"How are you coping?"
"Well, I'm surprised I'm not a full-blown alcoholic yet, but I've got really good at dissociation -- so I guess you could say I'm not.

August – September.
November – December.
April – Present.

Those are the times within the last 12 months (and counting) I’ve been home in Kansas taking care of my parents.

It has not been fun.
In fact – it has been one of THE hardest things I’ve ever done. And, to be honest, I’m not even doing it to the fullest capacity that I could be (and probably should be) at all.

I spend quite a bit of time trying to reconcile my childhood with who I am now & what they need me to do/what they need from me now. It definitely shapes the way I interact with them today. Considering when I was a kid if they would yell at me and literally tell me to go away – I would. I would go hide in my room because that was what I understood was how to “keep the peace”. And I have a hard time now — when they require my actual help — and tell me to go away trying to understand the difference. The inner child in me says “Okay bye”. But I have to fight that & just do it regardless. I have to be there and change the diaper, make the food, force the medication – whatever it is. It takes a lot out of me emotionally to fight those inner feelings.

That’s something that I don’t fully know how to explain to people. I don’t know how to explain that being here in Kansas, sleeping in my childhood room, taking care of the parents who never cared for me (or truly really ever gave a shit about me) but now I have to (and do) give a shit and am taking care of them feels. But for them to be ungrateful or just as mean as they were when I was a kid – what that does to my psyche is…

…really hard to explain.

Scratch, claw, stand tall don’t let em’ take you alive
Ain’t a white flag flying this time.

**trigger warning — I reference suicide**

Today their LPN came out and it’s the first time she’s seen my dad yell at me. She said, “that may be your daughter and how you choose to talk to her, but you won’t talk to me like that.” Why did he speak to me aggressively and with heightened emotion? Because I told the nurse the truth. But he refuses to believe or acknowledge some things. My mom chooses not to shower or bathe. She won’t do it if I ask. So that’s fun.

They don’t want to eat all the time.
They don’t want to bathe.
They don’t care about the trash & don’t care if their clothes or sheets or whatever are dirty.
They are so indifferent it is incomprehensible.

Today I asked them why the mess & the clutter & the bullshit didn’t bother them. They both stared at me like deer in headlights. I told them, in front of the nurse, I said “I don’t know what to do with these reactions or information because that’s not how I operate.”

Today I told the nurse the truth about it all. I let her know that I was trying to “teach them they needed more help”, but they didn’t see it. I told her I didn’t know how long I had with them but I knew that when my dad goes that my mom will purposefully after. With all of the suicide attempts she’s had, I can’t imagine she will be around much longer after. I said I had accepted that for years. She told me that when her father passed away — a month later her stepmom had shot herself. I don’t feel seen (in the deepest sense of the word) very often, but in that moment I truly did. Not many can relate to that statement. And I honestly thank God they cannot. But she said, “I’m glad you know what you’re up against.” She said, “I don’t have any answers, but we will do our best to figure this out together.” I almost fell to my knees in tears.

I wish you could hire someone to just make decisions for you. Some magical genie that would be able to evaluate the current situation and the future and say “Okay, here’s what you need to do!”. But that doesn’t exist.

There is no genie.
No one is coming to make the decisions I have to on a regular basis for me.
No one is going to tell me the future and ensure the decisions I make are the best ones.

“How are you coping?” I’m fucking not.

I don’t know how to explain to most people who ask me. I know they (and by they I mean you who is reading this) mean well. But I cannot explain 30 years of bullshit in a paragraph. I can’t. I simply can’t.

My dog isn’t a trained emotional support animal. But I will tell you that I do not know how I would have managed all of this without her.
My boss has been so understanding through all of the appointments I have to take my dad to.
My friends here in Kansas have been incredible.
My support system back in Vegas has been the most understanding – more than I could have asked for.

Parents get old. We all get old. We aren’t ever really prepared for the SHIT that comes with it all.

But I promise you – I fucking promise you – if you do not deal with the shit that happened in the past; if you do not process the things that did or didn’t happen to you in your former years…they absofuckinglutely will resurface. And I suggest you figure out what you are going to do with all of that sooner rather than later.

Because the moment it all hits & you don’t have any choice but to process it all privately…and face in real-time (at the same time) reality– it won’t be fun. It will hurt. You will hurt others around you. And you will hurt yourself more than anything in the long run.

We are fragile beings. We cannot carry the weight of everything that we try to. And when we are forced to do it all alone? We will break. You will break. I broke. And I broke a lot of things around me I didn’t mean to.

We are not meant to spend these wars fighting them alone. I truly believe that. Some of us sit here & say “I can do it all on my own — I don’t need anyone.”

I promise that’s not how any of this shit works.

So gimme you on your worst day, and I’ll give you my best
When you only got 10, I’ll be that 90 that’s left

Do yourself a favor and handle the demons in your mind before they come riding like Rohan through your mind & you don’t have any elves or dwarves to help you battle them. ‘Cause I promise you — if you’re like me? It will be a process. A long process. That many won’t understand. Many will not stick around for it. Those are not your people.

But I promise, I promise — the ones who are meant to? They will be there. They will understand. They will help you in ways you never knew people were able to. I love my people & my tribe. Find your people who give you the 90% or more when you only have 10% or less to give.

These are just my rambles. No one needs to check on me. I just needed to get a lot of things off my chest & out of my head before I lost my shit again.

Today was a rough day.

Maybe tomorrow will be a better day.