u/possumgirl76

i’m in my early 20’s, my parents are both in their early 60’s. they’re getting old, but they aren’t going senile or anything like that. yet both my parents are acting like they can’t wait to be 6 ft under.

my dad had cancer when i was 14, had to get a surgery and some radiation therapy. it barely seemed to phase him at the time, he remained in good spirits. he rarely talked about it and whenever he did, it was like he was talking about the weather. just a fact, no reason to feel particularly strongly about it. maybe it was the shock of getting such a terrifying diagnosis, maybe he was just putting on a brave face. i don’t know. but the treatments came and went and he came out of it all okay. in April it came back. the prognosis wasn’t awful, not a: “you’ve got 6 months left to live” situation or anything like that thank god. but it’s still cancer. he isn’t hiding how much it’s getting to him this time around, it’s obviously on his mind constantly. sometimes i get the feeling he doesn’t see a point in living at all anymore. i call him every day and spend time with him whenever i can. i try to do anything to lift his spirits or at the very least take his mind off of things, to no avail. i’ve had health issues of my own over the years, not cancer. but sometimes he’ll just say something that sounds like it would’ve come out of my mouth a few years ago. i try to tell him i understand. the stress, the hopelessness, the anger, the “why me?” attitude. waking up every morning feeling like shit, like you’re just a fun lab rat for your doctors to experiment with. i’ve been there dozens of times, it’s such a depressing state of existence. i love my dad, i hate seeing him like this. i feel helpless.

my mom’s situation is more complicated, i’ve talked about her on here before. our relationship is very strained. she’s got type-2 diabetes, morbidly obese, can’t walk up a flight of stairs without her heart hurting and sweating like she’s just ran a marathon. she’s prescribed ozempic for the diabetes, she doesn’t take it. she has the resources to start seeing a personal trainer or physical therapist. she doesn’t. whenever she goes shopping she just buys ice cream and candy and pastries. she spends her days in her lazy boy watching TV stuffing her face with crap. she was briefly hospitalized twice recently, once because of a clot in her lungs which was thankfully taken care of, and once because of a UTI she didn’t bother to get treated until she physically had to. she blames me for her instability. i’m less sympathetic to her, both because of her attitude and also because most of her health issues could probably be fixed if she just got off her ass and started eating better. i’ve met people her age who you’d think were 20 years younger just because of their outlooks on life and how they take care of themselves. i can’t be bothered to care about someone more than they care about themselves, especially when my other parent has fucking cancer. she’s clearly pissed i’ve been giving most of my attention to my dad these past few months and it’s infuriating.

there’s a constant sense of dread looming over me. my mom isn’t going to make it another 10 years living the way she does, maybe not even another 5. i wish i could say i don’t give a single fuck about the situation she’s created for herself, but that’d be a lie. as messed up as she is, i do care about her. you only get one mother. as for my dad, according to my his doctors he’ll be alright once he gets through his treatments. but cancer is terrifying. it’s unpredictable, the treatments are grueling, and it doesn’t help that it feels like he’s silently praying he won’t have to wake up tomorrow. i’m looking at 2 people who seem like they’ve given up on life, and i know there’s nothing in my power i can do to fix it.

I'm 22. my mom is in her early 60's. I don't wanna get too into it but we've always had a complicated relationship, and now I'm at a crossroads between frustration and grief. she has type-2 diabetes, which she's prescribed Ozempic for. she doesn't take it. for a brief period of time she was seeing a personal trainer at the gym, regularly saw a nutritionist, and lost a bit of weight. then the pandemic hit, and ever since she's been doing nothing all day but sit in her lazyboy watching TV eating candy and ice cream. she's stopped working, and she can't walk for 10 minutes without panting like she's just ran a marathon. about a month ago my mom called an ambulance because she wasn't feeling right. they found a clot in her lungs, was prescribed blood thinners, and was discharged after two days. my mom isn't senile, she has the resources to go back to seeing a nutritionist and doing physical therapy. I told her she needs to make some changes and start taking better care of herself. she doesn't, and blames it on me.

a few days ago she went back to the hospital because she wasn't feeling right again. the clot in her lungs is apparently gone, but she was diagnosed with lactic acidosis and is still being watched. I looked up lactic acidosis. this is her body screaming at her that it won't be long before it shuts down completely unless she makes some serious changes now. I asked if she wants to live to see her only child get married or possibly get to meet her grandchildren one day. she bluntly said: "I probably won't, since you don't love me."

I'm pretty sure I know exactly what she's doing, she's done it my entire life. whenever she wasn't getting her way she'd threaten to commit suicide: "you must not love me enough to do this thing I want, so I may as well kill myself." when I was a kid it worked, I'd bend over backwards to do whatever she wanted and make her happy. It stopped working when I grew a spine in my early teens, and she clearly resented the fact that she couldn't use that manipulation tactic on me anymore. now she's won that power back by getting to pin the fact that she is quite literally slowly killing herself by not caring about her health on me, and it's driving me insane. I'm heartbroken. I can't stop imagining the worst case scenarios, wondering what day it'll be when my mother's body finally gives up. and I'm simultaneously furious that she's choosing to spend what could very well be the last year she has on this earth going back to using that old disgusting manipulation tactic on her child.

EDIT: for some of the the people in the replies who are concerned, trust me i’ve been well aware that my mother is mentally unwell for about a decade and i know there’s no fixing people like her. i regularly see a therapist and i have a healthy support system. on a logical level i fully understand that none of her actions are my fault and it isn’t my job to care about a person more than they care about themselves. in a perfect world i’d keep living my life not giving a fuck about whatever my emotionally abusive mom is choosing to do with herself. but unfortunately we don’t live in a perfect world, and knowing of all of these things doesn’t ease the pain. you only get one mother. i could cut contact with her tomorrow (and there have been periods of time over the years where i have) and it still wouldn’t make this any easier. it wouldn’t make this sense of dread and the stench of looming death go away. the sting of grief would still be present. not necessarily for the person my mother is, but for the person i wish she was and for the relationship with her i know i can never have. hope this makes sense.