I [40M] am starting to hate my father [68M] as he declines... not sure how to even handle this

Throwaway account.

My dad has been in physical and cognitive decline for a number of years now. My parents moved several years ago to be closer to us as they get older. My mom is in reasonably good health, my dad... not so much. He has a lot of health problems, and it's clear they're starting to take their toll. He seems to have some sort of dementia or maybe even Alzheimer's, and he deals with a lot of physical pain.

He's always been a little confrontational, but for most of my life he's been an awesome dad and took care of his family. But for the last year or two he has been increasingly nasty to my mom and my wife, especially when I'm not there. He treats them like dirt and can sometimes be downright cruel verbally to my mom.

I recognize that this is due to the cognitive decline and pain and it's not his fault. But it's becoming increasingly hard to excuse his behavior. I realized tonight I'm actually starting to hate him on some level.

Ideally we would be able to put him into memory care or some other long term care facility, but he has zero insight into his issues. To him, he's the only sane one and the rest of us are out to get him, and I worry putting him into memory care would completely ruin our relationship. He's terrified of that, and is very paranoid about us conspiring behind his back.

There's a part of me that just wishes he would die, most of it because I hate seeing him suffer, but some of it because he's just not my father anymore. He's a mean, sometimes even cruel old man, and it's hard to reconcile that with the father I grew up with. I know it's a horrible thing to say, and I hate myself for even typing this.

I don't really know where to go from here. It's killing my mom; she is so stressed out and she's doing everything she can, but it's never enough for him. Just looking for anyone who's been through something similar who may can offer some suggestions.

TL;DR: Father is going through severe mental decline and its making him treat the rest of the family like garbage. Very much getting sick of it, even though I know it's ultimately not his fault.

Submitted September 01, 2020 at 08:49PM by Capital_Economist_92 https://ift.tt/2F03Kjq