Roles Clash

I tend to push myself too hard. I have always done this. When I work out, I only know that I'm at my limit when I physically can't lift the weight one more time. I do life this way too. I get the feeling that this isn't very pleasant for the people around me. I do and do and do until I just can't do one more thing. Then I'm out. Except when you're a mom to a small baby you can't just be out. Especially when your husband is finishing up a PhD. Especially when your MIL has mid-stage Alzheimer's disease.

Today was actually a very light day of care giving on the Alzheimer's front. A family friend picks MIL up most Mondays and hangs out with her for a few hours, and today was no exception. If you know a family who could use this kind of help, and you're in any position to give it, let me urge you to do it. It makes such a difference to get just a few hours to regroup. 

I am not the main caregiver for my MIL. My FIL does the vast majority of care giving for her, and I am around and interacting with both of them, and am a sort of stand in for her comfort person when FIL is unavailable for one reason or another. So, when this family friend picks up MIL, it's nice for me, but I think the real blessing is bestowed on FIL. I hesitate to speak for him, but I think the both of us are oftentimes just hanging on, just doing the best we can from day to day. 

I'm stuck in a weird place. I recently saw this ad by AARP: 

My immediate thought was: "Where's the ad for ROLES CLASH?" Talk about sandwich generation - start out with a somewhat late in life pregnancy, then add in early onset Alzheimer's disease, and we're the poster children for role mash up. I don't know how to manage these two things. The vast majority of my breaks from MIL include taking care of baby, and a good bit of my breaks from baby include at least interacting with MIL and her delusions. Sometimes, like today, it's enough to make me want to run away. My own mother came over to play with baby this afternoon so I could take an hour nap, which was awesome, but you know when you're so emotionally empty that an hour just feels like a drop in the bucket? That is me today. 

My fear is that anyone reading who isn't intimately familiar with the day in and day out strain of being a caregiver will roll their eyes at my descriptions and write me off as melodramatic. I do, admittedly, struggle with depression and anxiety, as well as sleep deprivation due to aforementioned baby, which on its own will make anyone feel really rotten. I think we're in a cycle at this point, in which I am stressed about living with a demented person, so my son catches that vibe and is stressed out and doesn't sleep well, and then I'm more stressed. We keep passing the stress vibe around like a virus. I don't think there's a solution. That's the depressing thing about Alzheimer's disease. It doesn't get better. It's one thing to know that, and another thing to live it.