When it comes to caring for a needy parent, we don't have to get along with them. We just have to listen and do what we think is best for them.

People are born with different personalities and you can't blame her for her hysteria and you can't be expected to respond the way she does.

You could help by providing a little information in WRITTEN form that explains to her what happens and what doesn't happen when you get a small stroke. Then, you won't have to get yourself so aggravated, which will only make the situation worse.

I can totally feel your Mom pain. I am now caring for my 77 year old Mom since my Dad's passing a month ago. She's a worrier, fatalist, the most pessimistic person I've ever know and I SO hear my life gurgling down the drain. She makes mountains out of molehills and always has. Like you, my Mom and I haven't been the closest over the years, mostly because she drives me away with her nagging and pessimism but I am the one caring for her now, just as I was the one who cared for both of them when Dad was still here.

I want to bang my head on a wall every time I hang up from talking to her and when I have to go see her I have to steel myself for the day....which happens to be today. Trying to talk myself into leaving to get there now....

HELP!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! My life has fallen and I can't get up

Our stories are so similar it's eerie. I reward myself when I leave Mom by retreating to Borders, or Barnes and Noble. I do love my mother, I do. But I can't talk to her like a rational person, and there is brain pain after five or six hours. I do the best I can to take the best care I can with her, as I know you and others do in our position. Plan something good to do after your time with your mom. It helps. Take care!

Thank you!!! It helps so much to know I'm not the only one going through this. Today she was going on about Dad and how he never had a nice word to say to her in the last five years and I didn't have the heart (or I decided to be nice) and not tell her that he finally gave up trying to be nice because it didn't make her any nicer to deal with anyway. ARGH!!! I escaped after five hours only somewhat damaged. I had a date tonight (new guy) which went well but won't turn into anything. ha ha...at least I got to do something fun for the evening and not feel like a prisoner in my own hell.

Thanks for the suggestion...I will plan a quiet dinner for myself when I leave her from now on...treat myself to something I love.

If you need to talk I'm here...

Take care!!

Dear DeeD,

I am also caring for my mother, but I invited her into my home three years ago. I had forgotten what she was like. The sad thing is, she never changed. She's still got the same old ideas and prejudices she had as a child. She's 86, I'm 66. If I had it to do over, I would move to her town, rent a house until she died. But here we are, together, and pretty unhappy. I'm an only child, but I got as far away from my parents as I could. What an optimist I was to have her move here. She expects me to be her everything: nurse, cook, friend, companion and I'd rather be alone. She has no friends, no interests, no original thoughts or conversations...only an unhealthy attachment to my 40 year old son. He adores her because she never said no to him (his words). So it's basically them against me.

I guess I'd advise you to keep your distance and don't do something that will make you a sullen, seething martyr.