u/Mandible_21

My body is physically screaming for the comfort and safety that my ex partner provided me and I’d give up a limb to feel that right now, even though I know it’s not an option. I’m trying to accept these feelings of desperately wanting co-regulation with a person I simply can’t have it with.

I am a big proponent of actionable accountability and taking action in what you can control. But what do you do when you truly lack any control over a situation that is eating away at you?

Long and short of it, my Dad was diagnosed with cancer, bleak prognosis but he’s chosen to do chemo. Extending his life, but extending a life he doesn’t grasp. He’ll be living the rest of his days in a nursing home and doing chemo weekly. He thinks he’ll get to return home and to work no matter how much we tell him that’s not an option.

I feel so helpless. My late husband died of cancer in 2023.

I’m trying very hard to accept that I have no control over the situation or his fate and exacting control in the things I do have power over like taking physical care of myself. I’m trying to actually feel my feelings. Not to just intellectualize them, truly identifying, embracing, locating them in my body and sitting with all of it. But I feel like I’m just inching closer to a crash out.

I obviously know that I’m craving a comfort and safety that I once felt with my ex. Not only in his physical presence, but the comfort that I had back then when my Dad wasn’t facing death or rotting away in a nursing home. And I’m reminding myself that even if I could be with him, the feeling would likely be much different.

Is the best course of action to really allow myself to crash out? I’m trying to avoid it but it’s feeling inevitable.

Hit me with some bomb perspective, folks…

TL/DR: How do you prevent an emotional spiral when you’d do anything for a comfort you once knew but can’t go back to? What are some things that make you feel more “in control” over yourself when your practical situation is anything but in your power?

My Dad is one of the most private and emotionally unavailable people I know. He has refused for many years to talk about mortality in general and anything having to do with what he wants when it comes to end of life care.

His dementia has gotten really bad, as in 95% of the things that come out of his mouth are delusions about things that he experienced decades ago. Parties he went to, jobs he’s worked when I was a teen, friends he hasn’t spoken to in years.

We just got a confirmed diagnosis today of multiple myeloma. It’s bad. Like Chemo for the rest of his life bad.

How the heck am I supposed to decide what to do when he has never shared anything about his outlook and wishes with me!?

He is hospitalized right now and can not go back home, but deciding to do chemo will severely shrink his care facility options because most nursing facilities don’t want to take on chemo patients bc of the financial and transportation commitments they’d be making.

TL;DR: How do you bear the emotional burden of making major health decisions for a parent with severe dementia who has never shared a single word about what they’d want their care and life saving choices to be.