So who cares for you?

Is this the right thread Jaxie?

Ramblingrose22: What an interesting point you make about releasing all anger & pain. At the age of 75 I am still seething at the way I have been wronged by my father and husband. I seethe with injustice about the way a particular friend had treated me. It is very wearing and I think the origin is low self esteem. So how do you get rid of these feelings and emerge into the sunshine to accept that we are truly on our own in this world?

We are 67 and 68 and still relatively independent. Our children think of us as very young so don't really offer help. I would hope they would help when we are older as they have all helped with older in law family members. My son nursed his bedridden FiL for six months doing everything for him rather than putting him in care. So I try not to worry. We have our wills written and affairs sorted and I just try not to worry too much. I cant see the point. Perhaps I have my head in the sand.
I do feel for everyone. I didn't realise so many people felt this way. It really is a sad situation. We must as we get older concentrate on ourselves first and foremost. Because it seems for most of us we are all we have.

Indeed we do chicken

I think I have spent the last 40 years waiting for "my time" to come along but now accept that my time has probably been and gone.

Day6---You have put it all so well and it really reverberates with me. I've always shrugged things off, pretended I don't care, pushed potential friends away because I haven't felt "worthy" enough and never ever admitted my own needs. Now it's all come back to bite me and I'm in a cage of my own making with the key long lost in some forgotten drawer! Several years ago, I met a new neighbour who refused to be pushed away and claimed me as her best friend, wonderful years of being valued and cherished, but she died and the cage closed again.
Gillybob----we need to set up a "lonely in a crowd" club to give support to all of us who are in this position. I suspect there would be very many potential members.

Since my late teens I have always been the person who looks after everyone else. I had my son at only 18 and was kind of left to get on with it having "made my bed....." I Since then I have looked after grandparents, parents, sister, husbands,children and grandchildren, while working full time and I am still doing it. I have never once asked for, or been offered a favour in return it's just assumed that I will always say yes and do whatever is expected of me.
As a consequence of this I am often desperately lonely with no friends and nothing to look forward to except years and years of the same. I know that must sound dreadfully self pitying to those who would love to have someone to care for and I am sorry for that.

Like Day6 said above sometimes I am tempted to say "what about me?" but I don't think I would be taken seriously anyway.

It is an interesting question Maw.

I have always had a very hard time letting anyone be my 'rock' - not that anyone ever seems to rush to be it either. It's probably my fault. I have a hard time admitting to any sort of vulnerability so I suppose people just leave me to it. I definitely feel many times that I care for others far more than they care for me. Now the children are grown and have moved on I feel my role has changed. I feel lost but not cherished. I have a dear other half but I get the feeling he too needs my 'strength' if you know what I mean?

All my own fault, brought about by having to sink or swim from early adulthood. Paddling my own canoe has been my default position and I'd dearly like to give it up for a motor boat with passengers and a captain.

I do feel neglected in terms of people never really wanting to know how I am, how I feel etc. If I stamp my feet and say "What about me?", as I am dearly tempted to some times, it seems like attention-seeking.

I have to learn to be selfish, look after myself and be self indulgent, but it's hard.

Thank you Kim19. I'm pleased you feel the same. I often feel vaguely out of step, so it's nice to find someone who understands.
Best wishes. I hope you like the poem, Quicksand Years.

Apricity, just wanted to say how very profound and all encompassing that was. Thank you too.

There is so much strength, hard won wisdom and a lot of stoicism in this thread. It has provided me with lots of food for thought. Thank you Grans. ?

Accidents of birth (eg only child) and our family of origin, our own and our children's life choices, health issues, loss of partners and friends, Lady Luck and our own longevity all play a part in the weft and weave of the tapestry of our life. The thread could almost be called "The Loneliness of the Long Distance Survivor."

*MawBroon" - amid a lot of heartbreak our DGS has taught us the importance of saying "I love you". DH and myself both came from families where it was not used at all although we both felt loved. I think if was the way it was back then. I also would like to thank you for this post.

Jacqu
I would have said something similar to you regarding full time DH care but I was spared the other problems you endure. But my life is all the more empty now.
Just do tell him how much you love him. Perhaps I was head in the sand, never prepared to admit that there might be so little time, so that despite 20 years to get used to the idea, the end when it came still knocked me sideways.

I don't think I will be lonely as I am happy with my own company and most days haven't got enough time to do all I want to do but I don't know who will be caring for me. My days at the moment are full caring for DH who is living with chronic heart failure and has now lost his eyesight in both eyes after a couple of years coping with the loss of one. I am sad for him every day but thankful he is here. DD who lives 4hrs away has her own health problems but is supported by her DH but they have to help out with her MIL who also has health issues and needs a lot of support. DS has had to work hard to recover from a messy divorce and is only now getting his life back both financially and mentally during which time I have been giving a lot of time and support to grandson. but I have various health problems and know if I had to go into hospital DH would need full-time carer(s). We don't talk about it so it has been good to read this and maybe now is the time to express our feelings more to each other and to the family.

It can be a shock when you have been so used to looking after others to finally finding yourself as no ones number 1. Do you find that sometimes you find yourself seeking out others to ‘look after’ in some way, either emotional or physically? Then when I became ill myself, suddenly folk fall away to the sidelines. Even my own daughters really struggled to find out their mum had a long term illness. It was quite a sobering time, but am finally learning to put myself nearer to the top of the list.

Me too Niggly. I often think I'll finish as I started. A lonely only child sent to boarding school & a lonely old woman ending up in, hopefully, a better grade boarding school for oldies

It’s strange you mentioned this Mawbroon I was thinking the other day, when I saw someone writing about wonderful family meals that I really have no one in the world except my children and grandkids, of which two kids and five grandkids are overseas, My daughter nearby is very good to me and would do anything I asked for, so I hugely count my blessings ( I try to be self sufficient where ever possible and ask as little as poss and I would never expect to live with her, we are great friends but it wouldn’t work and I wouldn’t want to) I still have contact with my two grandkids nearby although now teenagers so not nearly so much in my life, but with parents both gone, no siblings (an only child) divorced (he’s also dead although we had little contact) and no cousins, all gone There’s no big family around me

bikerhiker so very very sad for you ?

I'm an only child and went to Boarding School, so I philosophically tell myself that I started in Boarding School and I'll probably end in 'Boarding School!!' At least I've had a bit of preparation so not too daunting!!

henetha, ditto to your mail. I could have pretty much written it word for word and share your problems as well as your positives. I will go and investigate your poem immediately. Thanks for sharing that.

And (((hugs))) & to chicken too!

Annie (((hugs)))

I think part of what I meant about being your own best friend is ensuring that one does not fall into the pitfalls outlined by annsixty. We have a friend who has turned into just such a person and the time which elapsed between contact has become ever longer.

We viewed a house for sale which had been lived in by six friends, three couples who lived together for many years doing exactly what chicken has written about in her post. They had enjoyed many years together being busy and living fulfilled lives. Sadly there was only one lady left and she was going into a home, a prospect which filled her with sadness and trepidation.
We have seen the places where the residents are controlled by sedatives, if necessary or more convenient, and left in rows in the residents' lounge, no stimuli or life at all. I suppose if you don't know what day of the week it is or even your own name it might not be the issue it would clearly be if you still had all your wits about you but who is willingly going to enter such a system? Not I, if there was an alternative!

We had an acquaintance who sold her home and bought rental properties, run for her by an agency to give her an income to live in some modest hotel somewhere when not on a cruise. She has a room in one of her own HMO properties where she stores anything she can't carry and it all seems to work for her as she literally is on her own with no known relatives. She says thst she is always well looked after wherever she goes and in addition there is excellent medical care on cruise ships. Horses for courses and not all of us are as brave or even well enough! She has obviously become a bit of a nomad since she seems to have dropped off the radar so can only assume all is well. It begs the question who looks out for her? Not a course I would follow myself!

I have had to face the fact that now my beloved daughter has died before me then it will mean a care home for me

What an interesting question, and something I had not really thought about although I've been alone now for ten years.
I've grown used to being alone and mostly like it now, although there are days when I hate it and could scream.
Like most mothers and grandmothers, I've spent a lot of time caring for others. And although it is true to say there is no-one in my life who would put me first, I think there are those that are fond of me and wouldn't see me in want or trouble. I've been incredibly lucky in having two dear thoughtful sons, and four lovable grandchildren. But they have busy lives, and at the end of the day I know I am alone, like a lot of elderly people are, and am aware of having to stand on my own two feet most of the time. Making decisions is one the hardest things for me. And coping with practical problems. But there is something about my aloneness and independence which I like, in a funny sort of a way. It's hard to explain, but I often feel instinctively that I am somehow meant to be alone.
There is a poem by Walt Whitman called Quicksand Years, from his Leaves of Grass, which I often read and one line at the end in particular resonates;-
"When shows break up, what but oneself is sure?"

Isn't an awful indictment on our country and our care system (or lack of) that people DREAD the thought of going into a care home? That is certainly my thought as well as many of my friends and the previous post. Sad indeed.

There are so many moving posts here and I have a lump in my throat as I write. My OH really doesn't notice me any more unless his meal is late to the table. My children are all too busy to be bothered about my doings and only one of my numerous grandchildren shows any interest in me at all---and she lives in Australia! Being in my 80s now, my close family and several friends are dead. Luckily, I still have three close friends nearby but we are all getting frailer and sometimes talk about this very subject. One idea that we have tossed around a few times is that, when we are on our own, we should buy a property together and care for each other---separate and private space, but also communal space for togetherness when wanted. We could also share the costs of live-in help when necessary.
I can cope pretty well with the "aloneness " of this stage of my life and don't feel guilty about taking time to read or do things on my own but do worry about who will bother to care for me physically when I am no longer capable of independence. The idea of being in a "home" fills me with dread.