe to leave alone for short periods but she doesn’t think so.) as time progressed and her COPD has as well, she is no longer willing for me to go anywhere without her. She has refused for me to hire sitters to stay with her so I can take a break. She has currently been in the hospital for over a week. I have been at her bedside the entire time up until today. I have postponed my own very necessary medical care to stay with her, sleeping on a broken couch then on a broken recliner2-3 hours per night. I have reached the end of my physical limitations and told her a sitter was coming so I could go to rest at a local relatives home or I was going to pass out. She finally agreed but I felt guilty because I wasn’t asking her
for her approval, I was telling her if I don’t get some rest, I literally will be going to the er. Things went fine with the sitter, but my guilt of what felt like me ‘abandoning her’ kept me from resting except for 3 hours. The benefit of that rest earlier today has already worn off. How do you meet your own needs without making your loved one feel like a burden or abandoned when you are trying to stay as well as you can so you can continue caring for your loved one?