How much trouble can a person tolerate without breaking down?

[Sabine Klare]

I think, The Bitchlist is the right place...
It was time for a new thread, and I don't think, I'm the only one person in this world, who is suffering so much...
The German translation of "How much trouble can a person tolerate without breaking down?" is "Wieviel Probleme kann ein Mensch vertragen, ohne zusammenzubrechen?"...
I am filled with so much stress, no one can believe that. I've also posted in this thread, and You can scroll down to my latest post:

http://forums.winamp.com/showthread.php?t=156419&page=35

But the topic has become too especially for the other thread...
If someone else is in a similiar situation and feels, a breakdown could come very soon, if the stress becomes too big, so big, that it is incredible, then I think, this is the right thread for that...
Feel free to post here...
Greetings from Sabine Klare Aka Sternenmaschinebine

[swingdjted]

I'm under some stress, but not to any level where it's harming anything, currently speaking at least.

I've had some really horrible things happen to my family and me, some of which I have talked about on Winamp forums, some not, but luckily I'm ok for now.

Posting here gets me subscribed, and hopefully I'll be able to read up on how you're doing and maybe occasionally offer a helping hand, or at least a shoulder to lean on and an ear to listen.

[rockouthippie]

You can take a lot. If you're worried about cracking up, you're probably ok. Eat peach pie and ice cream. It's hard to crack up when you are eating peach pie.

[swingdjted]

Well, true, because the peach pie does the cracking up for you.

[rockouthippie]

My sister is having one of these times right now. Her house burned down. The insurance company is fucking with her and her husband is having heart problems and likely isn't gonna live very much longer. He's only 50.

If that doesn't push you over the edge... like I said... we can take a lot.

[Sabine Klare]

The insurances earn through regular receipts, but if they have to pay, they don't want. The supervisor of my mother herself doesn't have results yet from the 3 insurances after the fire in June. Many things got lost in this fire, and then my mother had been thrown out of the leased apartment, which meant the next loss...
Yesterday I've visted her in the hospital, she is stable and hopefully she will be brought back into the nursing home this week. The blood values had not been in order before the briefing to the hospital...
Spring 2002 the authorities of my husband's grandmother had forced us to do many things for her many times per week, for so many weeks until her death. We had told these authorities, our own health (of us both) is very bad and we cannot do these things, but they had ignored these facts and they had forced us again. Summer 2002 I had my nervous breakdown. I myself had caught aid, I got 3 and a half months for a full-time therapy, but I had always slept at home. It was a terrible time for me, and I cried a lot. Not feeling my arms and legs properly anymore, not being able to walk and speak properly anymore, it was not very nice for me, and these symptoms had lasted for one year long, because the next problems came. Also the death of my father was in that time (6th March 2003), he had suffered in his last weeks very much, and I was so helpless, because we could do nothing anymore. After his death my mother came 10 weeks later into the hosptital for 2 and a half months, because she had fallen at home and broken her hand, also her diabetes had become worse. But Finally Summer 2003 I began to feel better again. And You can imagine, why I never want a nervous breakdown anymore...
You know now, why I've choosen this topic...
All the best also for Your families...

[fc*uk]

Sorry to hear this Sabine... hopefully this has improved for you.

You seem to be dealing with much of the same stress I was/am having to deal with in regards to my father.

People can handle a lot. Just remember to take some time out for you as well. You will get through it, this is only temporary...

[Sabine Klare]

Thank You, fc*uk...
Yes, I am wondering, why I didn't break down again until now. Maybe I can handle much more and much better than 10 years ago...
I think, it will last again 1 1/2 - 2 years, before maybe my life can become a little bit better again. I hope, it will be only temporary...
A doctor had examined in the summer my mother and discovered, her short-term memory does not work anymore. In May, I would not have noticed something, but now I see it clearly, and more of it. How fast are these changes? Will it last a few weeks, a few months, a few years? She cannot really remember anymore, only a little bit, that I had played my music-videos (WMV) in June, when I was in her apartment for 3 days and 2 nights. And if she calls me and gets me finally at the telephone after so many tries, then she wants, that I should call her back, although she has me already at the telephone and speaks with me...
But I don't want to think of a next funeral now (with my husband's or my own mother)...
I should take some time for me and not work too much. Sleeping and dreaming is very good, also the music at home and outside and also some selected talks with some people (but I don't mean the many telephone calls of my mother each day now)...

[rockouthippie]

No. It isn't really temporary. It will always be something. I try to proceed with an attitude of gratefulness, even if it is only for peach pie. I lost my mom last year after a protracted illness and I got worn pretty thin. But I loved my mom and that means you gotta take the good with the bad.

I found out that if I kept my mind on being grateful for what I had, even if it was kinda meager sometimes, I felt better and acted better.

It's kinda stupid to say "It could be worse", but it could. Is the glass half empty or half full? If it isn't half full, lie and say it is. Existence is a very subjective thing. Try to get some exercise and eat right. You get worn down and kinda neglect yourself when you're in one of these things, but try not to.

You might be beat to shit, but you still got a gig to do. People that actually crack up don't ask questions like "How much can a person take?", they just crack up.

People are pretty durable.

[Sabine Klare]

I am afraid, You could be right, rockouthippie, that it could be not only temporary, but then I will never escape...
My husband's mother will be transferred to short-term care in a nursing home, but maybe she will stay there forever (I am afraid), and she doesn't have enough incomes to pay that. Then the authorities will interrogate my husband and me to verify our own incomes, but they cannot force us to pay, because we don't have enough incomes. They always verify the incomes of the childern and their partners, and if at least one of the children (as an adult now) or his/her partner will have enough incomes, then that child (adult) will be forced to pay for the nursing home. Another woman had been forced by the authorities to sell her car, because her grandmother had been brought into the nursing home...
Funerals have to be payed by the children, too (a new law since 2004), whether they have the money for that or not. Painkiller for cancer must be paid by the own incomes, and suddenly that person or the whole family can get debts...
I do not know if they come to pry into our apartment, and then we cannot refuse that. But that would be a invade in our privacy, and we have our rights for our private life. We don't have so much, but we want to keep the less things, which we have. Nobody is allowed to take us away these things, which mean so much for our life...
We don't want to get debts, but we can be dragged into debts. Maybe I am in the "end-of-the-world-mood" now, maybe not. We could also have a little bit luck and my husband's mother could come home, for now. And after so much destinys I am expecting also some luck now...
An actress in Germany decided to go into her own death this year with only 42 years, because she got no more orders in the movie business, and she didn't know how to pay the next rent for her leased apartment. In the Eighties she had become very famous in a TV-serial. But suddenly the movie business wasn't interested in her anymore, and she didn't get incomes anymore...
I am not so famous, but I am alive...

[rockouthippie]

If a tree don't fall on me, I'll live till I die

[Sabine Klare]

Yesterday I had a telephone talk with the supervisor. She had seen the TV-news with the fire report from 2012. The year 2012 was the year with the most burnt houses and apartments, in no other year so many houses and apartments had been destroyed by a fire. A very good girl-friend from us had lost her house by a fire in November and the brother of a further friend had lost his house in December...
The house management could have terminated the lease agreement with my mother also due to odor nuisance, if there wouldn't have been the fire in June. Noise pollution is another reason to terminate a lease agreement, our own neighbors above have suddenly moved out, after they had their very loud washing-machine running each night. The incontinence of my my mother has become much worse in May, she had severe diarrhea on the day, when she had fallen at home on the carpet. The nursing home should finally repair the windows in her room, each visit is painful for me. Mostly I have to go away earlier than I had planned. I say "I have to go home now", and then I leave the room and I run to the balcoon behind the community space. I get already a nausea, if I think about it, and I don't want to vomit...
In July the official doctor has discovered an age dementia, when he examined my mother. The supervisor has told me, my mother will not recognize her own children anymore some day, it can happen in a few months or years. Some other old people can also become very aggressive, an old man had pelted each visitor with objects in his last months. But in this case I would strike very soon...
I cannot tell my friends "I want to make a big tour with You next weekend". The next terrible telephone call can come everytime, maybe I have to go somewhere else at short notice, and then I have to cancel my plan with the tour. I have to live with that for many weeks, months or years. But if I make a visit in a hospital and the weather is very good, then I can stop at a station near a lake on the way home, of course. I had visited a lake 3 times in May, the third time I walked around the lake. I know the lake since more than 40 years now. In my childhood there were also therapy horses near the restaurant at the lake, last year I didn't see them anymore. Long tours are not possible for me anymore for a very long time, but maybe short tours, although I cannot plan a tour. Then it must be very spontanously...

[rockouthippie]

This sounds like my life until about a year ago. Just do the best you can. If you mess it up, and you will, don't feel too bad. Chances are nobody would have done any better.

You sound like you are coming to a point pretty soon where nothing you do will matter. I came to that point with my mom. She got so messed up she didn't know who I was anymore. I couldn't get a smile out of her anymore. And you find out those emergencies you dealt with for so many years aren't emergencies anymore. That has it's own bit of pain. That what you do doesn't really matter anymore. That was hard for me. I came along and saved the day so many times. Then one day it didn't matter. It might have been the hardest thing feeling helpless and wishing for a time when I could make a difference.

If it helps, I think God has some mercy on us when we are really ill. I know some times when my mom enjoyed really poor health, she didn't remember it or feel it at the time. I really think a lot of times it looks worse than it is. I know my mom didn't feel as bad as she was. Her end looked horrible. I don't think she felt it much.

You can be your own worse enemy in a situation like this. You're going from a situation where you are making a difference to a stage where it doesn't matter. Recognize that and re-prioritize. You could start fixing all those things in your own life you didn't have time to do.

[Sabine Klare]

I had always hoped, my mother would never get an age dementia. I myself don't want to die with an age dementia or a terrible disease, if I myself am also very old some day. That must be very terrible for the old persons, but also for their children. My father didn't have an age dementia, but he had parkinson for a very long time (23 years). In his last weeks he wasn't able to speak anymore, and he had bedsores, before he died at home (with 74 years, a half year before his 75th birthday). There are many other terrible diseases in this world, and also younger people can get a terrible disease and die, not only old people...
I have many questions about my childhood. Last May I had asked my mother many times, when she was in the hospital the first time, because she had broken her shoulder at home. And she had known the most details of my childhood. Now it has become more difficult. I can still ask, for now, but I should ask in these days, because maybe I will not get an answer anymore very soon...
My own childhood... My life was in danger until before my 2nd birthday. A doctor had discovered an embryonal mistake in my body, and an OP had saved my life. The hospital was a trauma for me, I got many therapies in my childhood, and with 4 and a half years I had spoken my first word. After my 7th birthday I came to the first school with a special pedagogy. The school was very good. A teacher had managed our class from the 4th class until the 6th class. He had a very good quality. After the 5th class my mother had forced me to change the school, although I wanted to stay at the same school until after finishing the 6th class. The 6th class in the other school was also very good, although the teacher was very strict, she had punished a child with an extra homework also, if the child didn't pay attention in the lesson, she yelled at each of us very often. But the other children in the 6th class were very social and without prejudices. Then I came to the high school. There were 2 7th classes, and the director had put me into the worse class, although I wanted to be put into the better class. And "The Hell on Earth" began for me for the next 6 and a half years... Oh yes, my childhood was much better than my youth...
My parents didn't abuse me. The teenagers had abused me for 6 and a half years. I learned to know also a few adults, who had been abused by one of their parents or both. My parents were not so strict like some other parents of some other children, maybe my father a little bit more than my mother, but not so much. As a teacher in another high school he was in stress very much, and then he wanted his silence (a little child cannot always understand that, of course). It was very hard for me to experience the psychotic phases of my mother, mostly she had to be brought into a hospital (she had been forced). For a child it is very terrible, if a trusting person is suddenly a whole other person. Also her aunt, her sister and her niece were in a hospital many times (I don't know, what had happened to the 2 children of her nephew, after they have become adults). A psychotic phase must be terrible also for the person himself/herself (I know many such people). Fortunately I had never a psychotic phase. I had only a nervous breakdown in Summer 2002 (which was also very terrible)...
I am trying to do the best. What else should I do?...

[swingdjted]

@RoH - I liked your video.

@SK - One of my dad's friends fooled us about a month ago. We were at a restaurant, and in the middle of a story he was telling us, he just stopped to think for a moment, and then said, "Damn CRS is acting up again". My dad just sorta smiled and nodded, and seeing that, I figured he knew whatever CRS was, but since it was still silent a couple seconds later, curiosity got the better of me, and I finally asked, "What's CRS?" He replied "Can't Remember Shit".

I can't believe I made it this late in life without ever hearing someone say that, because when I laughed about that, my dad seemed surprised that I hadn't heard that line before.

My parents and their friends are in their late '70s. Some of their friends are really falling apart, mentally and physically. On the other hand, my parents seem to be more active then even I am.

I think their secret is to always be busy. If you're too busy with something, you don't really have time to dwell on bad events. It's still important to help and support people who need it, but only to a degree where it's not needlessly hurting you.