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Toxic Family Life
i'm 27/f. Since I was a small child, I have been caring for my mother. She is unable to regulate her emotions. After her divorce, when I was about 2, she only became worse and worse. Although my grandparents have always been a huge help and I lived with them throughout childhood, they never enabled her to take care of herself. She is about to turn 60 and prior to now, she has never paid her own bills. She never had a savings account. She quit working for about 20 years to stay home, and she maxed out every American Express that my grandparents handed her. She owned a home throughout all this time, which she got in the divorce. She had the home rented and received some income from that rental property throughout the time we were living with my grandparents.
To make a long story short, she ended up moving into that house and I currently live in that efficiency. But, not much has changed. I graduated with my masters degree and I currently have three jobs: career job, side job teaching ESL, and uber eats. My mom has one job, but she does not pay any bills. I'm not paying any rent living in this efficiency, but I cover all the costs of the house. I am paying a lot more however, with my health. Ever since we've been living on this property, she is completely and totally dependent on me. She frequently calls me in crying spells, which I have to help her through. She has major outbursts, like throwing herself on the floor, screaming. Many nights, she calls me over to her place to sleep with her because she is afraid to sleep alone. When I go out with friends, she calls me about 40 times a night to ask me when I'm coming home. I've talked to my grandparents and my dad about it. I've told them that I'm really tired and I don't feel equipped to do this anymore. At first, they turned a blind eye. But now, my dad is starting to believe me and actually taking action. He's helping me with certain bills so that I can save up enough money to move out of the efficiency and move to California. I've been talking about this since I was 16.
But, here's the problem. Last year, I was hospitalized and at the time, didn't have insurance. So, that urinary tract infection is costing me $10,000. That was all money I had planned to save. I also owe an aunt of mine about $2,000. So, altogether, it's going to take me about 20 months to pay all of this off, with all the other bills I have (power, water, phone, cable, etc.). I don't have a choice but to pay cable because this isn't technically my house. Altogether, this adds up to the price of rent because the power bill is for the entire house, not just my apartment. If I didn't have the hospital bill, I would be able to move out quicker. When I think that it's going to take me 20 months to move out, I feel really discouraged.
Just today, my mom got into a terrible argument with me because she didn't like that I was wearing a long skirt. A few years ago, about 6 years ago, my mom actually became very abusive. She almost killed me by throwing her body on top of me and sticking her fist in my mouth because she didn't like some things I had bought for Christmas. On another occasion, she closed the door on my wrist and it was severely scratched. Then, she doesn't remember any of it. Not too long ago, she bought some things for the efficiency.At the time, I had injured my knee and I told her I couldn't help her take the items out of the car because of the pain. She was so angry, that she started throwing all of the furniture on the lawn and her eyes were bloodshot red. Right now, it's de-escalated to emotional abuse, but I do live with that fear of it escalating to physical at any time.
So, after this long story, I can ask... what can I do in terms of the medical bill so that I could really put that money towards saving? Some days, I honestly just feel so depressed. I don't have the motivation to get dressed. I'm breaking out in hives. Have trouble losing weight. I notice that when I lived away for a time period, all of these symptoms just disappeared. Or when I'm on a vacation with other people, it disappears. I just can't sit front and center of these issues. I struggled with the guilt, but I've come to understand that I have nothing to feel guilty about. Your advice is needed and appreciated.
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Your body is reacting to the level of stress it has. My body had the hives and much more go haywire when I was married to my first husband who was verbally abusive. A body can ward it off for a while when it's occasional bursts of stress with time in between to rest but you are in a situation that doesnt change so its constant stress with no 'off' button.
Now here's what I am missing on the story. Your grandparents raised you so I assume you lived with them. I am guessing they passed away and that is what changed. So when you could no longer live with them, you had to find a place of your own. But to choose to rent from your Mom when you knew her to be how she is, that part I do not understand, especially since you make a point to state your rent is free on the effiency.
No, it is NOT free. Your Mom knows a good deal when she sees it. All she or anyone else has to say to you is that you pay no rent and you believe you are paying nothing for a place to live when actually you are paying fully for a houses bills which your Mom should be covering. And I will bet that all of what you are covering on bills for your Mom is equivalent to what it would cost to rent a place of your own or a whole lot more once everything is tallied up. This would mean that in actuality, you probably can afford to rent a place of your own, something in your budget range, maybe if not a full apartment, a mother in law attached to a persons home or even renting one bedroom in their place while kitchen and such end up common areas shared. You might even be able to let go of one of your side jobs.
You used the word 'enable' early in your letter. I would like to share something about the word enabling from Wikipedia:
"In a negative sense, "enabling" can describe dysfunctional behavior approaches that are intended to help resolve a specific problem but in fact may perpetuate or exacerbate the problem."
So out of love and care for your Mom, your grandparents may haved helped her financially or done things for her which did not give her a situation in which she had to sink or swim on her own. You need to realize that it is not so much losing your place that is why you are paying for all of Moms financial needs, but simply the fact that you worried already what would happen to her long before you ever moved in there. When we think of loved one making bad decisions where they back themselves into corners, we can't stand the thought that they wouldn't pay bills and end up homeless for one example. However, Mom being like a child in a grown ups body only fools the public as long as your grandparents or you now fully cover everything for her so she can look normal to them. How quickly that would change if lets say that tomorrow something happens to you and you die and she were all alone. How would she cope then. Who would take care of her? None of us can say, Oh I will live to be old and grey. Any one of us can die getting hit by a car or some other way, like in a fire, etc.... Usually, it's parents having to wonder how a mentally disabled adult child will survive after they are gone, but it could happen here too with no infra-structure set up to take care of Mom. Lets say you are lucky enough in the next couple years to marry and start a family. When your attention has to go to your children, will you even have time to help out Mom to the extent you do now or would any husband be willing to help the problem continue by covering for your Mom?
What she needs is to get plugged in with agencies that can help. A person can't work easily or at all if they have any disabilities physical or mental that prevent them from holding down a job and taking care of their basic needs. I am not saying a disabled person can't work but there are some that due to their type of or extent of disability can not work at all like a para plegic.
I did mention mental disabililties, right? And thats where I want to head with this. Unless your Mom died tomorrow, as long as she is alive, she can begin to learn how to take care of some of her basic needs like any adult would. This she can do with varied success depending on her disability but no where do I see mention of her ever getting diagnosed or recieving mental health evaluation because dear, your Moms behavior is not normal. So far from it. She indeed suffers some kind of mental disability. Whether its the type that effects her ability to take care of herself with training, I do not know. Heck, there are even classes these days to teach college age folks how to cook for themselves, stuff I did as a teen already. If college kids have classes to learn an adult task like cooking, then there will be classes for other such things. If you stopped taking care of Mom, what would happen? It would become evident to any professional, that she is unable to take care of herself and maybe even along those lines, a danger to her own welfare as far as not being capable of making the sound decisions to earn money and pay to keep a roof over her head, food in her stomach, and bills paid. If she fails to eat, becomes ill, or the bank wants to take the house due to back taxes or mortagage payments not made, then she'd have no place to live. Well you too technically but its your fear for yourself that is blinding you to what Mom needs. You need to cut her off and let her sink as she was meant to for a long time and then the loving thing to do is to contact agencies in your areas that promote care for senior citizens or for those also with mental illness. Your mom trying to kill you once shows how quickly she can swing from harmless to dangerous and that dear, is mental illness. I am surprised that was never mentioned just the word toxic. Toxic would be a mentally sound person choosing to be evil and treat others in a toxic way. THe way you are treated by a mentally ill person is toxic too but its more complicated, they either don't know what they are doing or don't understand why they feel forced compelled to do things they rather wouldn't. Normally, you can't force an adult to go for mental health evaluation. However there are situations where if that person is a danger to themselves, then agencies have legal authority to come in and take control of the situation. As long as you pay for everything, no agency is going to look at your Moms living condition and think, oh shes a danger to her own wellbeing.
I have read many stories of people who were hoarders, whether stuff or lots of cats or birds and it was filthy and unsanitary and the condition of the living space found to be unfit for human health let alone animals if in the picture. THat is one scenerio where agency professional oncds alerted to the problem would step in.
So as I see it, the hard thing to do but best for you and your mom is that you hunt around for a place, maybe just a room to rent for now that is no more than what you already shell out for Mom.
This is important as the first step so that there is no worry about a place for you to live that is safe. Then from that point on, either you call and talk to her doctor and let him know whats going on and see if they can call her in for a yearly physical. When we get to Moms age, we all have to see a Dr. more regularly and be tested for the basic problems that begin to show at that age range. However once Mom has willingly gone to see the doctor, if he knows how bad things are with Mom not able to do any adult tasks for herself, he can order her to have a psych evaluation and share your details to that doctor and if there is a problem which I guarantee there is because she is so very Not normal, then she can begin getting help of all kinds, especially if her mental health has been an issue she's been able to keep hidden her entire life and now is in a bad spot. You are the last living relative I assume, or at least the only one concerned enough about her to get involved. Don't enable Mom to keep her problem hidden to her dying day. She needs to feel free to not worry about herself or her condition, knowing its being taken care of and she is getting the professional help she needs. You are not a professional, so what you've done out of love and a tender heart to not see her suffer any lack of physical needs, actually prolongs her situation going unnoticed by professionals so that indeed you would create that noose around your neck where you are being affected by this until the day she dies if you don't first from the stress. This kills your chance to enjoy your work, have a place of your own, friends to hang with, a mate to love and children to raise because you will be too busy raising your mother which you've mentioned doing the role since a young child. I know habits are hard to break but in this case, you are hurting rather than helping your own situation with Mom. Talk to agencies ahead of time, even before you move, so you already know what kind of help is out there and what they can do for her legally at this point or later when its worse.
Agencies names vary often by state so I would encourage you to contact your local DSHS, or Dept of Social and Health services for a meeting with someone to discuss whats going on with your Mom. Unless you want to be her caregiver til her dying day, you need help. I am sure you will always be involved to some extent with Mom and her welfare but it should be the professionals relating to you any improvements or set backs with your Mom that 'they' are handling as they are paid to do, its their job. In essense, you carry 4 jobs with the 4th being Moms caregiver. I used to work as a caregiver for the elderly but mostly mentally ill. I know what is and isn't available to some extent altho things can have changed a little due to lack of funding but there are still things like food stamps and people incaple of working due to their mental health condition and recieving money from the state like a social security monthly.
I hope you start reaching out for professional help for your Mom.
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