The dilemma I’ve never known, despite asking both my parents, why, for the first four years of my life, I lived with my grandmother. Then she died and I moved in with my parents. Like my grandmother, my parents were strict and beat me. I was often bruised and occasionally bloodied. They demanded complete obedience. I would be hit if I got a less than perfect grade for any subject at school. It taught me to be a hard worker, so I am pretty successful now. I am in my 40s, know some nice people and could have a good life if every spare minute wasn’t spent either with my father or fretting about him.
My mother died five years ago and my elderly father’s health and dementia require a lot of care. The past two years were super-difficult and the last six months were closer to hell. I have appointed a care agency to come in, which he hates, and he needs more supervision than they are able to provide.
He wants me to live in and be his sole carer. He cannot see why I have my own flat. He regards single, childless women as having nothing to do. He has never been interested in my career and says I don’t need it as he could give me housekeeping! He can put on a front of charming sociability and everything ugly is happening behind closed doors, similar to when I was a child and, as when I was a child, I don’t tell anyone about his bullying. I feel ashamed as if it is my fault. I know it isn’t, but these feelings defy reason.
I’ve found him a nice place in an expensive home. I broached the subject and he tried to make me feel guilty for even mentioning it. His dementia is taking hold now – he recently caused a small fire in his kitchen; he isn’t safe at home. I could get him into the home if I said it was for a holiday. I’m shaking even as I write this. I feel if I do this against his will, I’m doing something dreadfully wrong. How can I square it with myself?
Philippa’s answer I expect there is still a small voice inside you which believes that if only you could get it right for him then he’d be a loving father. It is too scary when we are children to feel that the people responsible for us don’t love us and aren’t safe people, and so it is easier to believe that, if only we could get it right for them, everything would be OK. And, paradoxically, often the worse we were treated the more ingrained and lingering this irrational belief becomes.
You are an adult now, but a part of you, the traumatised part of you, is still that poor child cowering from blows and thinking she must be bad otherwise this wouldn’t be happening. Please look at that undefended, vulnerable little girl inside you and give her the love and protection now that she never had then. She and you will never get anything right for your father. The time has come to get it right for you.
I believe you will feel less ashamed of your past and ongoing mistreatment when you talk about it more. Talk to your friends or a therapist. To start to do this will feel like a giant leap, but it will get easier. When you say things out loud about how you were treated and of your legacy of shame and fear, you will be able to hear yourself and feel for yourself more, and experience fear and shame less.
I can understand your shaking as you write, because even though you are now a responsible, independent adult with a good career, a part of you is still expecting a physical and mental beating for going against your father’s wishes. It’s time to act, despite your fear.
In a sense I endorse the “on holiday” approach because having advanced dementia means he’ll be more comfortable with a familiar idea like a holiday, whereas “moving to a care home” would be difficult to take in. And it will be like a holiday. He won’t have to worry about his meals and setting fire to the kitchen, he will be looked after, there’ll be company for him and a clean bed. At my father’s home, they gave them all sherry before lunch. You can square it with yourself because his current situation is unsafe and unsustainable – and he doesn’t even sound happy. But bear in mind that unless it is established that he lacks mental capacity, the decision about going into a home is legally his to make – so he ought not to be led to falsely believe this is a holiday, although you could help him to view a trial stay as being like one.
There’s one point I want to pick you up on – your career success now is despite being beaten, not because of it. Had your father been protective, loving and kind, this might all feel different. Then he would not want you to sacrifice your life to be his full-time carer, and you would have been far more willing to spend more time with him.
Recommended books: Contented Dementia by Oliver James; Toxic Parents by Susan Forward.
• This article was amended on 18 April 2023 to clarify that, unless it is established that a person lacks mental capacity, decisions about care are their own to make, with or without help and based on relevant information.
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