My mother is dying of lung cancer. She drank heavily for years, but now she is sober. The effects of her alcoholism and my father's are still evident, even though she is dying and he is in a nursing home.
My biggest problem with my mother is that even though I also am sick, she expects too much from me. (given my own illness) My mother was a person who was taken care of all of her life and when my father went into the nursing home, I think she expected me to fill his shoes. She would have me running all over the city to do her errands if I let her and I don't anymore now that I am sick. She is still a very difficult person for me to deal with, in spite of the fact that she is not drinking. She is very self absorbed and critical of things that I do or don't do. She is getting harder to love, the sicker that I get, and I don't know quite how to deal with the feelings of guilt that she instills into me to this day.