Where has the guilt gone?

Feeling kinda bad for my brother right now.  He is, I feel, about 3 years behind me in dealing with his feelings about mom.  Not because he is a boy. Not because he is 2 years younger than me (at my age that doesn’t really count).  It is because he has lived 2 hours away for the past 20+ years and has not had to come to terms with how horridly abusive and manipulative my mom can be.

As mentioned before, my mom threatened to kill herself last week.  I am done with her.  She is manipulative and this is her “go to” thing when something goes wrong.  Meanwhile it throws me, DH, my brother and the rest of our little family into a panic or emergency mode.  Well…it DID.  While I admit to having moments of panic, PTSD, anger and a whole slew of other emotions that day…they have not persisted.  I am rather calm about the whole thing and am very well aware that what is to be…will be…and I really have no control over it.  I can only control MY response to it.

So, other than the blog post, and the immediacy of the whole situation, I am feeling fairly sanguine about it.  Mom gonna do what mom gonna do.  I am not responsible for her and will not accept responsibility for her actions.  My brother is in complete agreement but his heart is having a hard time making peace with his head.  He is so angry!

Mom asked us if we can give her 600 dollars (599 to be exact) per month for living expenses so she can go to an assisted living place (American House).  Well, brother-dear and I have been down this road before.  Mom cannot really afford an assisted living home because she requires WAY too much care for it to be fiscally responsible.  She is as round as she is tall. She CANNOT weight bear any weight at all.  She has barely any upper body strength. She does not/cannot toilet herself.  All of this and she has insisted she is “independent” for eons.  Now she wants to go to an assisted lviing facility and just get us to pay an extra 600 dollars/month for incidentals (like diapers).  BALONEY!

My brother and I worked our tushes off a few years ago and mom didn’t have enough money, even if she had an extra 2K/month to be able to afford assisted living!

OK, I think I digress…So my brother is a bit angry, disillusioned, frustrated and sad about mom’s current state.  He did just say “I just wish mom could get to where she is happy and safe.”  But when she requested the extra 600/month I thought he was gonna lose it!  He did call her a couple days later.  He reminded her of a conversation we had last spring when she had asked “How can you help me?” and at that time we made it clear we cannot help her financially and would never be able to.  She told him she didn’t remember that conversation.  After they hung up she sent this text, “Don’t tell your kids how I died”  Oh YA!  And THAT was the straw that broke my brother’s back.  So, in other words, if we don’t give her the money she will kill herself and it is all our fault!  Big-giant-baloney-balls!

My poor brother is so upset and angry.  While I am like..ok, what’s next?  I know, for certain, the choices she makes are … totally … her own choices and I am not responsible for them.  My brother knows this as well but I think he doesn’t believe it as much as I do.  Makes me feel sad but I can’t do anything about that.  I just listen.  As I listened to him just last night I began to wonder…where has the guilt gone?  Sure I feel bad for mom but I really DON’T feel guilty about leaving her to her fate.  There is no sense of, “If only I had…” or “I should have done this and mom’s life would have been better”.  Those were all things I was saying to myself about 5 yrs ago.  I can say I don’t know if I am happy that I don’t feel this way anymore or if I feel a bit sad that I am even more jaded…