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Everything needs to stop with you and her for 3 weeks until you recover. Stop it. I mean really, just stop it. You are sick. I had lobar pneumonia (non Covid) in April and I’m just now starting to feel well.

You are going to cause yourself to relapse. (This is all said with concern since I just went through it and I didn’t even have covid nor was I hospitalized).

It also sounds like your mother needs a higher level of care and supervision. If she can’t work her AC, she could have a heat stroke.

Your mother has also lost the ability to care about anyone but herself. She should be concerned about your health as the first thing, but she is worried about silly things (except the ac… that is serious) over you. She needs to be evaluated.
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"Mom says I don't help her"

people can say all sorts of things. that doesn't mean it's true.
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Your mother is not living independently, you are not her servant, you are her daughter, you have relinquished that role when you became her caregiver.

Time to reconsider the entire situation, and stand up for yourself, it may be time for her to go to AL, where there is a host of paid servants at her beacon call.

You said "Temporary" situation then you intend to jump right back in feet first, my question is "Why"? Even now, while you are sick you are doing way too much for her and you are already in the burn out stage.

Take your life back, get yourself back on track. Remember "No" is a complete sentence.
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southernwave Jun 2023
Yes, someone needs to take OP’s phone and internet away. Our hospital had to do that with a doc when he was admitted for Covid; he kept working the phones and wouldn’t rest, so they took his cell phone away.
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(((((((hugs)))))) Dear soul, your mother has no idea about your needs as opposed to her wants, possibly from developing dementia, and/or how she has always been. You have to look after yourself and accept that she will not appreciate your reality. Your profile says your mm is in independent living. Sounds like it may be time for her to move to assisted living, or to hire (with her money) some help.
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Concentrate on your recovery.

Mom will dial the next person in her phone/address book & hassle them.
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Your mother is selfish and self centered. Might be time to back off propping up her facade of independence and have her hire someone (with her money) to help her.
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southernwave Jun 2023
Isn’t that the truth? Her mom is NOT living independently. That is all fake to make everyone feel better.
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Hi, OP, and welcome.If things go on like this, you are likely to stop ‘loving’ your mother. That’s not the result you want!Here is one suggestion: For a week (or two or a month to include monthly jobs) make a list of things you have done for your mother, and also things that she has asked you to do but you haven’t been able to do. Include times actually taken, or estimated if not done.

When it’s done, add up the times for things done, and also for things requested but not done. Take it to your mother and talk it through with her – no anger, just what you are actually doing plus not being able to do. Take a witness (your daughter?) who can make it clear that you are NOT yelling and you DO help.Let her think about it for a few days.

Then try again. This time, set out your boundaries – what you can do, and how much time you can spend. Once again, with an important witness. The end you are looking for is an acceptance from M about what you can do. And if it’s not enough, the discussion continues about where to find the additional care.

This has become more ‘in your face’ because you are not well. But the problem was there anyway, and it will get worse as M gets older. This is one way for you and M to look at the real issues, not just isolated problems like a TV fault.
Yours, Margaret
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Is she just demanding and oblivious or do you think she may have dementia? As my mother’s dementia progressed (she was always demanding and dissatisfied) she did less and less for herself, all the while telling me how she just needed me to do a few little things for her. Like handle her finances and pay her bills, clean her house, wash and dry her clothes, plan her meals and shop for groceries, make and drive her to appts, sort her meds, and be on call 24 hours a day, in case she thought of something she wanted. All the while complaining that I should be doing more for her.

Does not sound like your mother is capable of “independent living”. You must take care of yourself first. As you step away to recover, your absence may give you a better idea of just how independent she is capable of being. I say this because, looking back, I enabled my mother to be “independent” long past the time she should have been in care. Stop, recover, and reevaluate with fresh eyes.
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mom2mepil Jul 2023
Anabanana is correct. We, as daughters and sons of aging parents, start out by helping with a few small things and then later wake up to the fact that we are now doing EVERYTHING. I realized that I was essentially “living my mother’s whole life for her,” and she was just tagging along for the ride, making more and more demands. (My mom has been diagnosed with Alz.) Eventually, I woke up to the fact that Independent Living is for people who are actually capable of living independently. My mom *thought* she was completely independent, but I was twisting myself into a pretzel, propping her up from every angle. I finally had to cry uncle and move her to Assisted Living because my mental health was going down the tubes. She threw a series of huge, dramatic fits about the move, but it had to be done. Now that she is in AL, I know she is safe. She has friends and is not lonely. The staff takes care of most of her needs (and her living situation is greatly simplified, which helps a LOT). She still calls me with demands from time to time, but I no longer feel any need to jump to attention when she does. There are nurses there 24/7, and a PA who sees patients there at the AL three days a week and who is always available by text if I need to reach him. Mom has only a couple of outside doctors (specialists) and her dentist, so I still take her to see each of them a couple of times a year. I handle most other things behind the scenes (finances, taxes, prescription refills, buying supplies, etc,) I choose when I visit and for how long. It’s a vast improvement over the crazy hurricane we had when Mom was in IL.
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Oh my my. You are doing so much for your Mom and she has no clue how much energy and work that takes.

If you are looking for an excuse, steroids will make one more impatient and quick to anger in some people.

However, the bottom line is that your Mom has no clue how much you are doing for her. Call it selfishness, call it clueless, call it egocentric....

I don't know how to make her understand what a gem she has. Keep those boundaries up. Don't move them....and don't let her comments, guilt you into feeling that you are not doing enough.
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southernwave Jun 2023
what boundaries though ? I struggle to see any.
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Welcome, TxBeBe!

I'm sorry you've been so ill! I think right now you need to forget about everything other than getting better. No one else is going to take care of you, right!?

Here's the thing. You are doing LOTS for your mom, but it doesn't that way to her. It's NOT because you're not doing enough; it's because she needs more help than one off-site person can give.

Your profile says that mom is in Independent Living. When my mom was in an Independent Living facility, she would call us for stuff like ants in the kitchen and burned out light bulbs. We would say, "no, mom. You have the staff do that."

She would say "oh, I don't want to bother them".

We told her that's why she was there, because we couldn't keep responding to all of these small requests for support--we had no time for our families or our jobs.

We visited on weekends, took her shopping, paid her bills, set up her meds and did medical appointments. Believe me, those tasks took up enough time!

If mom doesn't have others around to help, consider that she may need something like an Independent or Assisted living place where there ARE people around to help her.
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