My challenges are tending to my father and my black lab whose bodies are failing them, and a mother whose mind is failing her. No one is going to get better. I don't wish them dead, but I know I will feel a sense of relief when they are gone.
I need to get a job soon, which is going to complicate my situation. My dog can't go for 8 hours without being taken outside, so I'll probably need to clean the carpet every day, or put her in diapers. Everything I do for my parents now will have to be done on weekends or after work. Mother still refuses to get help. She wants me to do everything because she doesn't want strangers in the house. I think it's because they are feeling more and more vulnerable as they continue to lose themselves to old age.
I've been trying to do things for myself that lift me up even if for just a little while, but that takes energy I don't always have. The other day, exhausted after a morning of doing things for the parents and taking dad to get his eye glasses adjusted, I slept on the sofa for 2 hours while the roofers pounded away on the the roof above me.
On a brighter note: our insurance is paying for the new roof because it was damaged in a hail storm last year, and my garden is amazing this year. I'm glad it's too hot to work in it now so I can enjoy it.
I hesitated posting because I feel like I've whined too much about my life already. I'm reading a book that is helping me keep perspective, and it even helps me fall sleep faster at night. The lack of sleep has been, by far, the worst problem of all. I still don't sleep long enough, but I am getting more.
