to all those who are looking after their old ailing parents, and are having to care for them as they would babies...
A dear friend was telling me how she was devastated by the state her father was in. She and her sister had to look after their once-strapping-imperious Dad, as if he was a baby. Having gone through a similar experience, I knew how she was feeling. It is an unbearable pain in the innermost and deepest part of your heart to see the parent you once relied on, the parent who probably ruled your life with an iron hand, the parent who might have treated you unfairly on occasion, the parent who cared for you when you were ill, the parent who wiped your tears, the parent who helped you grow up, and who you left far behind - whatever the reason...but a parent occupies a larger-than-life presence in the heart of every child no matter that the 'child' may now be an elderly person. Where once you so relied on them to take care of you, today you are caring for them as you would your own little children...what a tremendous thing to cope with - your own children on one hand, who for a parent always remain their babies, and your parents-turned-babies on the other. Bathing them, feeding them, combing their hair, looking after all their needs, caring for them, loving them so that they don't feel left out or abandoned - what havoc this creates in the heart and mind cannot be calculated. The frustrations you experience looking at their helplessness, and at the same time trying to not let them feel the frustration of their helplessness and dependence. It can turn your whole mind upside down, and no consolation or reasoning seems to help you to come to grips with this. Many rational solutions of how to cope are offered, but nothing seems to work, and all the while you know that you cannot allow yourself to be sucked into this quicksand of sorrow - life has to go on - there is a responsibility to yourself...and to those who love you...and those you love...
And then when this parent-turned-baby passes on - you know with your head that that was the best thing that could happen to the parent, but the pain is cripplingly overwhelmingly unbearable, leaving an aching forlorn-ness, a desolation... . My brother says it is because when you care for them as a baby, and the parent goes away, it is as if you have lost your child - and that, we all know, is the absolute worst thing that could ever happen - to lose your child....
So how do we cope? I think the only thing is to draw strength from the fact that you are not the only one who is walking on this road...so you are not alone...
Believe that you will come through....lean on grace, and keep reminding yourself that you are not alone...
and...............................
send a silent ' I know ...................I am with you....' to someone who is struggling...