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Many people view caregiving for an ailing parent as a loving act. It’s a chance to pay back the debt we owe our mother or father for raising us.
Stripping away the emotion, it’s a classic case of reciprocity: We know that our parents made sacrifices for us—and now it’s time to return the favor.
But caregiving, even when directed at someone we admire, respect and view as our best friend, takes a toll. It’s exhausting.
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Where does that leave you if you’re stuck caregiving for a parent whom you never particularly liked? Worse, what if your parent is a toxic presence to avoid at all costs?
Some offspring confront an even greater dilemma. If they experienced emotional, physical or verbal abuse from a parent, it’s almost unbearable to drop their lives to help a now-helpless person who behaved so cruelly.
So what do you do?
“You have a choice,” said Carolyn Rosenblatt, a registered nurse and attorney in San Rafael, Calif. “But you can uplift yourself by doing the right thing.”
Rosenblatt, a consultant on age-related problems, has counseled families dealing with difficult caregiving challenges. She knows that adult children dread having to choose between allowing Mom or Dad to deteriorate because they can no longer take care of themselves—or stepping in and managing their daily lives when they feel deeply conflicted about doing so.
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Typically, adult children grapple with an emotional stew of anger, guilt and grief. Watching a parent with dementia, Parkinson’s or another progressive disease is heartbreaking. If you harbor ill will toward that parent, you may not recognize yourself as you harden your heart and—with cold calculation—keep repeating a harsh mental loop (“She deserves this,” “It’s his fault he’s alone with no one to help him, not mine.”).
Rosenblatt understands how nightmarish parenting can leave offspring scarred. But she has seen the plight of dementia patients who lose their faculties, engage in self-neglect and endanger their own lives.
“Forgiveness is releasing an emotional attachment to a perceived wrong in the past,” she said. “And I’ve seen some adult children find it in themselves to forgive, rather than punish the parent by neglecting them because they were a bad parent.”
If you’re unwilling to forgive, good luck suppressing your guilt. You may feel so haunted by your determination to turn a blind eye to a parent’s decline that self-disgust sets in.
“Guilt might be a motivator if you don’t want to do something,” Rosenblatt said. “You don’t want to have unresolved issues after they die. I’ll take guilt versus doing nothing” if it leads a caregiver to spring into action.
There are pragmatists who insist that one’s behavior has consequences. They justify not helping a terrible parent during their dotage because “what goes around comes around.” It’s karmic payback, but not the good kind.
Rosenblatt rejects such thinking. She emphasizes the benefit of freeing yourself from the pain and resentment that a parent has caused.
“Nobody feels bad about helping a vulnerable person,” she said.
Ideally, an adult child can enlist outsiders to provide hands-on care. But it takes money to hire home health aides or other support team members such as nurse case managers.
“Not everyone can afford this,” Rosenblatt said. “And even if they can, adult children may still wind up doing some of the caregiving themselves,” such as helping the parent with toileting and spoon-feeding them puréed food from a blender.
If you decide to take on the challenge of providing personal care to a toxic parent, brace for impact. Dementia or other diseases can cause unpredictable personality changes.
A lifelong belligerent cynic can turn into a softy. By contrast, their nastiness can intensify as they become increasingly agitated and aggressive.
Experts will assure you, “The illness is causing this behavior.” But that won’t help you cope.
“The feelings you have are real, like resentment,” Rosenblatt said. “Don’t keep those emotions inside.”
She suggests venting to trusted friends who listen with compassion. Your frustrations will not go away while the demands of caregiving escalate, but at least you can take comfort in knowing you’ll be free of guilt after your parent dies.
“Voicing your feelings has its own purging effect,” Rosenblatt said.
