Hard times.
Hi everyone. I found this group during a really difficult time in my life. I can see how supportive people are here, and I honestly don’t even know whether I’m looking for comfort, understanding, advice, or maybe just someone who has been through something similar.
People say that bad things rarely come one at a time — when it rains, it pours. That’s exactly how my life has felt.
I’ve been going through an incredibly difficult period. I lost my baby to sudden infant death. Not long after that, our dog died. Then, about a year later, my mother became seriously ill with liver cirrhosis.
She had been drinking heavily for a long time and was also taking quite a lot of medication.
I work as a nurse in a hospital. I have already admitted my mother to the ward where I work twice. Both times she was extremely unwell, and both times we managed to pull her through and get her condition stabilized.
My father is a long-distance truck driver, so he is rarely around. He also struggles with addictions. Throughout my childhood and my parents’ marriage, he was repeatedly unfaithful to my mother and was rarely home. Later he developed a gambling problem, and he still gambles now.
My mother drinks partly because of how unhappy their relationship has been.
I keep asking my father to stop gambling and to support her. Their relationship is very complicated, and I don’t expect him to suddenly fix everything, but I keep asking him to at least try — even if only for my sake. But it feels like he simply doesn’t care.
My mother raised us, but she was always angry and unhappy. There was physical and emotional abuse during my childhood. She wasn’t always a good mother to me, but despite everything, I have always worried about her and cared for her. I’ve always felt sorry for her.
Now she doesn’t work and is financially dependent on my father, although I help her as much as I can. For now she can still take care of herself, although her blood clotting is impaired. But lately I suspect that she may be drinking again.
The first time I admitted her to the hospital, the gastroenterologist told us that her liver still had some reserve and that her condition could partially compensate if she stopped drinking. But she started drinking again and became much worse.
The second time, I brought her to the hospital again, and somehow we managed to get her through it once more. Her condition improved again.
That’s what makes this so painful. She really could still live. But sometimes it feels like she almost wants to die. She talks about how she wants to be buried and what should happen after she dies.
It hurts knowing that I cannot control her drinking or make her want to live.
I’m also terrified of what might happen if she gets worse again. I already lost my baby, and I honestly don’t know how much more grief I can survive. I’m afraid that if I have to arrange another funeral, something inside me will completely break.
I’m afraid of her suffering too. Right now she doesn’t have esophageal varices or ascites, and she only has mild hepatic encephalopathy. So there is still hope. But none of that matters if she continues drinking, and I cannot control that for her.
I’m exhausted.
I feel like I’ve been left alone to carry all of this.
Thank you to anyone who took the time to read this.❤️🌷