How often do you visit her? How about her mother? Other relatives? I can’t imagine what it’d be like to be 35—in the prime of life!— and living in a group home, especially if my disability was physical and not developmental or mental. I can imagine it’d be awfully lonely and depressing, kind of like prison. I’m not judging you because clearly you have a conscience, but, just imagine if the roles were reversed. Maybe you could be her advocate? Sometimes if we change the way we look at a situation and go all in, instead of trying to avoid it, it can change us for the better. BTW: Your feelings are totally legitimate, but you are not your feelings! What you’re feeling does not make you a mean person; it makes you human.

I totally agree, however (here goes the big however) I also have to care for my 99 year old mother (doctor appointments, grocery shopping, errands, etc) and I myself have quite bad arthritis and would love to have a knee replacement but really need to wait until my mother is no longer living otherwise I cannot help her. My niece lives 45 minutes away and I used to take my mom to meet up with her and my sister (her mother) but it is difficult now. We get together about 20 times a year for holidays and other activities.

I do most of the caregiving for our mother since my sister had my niece to visit. She herself says she dreads the phone calls because it’s really hard to keep a conversation going. I think too the mindset of my niece is not the same as other people. She lives in a different world than non-handicapped people and does not understand that you cannot call a person five times a day. She is not mentally handicapped but just has a different understanding of life.

Just St venting I guess. No goid andwer here. One of her brothers is actively disinterested to the point of not wanting to hear about her and the other does his best even though he has his own family.

Maybe make arrangements to share some of your day with her via FaceTime. Move the screen to the table so that she can see you feeding the toddlers and interacting with your mother. Schedule a time when you will call her when you are sitting down doing something else. Do you have a headset phone? I know the time won't be long but it might give her something to look forward to and not require your full attention.

First of all, I am sending you a huge, huge virtual hug. And I think tqtqttbw has a good idea. If your niece can just see her loved ones, that could be of help to her. Perhaps the toddlers would like to show her what they are playing with. If your mother is able, she might wave hello, or tell her what's for lunch. Set yourself a designated window of time, and don't respond to calls outside that window. Instead, ask your sister to check in with her daughter in the evenings. Suggest that some routine in the calls will ultimately be more soothing. If your niece can be made confident that she can spend time with her family on a regular basis, the need for hyper dialing is more likely to recede. Blessings on your entire family.

i would do several things: talk to the group home, is she being social there? are there activities she could/should be involved in? give her and yourself structure on when you can talk with her and when you can't, if you know you'll be "busy" on saturday, tell her so tell her you can talk between 8 and 8:30 i have a friend who has stage 4 breast cancer and has very few friends and her father died last year...i hear from her daily from 6:30 am to 11 pm and it is very wearing.... but she is a perfectly normal??? person who is still working full time and after almost 4 years of constant "conversation" i'm about tapped out.. do not feel guilty just set up some perimeters....