I feel like such a monster right now, like legit the WORST human, and it’s making my stomach hurt just typing this out. So my mom, she’s… a lot. And she’s getting older, like way older, and it’s just getting… intense. She lives in her own place still, kinda, but it’s more like I live there too, but I don’t, if that makes sense? I’m there ALL THE TIME. Bringing her groceries, taking her to doctors, making sure she eats, which she doesn’t really want to do half the time. And she calls me like, twenty times a day. If I don't pick up the second it rings, she calls my sister, my cousin, my old neighbor, literally ANYONE to find out where I am and if I'm okay. Is that normal? Like, for a grown-up? Cuz I’m like, sixty, I was a teacher for FORTY years, I taught actual kids how to read and write and stuff, and now I feel like I’m in detention all the time. She always has something she needs, always. And if I say I can’t, even if it’s for like, five minutes, she gets this look, like I’ve personally murdered a puppy right in front of her. It’s draining. I’m just so tired, all the time. And this is the BAD part, the part that makes me wanna delete this whole thing and just pretend I never thought it. I was looking up assisted living places. Like, real ones. Not just like, senior apartments, but places where they actually help you with stuff. And I felt this… relief? Like, a little tiny spark of it. And then the guilt hit me like a freaking truck. My mom! My mom, who raised me and did everything for me and made me go to college even when I just wanted to chill and be a musician or whatever dumb thing I thought I wanted to do back then. How can I even THINK about putting her somewhere? It feels like I’m abandoning her, even though she can barely walk by herself and sometimes forgets if she ate breakfast or not. And she’d HATE it. She’d be SO mad. Like, what kind of awful daughter even considers that? Is that totally messed up? I just keep picturing her face if I ever even brought it up. The disappointment. The "how could you." And I just freeze. I can’t even imagine having that conversation. But then I think about myself, and like, I retired, right? I was supposed to have time to do stuff, like read books, maybe join a pottery class, finally learn how to use that air fryer my niece got me for Christmas. But I can't. Because I'm always doing something for my mom. And I know it sounds selfish, I know it does. But sometimes I just wanna scream, you know? Like, just get one day, ONE DAY, where I don't have to worry about her or what she needs or if she's lonely. This city is already so much, everyone's always rushing, and I just feel like I'm drowning in all these obligations and I can't even tell anyone because it's MY MOM. My sweet old mom. And I'm just this terrible, selfish person who wants a break.