Michelle, you are carrying a lot. It’s really weird when a parent stops leading, becomes the child. On my third round through a parent’s end game. My mom maintained her agency to the end, though she got weaker and weaker from the disease that was killing her. She’s my model. My step mom, who was in every important way also my mom, faded into Alzheimer’s, left us long before she died though her physical presence was in the house until the last three months or so. I now take care of my dad, 97, in my home and chafe at the restrictions.

Take care of yourself, if you can, treat yourself to a massage, a counselor, a short vacation. I have had to remind myself time and again that I am not my dad, that though his mental decline scares me (too close to home) and his sometimes whiny dependence constantly irritates me, I don’t have to take his path. Take walks under that glorious sky and reflect on how far you have evolved from your parent’s state, how you have stepped up when you could. Believe me, many sons and daughters don’t step up at all.