The Whole Ugly Story...

My name is ”Caregiver”, I’m 39yrs old, I’m married to an awesome man, & we have an 8yr old little girl Brianna, who, even after being exposed to as much as she has in the past few years, is quite a character with a very loving & gentle soul. I’m also the daughter of a Mentally & Physically disabled Mother, who for the past almost 2yrs up until a few months ago I was her full time caregiver. There is absolutely nothing special or heart wrenching about our family. We haven’t suffered any devastating events or lost any family members. We are just a typical family struggling to survive.

My Mom has been mentally ill all of my life & I believe most of her own life as well. Although, having grown up in that environment I never knew any different, about 2yrs ago it became obvious that my Mom, because of both mental & physical disabilities, could no longer care for herself independently, so we moved her in with us in order to keep her from going into a full time care facility.

During the course of the past 2yrs our situation has gone from bad to worse to desperate. I didn’t realize at the time the added expense of caring for my Mom at home would literally cripple us. There were periods of time that my Moms medications alone were close to $3000 per month, & her income was literally less than half that amount. I soon had to choose weather to pay the Mortgage & household bills or pay for her medications. I chose her medications & I’m not complaining, if I had to do it over again we would do the exact same thing.

My husband, being the man that he is, would constantly tell me that he just wanted our daughter & me to be happy & that he would do what he could to make that possible. My husband is an over the road truck driver, that being said, he sometimes stays out for up to 4 months at a time to help make ends meet. In January of 2007, it became necessary to file for bankruptcy in order to save our home. Literally 2 days later, my husband was diagnosed with type II diabetes & was sent home on temporary disability. It took close to 2 months for him to get his first disability check. On top of all of my Mom’s medical expenses, we now had to add his medical expenses, such as testing supplies, insulin & other medications into the mix as well. We also had to change the way we did our grocery shopping, which wasn’t necessarily a bad thing it’s just more expensive to eat healthier.

During this same period of time, my daughter, who had be diagnosed prior w/asthma, allergies, & multiple ear infections, finally had to have surgery to remove her tonsils, adenoids, & have tubes put in her ears.

And then there is me, the “Caregiver”, I have Crohn’s Disease. I was diagnosed when I was 16 & for the most part I have learned how to control it without much medical intervention, but with all of this going on & the stress it entails it has been flaring up more frequently now & we have had to ‘splurge’ & buy my medications so the ‘caregiver’ could continue to give care to all the other sick members of the household. Needless to say we got even further behind.

I believe it was the end of April beginning of May when he was finally released to go back to work. During this whole period of time I was unable to work outside of the home due to my Mom’s need for constant supervision. I decided to see what I could do to make money from home. I opened my own store on ebay Scent * Tastic selling handmade bath & body products, that I made right here in my kitchen as well as some high end cosmetics that I got for good prices. As with any new business, every penny I made had to go right back into the business.

Things were starting to look up in that, I had gotten my Mom into a Medicare Prescription plan where most of her Medications were going to be covered & we could combine our incomes to start getting caught up.

Over the course of this past summer, my Mom’s mental illness gradually got worse to the point where there was little to nothing I could for her. She became very abusive & combative towards myself as well as others including her Dr’s & my 8 yr old little girl. In October, I finally had to make the decision to have my Mom put into an Assisted Living Facility, as I could no longer handle her care on my own. Her behavior had become so disruptive that it was now affecting my daughters’ behavior & performance in school. Of course my daughter was very upset by this since she would no longer be able to play with Grandma on a daily basis, which was also upsetting to me because when I was her age I had an awesome relationship with my Grandma & was hoping she could look back & have those same types of memories of her Grandma.

I knew when I made this decision that foreclosure was imminent. We just couldn’t handle the bankruptcy payment, the mortgage, & all of our regular monthly bills now without Moms income.

Since that time, my husband has had some bad luck with his truck with breakdowns & repairs & instead of getting ahead we’ve actually gotten even further behind. My car is probably going to be repossessed any day now as we’ve gotten about 4 months behind on that as well. People don’t realize when you get so far behind on everything, unless something drastic happens like all of a sudden your income doubles or you win the lottery for a substantial amount, you don’t just catch up. This Christmas would not have even happened if it weren’t for a Great bunch of people who belong to the Church we’ve been attending.

We have now gotten to the point of no return, our home will be sold at auction on February 4, 2008, the best I can hope for now is that a compassionate investor purchases our home & will maybe let us rent it. I tell you all of this, not for our benefit, as it is too late for us. Some may say I should have made better choices & I will be the first to admit that I’ve made a lot of bad decisions in dealing with my Mom’s mental illness, but I never meant for any of this to happen, as a matter of fact I really had no idea we would end up here. The issues we have been dealing with the past few years are just the beginning. There are plenty of families dealing with some of the same issues. The subject of "Caregiving" needs attention as this is a growing family dynamic. As "Caregivers" we need more resources, education, & guidance in making decisions on issues we've never dealt with before.

Even though my Mom is now in an Assisted Living Facility, this is an issue that I would like to stay involved in just because of what we've been through. Right now I have to take care of my own family first, before I'm useful to anyone else.