Since my mom became ill things have changed a lot around our house. I’ve been spending more and more time and TONS of emotional energy on her care. Arranging playdates for my kids so that I can take my mom to chemo, missing soccer games and dinners at home, attending doctors appointments and spending weekends up north with my parents. At bed time? Gramma has to take her medication. Needless to say, my attention has been elsewhere. Going to the park? I’m not comfortable leaving Gramma alone. Are you starting to get my drift?
Basically, I am neglecting my children. There is only so much of me to go around and right now I am focused on my mom. Now, I want to make it clear, I don’t think there is anything wrong with this but it sure makes things hard. I know that my mom needs me and I know that my kids will learn about compassion and love by my example. I know this because my mom did the same thing for her parents.
The trouble is that my 6-year-old is really struggling. She misses me and she just doesn’t understand. In the last week we have had some interesting and extremely challenging behaviour:
- She is now a baby. We have had crying, whining, crawling, and thumb sucking. She is constantly asking me to pick her up and carry her places.
- She refuses to go to sleep. She will eventually conk out but bed time is extended by as much as an hour and by the end of the day I am just pooped. This means that I have no time to decompress because I am too tired.
- She’s mean. Yup, she’s got some doozies and she does not hesitate to use ’em. “You don’t love me anymore!” or “You’re the meanest mom in the world!”
- She’s breaking me heart. She’s sad. She says she misses me when I’m not there. She cries for me. She clings to me. She says, “You take care of Gramma more than you take care of me.”.
That last one’s a toughy because, although technically I don’t, Gramma does need me more right now so her needs do trump everyone else’s. This is the root of the problem. She’s feeling insecure. But the real issue is, I can’t do anything about it. This is a fact of life right now and I’m hoping that the learning she gets outweighs the sadness. I hope that looking back, when she’s older, she’ll understand.
keep doing your best
Well, it’s kind of their job to make our lives more challenging! 😉 BUT, I think you’re so wise reminding yourself that you’re teaching your children compassion through your example. You’re doing the best you can — that is all you can do.
Jen, this brought a tear to my eye. Your Mom really needs you now and Kath is right, your daughter won’t remember how hard it was on her, but she will remember how much you cared for and helped her grandmother when she needed it most. It’s a lesson in compassion that will pay off in the future. In the meantime, the little time you do spend with your daughter, hopefully you can both make it “special time”, even of it’s just reading a book together at bedtime. I always find that my kids understand alot more once we’ve talked out the issue. But, there’s no doubt, this is a really difficult time for everyone (in different ways).
My thoughts are with ALL of you.
We know from our own experience that when our kids look back they’ll understand. They’ll look back and won’t even remember that it was hard on them or that they felt neglected. It’s usually not easy to do the right thing, but that’s what you’re doing.