My New Worry

I got this email from my mom the other night:

After the ballgame thurs. nite, dad told me when he was giving the photographer info for evan's pics he couldn't remember your or D's names for a bit.  The pics will come to us.  I know you have enough in your own life to deal with, but I'm telling you the following bcause I may need help w/dad & I don't want a phone call to take you by surprise.

I went w/him to his psych appt yesterday & told the dr. what happened while dad was at the restrm.  When dad came in he asked the dr. if I had told him I want to buy a new honda & won't consider a lease (not a word about his memory lapse).  Truth is we decided last sun. to keep the cars we have & had his car towed to the shop because it kept stalling when we tried to take it out.  Dr. Norton got him back on the subject, addressed the fact that he was beligerant w/me & decided to drop Seraquel & add Abilify.  On the way to the lab dad told me never to contradict him again & was very agitated.  He wouldn't calm down, Dr. N was called & he told me that if I couldn't calm dad down he should be taken to the ER for further eval.  I asked dad what dr.  told him about his meds, he said he was upset, couldn't really remember--he guessed take what he was taking before.  I was afraid to drive him, so he was transported & I met him at UMC ER.
ER dr. eval., called Dr. N & they prescribed Clonipan for aggitation & anx.  It may affect memory adversely so it's also diagnostic.  If memory is any worse, calling Dr. N's office next wk. & an MRI will be scheduled.    Clonipan was supposed to make dad sleepy, but he was up at 3 am when I went to bathrm.  He hasn't been back to sleep.

I'll deal w/him as well as I can.

Now for a little background.  My mother is more toxic than a nuclear waste dump.  If you were to meet her on the street, you would never know it.  She'd come across as a nice sweet lady, but for me highly toxic.

My dad had one of these certifiably crazy spells about two years ago.  During that spell, he had my mom arrested for domestic violence.  He was CONVINCED my mom was either going to stab him with a knife in his sleep or get a gun and shoot him.  My mother, with serious arthritis in her hands was going to stab a 300 lb. man to death.  They were leaving in Tennessee at the time and I live in Mississippi.  I had to drive all night to bail her out of jail.  Because she was arrested for domestic, she couldn't go home for two and half months, that's when the next court date was.  Soooo, she moved in with us and promptly became convinced my husband wanted her dead.  Right.

I had already lost my mind from 100 other things going on in my life and this just sent me over the deep end.  Somehow I managed to get through this, but I was broken.  Broken like I hadn't been broken since I was in high school.  

I've been in therapy learning how to keep my mother outside of my electrified picket fence, but she still tries to open that gate.  When she tries to open that gate, I become a mess.  A big fat mess.

Maybe I should wear this sign around my neck every time I see her: