For those of you who have had a * for some time now, I am wondering if the relationships that were fractured by your AD caregiving have been restored or have most of these former "friends" moved on permanently? The longer I am on this journey I am noticing that often my contact is not returned or if there is contact they make no reference to hb and our situation. I am pretty much just down to core family members and for them I am so grateful.
"Couples" friends are gone. I am not interested in renewing those friendships. Wives think I am after their husbands-perish the thought. I have easily made a new circle of women friends-either widowed or a few divorced. I am too active in volunteering and have made new acquaintances which may also turn into friendships. I have slowly let my bitterness towards former friends dissolve. There is still much to do and enjoy on my terms.
I do not have an * after my name yet but I would like to add some input for those just starting out in this battle. It may or may not be of help but it can't hurt. Kathryn and have lost no friends at all. In the beginning our friends asked me to please keep them up to date on how Kathryn was doing and I have. They are comfortable around her and call us to go out to dinner or a movie. Any time they see us they go out of their way to give Kathryn a hug and a kiss. At this time we no longer are able to go out like we were because kathryn is not doing as well. Our friends still call and invite us out even though they understand that we can't go now. They also ask if there is anything they can do to help. When we were able to go out the ladies would go to the bathroom and help Kathryn.
I think for us the secret was keeping them informed from the beginning. It wasn't easy for me to do this. I am not at ease with talking about it in person to anyone. It doesn't seem right to me to call someone to just tell them problems. But I would tell anyone if you have a friend or family member that says please keep me up to date and let me know if there is anything I can do. Do just that but understand that doesn't mean they will always be able to drop what they are doing or that sometimes you may ask them to help with something that they can't handle. We all have limits.
However, if they never call you or they are just nosey then you have to make a judgement call what you want to do. But I suggest you give them a cahnce and the benifit of the doubt at least until they prove they don't deserve it.
JimB
We haven't asked for much of them but I am sure if we needed their help they would be there for us.
Bluedaze has hit on an important aspect that now that once you are a widow, you are a threat to married women. On the other hand, the widowers have never had so many unattached women vying for their attention. Also, at 82, many of my friends are ill or dying - this past 6 months, I've lost 7. At church, when I pray for the souls of the dead, I have such a list that I forget some of them. Before, when you had an Alzheimer's husband, many friends didn't want to deal with that, or were incapable of doing so. So, as Bluedaze says, you make new friends, and you take up new activities. You find that you no longer even think about the former friends , and if you do happen to bump into them somewhere, it's easy to treat them in a light, casual fashion as if nothing happened, because indeed nothing did: they weren't there for you when it important.
I've had the * now for three years and as bluedaze* said, the "couples" relationships are still gone. Most of those relationships immediately disappeared as soon as AZ reared its ugly head. I always felt 'they' felt he had a communicable disease and it was catching. Now that I am a widow, "I'm out to get their husbands" so the wives lock them up tight...LOL.
I am developing acquaintances (mainly female as there aren't too many single men out there in my age group), which may turn into friends but at this stage in my life, I am really enjoying being alone. I was part of a couple for nearly 50 years (10 and 39), from age 10 helped my sister raise her three sons and had two children of my own. I can do what I want, when I want. I've been told by some that I am being selfish by not being at available at their beck and call....
Sorry Andy, if I strayed away from your original question but for the first time in life, I have a say in how I want to live it.
We were very lucky. Our friends did not desert us. We were even lucky enough to have a couple become our friends after they found out about Gord. They have been better than family. Now that Gord is gone, they are still here for me. They seem to be concerned about my being alone in the evenings and always call for an evening coffee. I hate to be a burden to them and frequently think about telling them they don't need to but then I think about how much I enjoy it and say nothing. They have a small cleaning business and I go and help them. Gord and I both helped them when he first had AD but when he started shooting what had been swept out of a room back in, I knew that we had to stop.
No, Coco, we love you, and you are lovable. But I know how you feel. This feeling will get less as you go along, and at the end, you will realize that you are magnificent. It's one of the low blows of this disease that it attacks our confidence. We have so much to handle, and no one human being can handle on their own, no matter how hard we try. You are not alone in feeling deserted at this most difficult period of you life.
Some friends left, the true friends stayed. However, I have noticed a major uptick in support and staying in touch after I placed him in the ALF. Having a spouse in a facility is apparently something people can relate to; having the 24/7 caregiving responsibility apparently was not. Frankly, the support was needed more when he was home.
Or is that we are perceived as not likely to ask these friends for help if our loved one is already in a facility? If the spouse is still at home, maybe - and God forbid and if we're not careful - this spouse might desperately need us to help someday in a crisis. No, I need to get on with my own life. Sorry that that I've become a cynic; I didn't use to be.
Most of our social life had been w/family, both sides, lots of siblings, etc. All got along. Otherwise, I've never been all that social, bit of an introvert, after an hour or two at a party I'm ready to go home, if I've even accepted the invitation to go in the first place. But even some family began to stay away--they said that they couldn't stand to see DH in such a way--which I saw 24/7. But I understood. Now almost all our siblings are also gone, it's a wholly different life. I have a gentleman friend, but do not want to marry, live together or even go out with other couples. So I'm not looking to get back into a couples scene. And, yes, I've also been in a situation where I saw other wives cling tight to their husbands as if I was going to take them away. Sorry, ladies, but your choices were safe from me. Like Redbud above, for the first time in my life I can do what I want when I want and no one else to consider. If it came to it and I had my youth, I'd care for DH again in a heartbeat, but I am where I am now in life. It isn't what I ever expected or thought I wanted, but I have embraced this phase.
Like Bettyhere* said, many of our friends (and HIS children) said they wanted to remember him the way he "was", rather than see him as an Alzheimer victim. After he died, I felt that even I had changed. I had no interest in their frivilous lifestyles and viewed them as the shallow people they were rather than the close, caring people I had thought they were. The first six months were the hardest, but then it was as if someone opened one door that led to numerous other doors and I found myself in an entirely new circle of friends. HIS children were out of the picture all together, and that was a good thing. My new friends were sincere, caring and entirely different. I adore them. And, yes, after another year, I became reacquainted with a gentleman I knew decades ago. Recently we were married. This life is nothing like my former life, and we are so happy. It's nothing like my first marriage, but it is good.
I learned it was futile for ME to try to be the person I was before AD, and equally futile to expect life to be the same ever again. I chose to look forward, step through those open doorways with eyes wide open. It worked for me. Yes, I think of my late DH often, but I remember him as a happy healthy man. I have filed away the last 3 years. It does no good (for me) to rethink what I might have done or not done. I couldn't fix him when he was alive, I couldn't fix him in death..... so I focused on fixing ME. That was a task within itself and it didn't happen overnight.
Am I 'fixed' now? Who knows? I am nowhere near like the person I was, say 20 years ago. My values have changed and everything in my life has changed, my name, my address, my church, my friends.... I made these changes bit by bit, day by day, one step at a time, beginning with a single 'toe in the water'. I'm at peace, I'm happy and I'm convinced today that back then, I WAS a very good wife and caregiver. When people asked me why I put my life on hold for years to care for him, I would reply, 'It could have been me, just as easily'. That answer usually sufficed.
As Starling often says, "It is what it is". What we make of it, is up to us.
I don't have a star, (and hope to never get one) and I am still in the resentful stage, so I better not reply to this thread.......
But, good to see you posting Andy♥ how is your DH doing? I wanted to let you know I accidently deleted your last email, so I don't have your email anymore!! SORRY! Could you please resend it? Praying your load has lightened some ((hugs))
Thanks for the responses. So much of what you all said struck a chord with me. True,fairweather friends aren't true friends. Being a caregiver for this disease does change your priorities and perspective on the future. It does strip away the "frivilous",not that you can't have fun and laugh,just different. If I bring anything away from this it would be not to waste thought and energy in staying connected with those that have drifted away. As many of you have said there will be new doors to open and new opportunities to experience. Love cant' live on memories, it has to be given away.
Yes, they drift away, but I realize that I, too, have drifted away from many former friends and have no desire to reconnect. It sounds heartless to say that I "left them in the dust", but in reality, that's exactly what happened. I can't share their narrow ways of thinking and unwillingness to face the truth of life's problems. We've all weathered lots of storms in this journey, came out stronger and need different things in life now.
Our "couple" friends started to drift away years earlier as they moved to different locations for starting new jobs, being near grandkids, etc. What caught me by surprise was the unwillingness of DH's family to even call or visit, much less offer support in more concrete ways. They have all but disappeared, EXCEPT now that their children are facing their own milestones (marriage, new babies, etc) we are all of a sudden on the invite list. They have a pretty good idea that we will be unable to attend, so it appears that all they want is the gift.
One of the biggest surprises is that neighbors with whom we've not really ever had a relationship, have stepped up and call to see how we are and if they can help in any way. One night our next door neighbor was wandering in our back yard...I asked him if there was a problem.. He said he was just checking to make sure DH was home - he thought he'd seen him outside and was worried because it was late at night. I am grateful.