Dear Ginger,
Thank you for sharing. Unfortunately, I also understand.
Here are two examples from my life that made me shake my head in amazement ...
My father developed dementia near the end of his life. He was placed in a nursing home. After decades of hardly ever seeing him, I would visit every month just to make sure he was okay. During one of my visits, he started to express regrets for the life that he lead (he drank his entire life and basically died penniless). He then started to blame my mother, his ex-wife. They had been divorced for 37 YEARS, but in his opinion if she had stayed with him he would have been able to turn his life around. I did remind him that she waited 16 years for him to turn his life around.
Another example involves my mother. When my dad finally died, I held a small memorial service for him in the church he went to as a child. The service was less about him and more for me, my siblings, and my children. When my mother found out she was furious at me. She berated me over the phone for over an hour. How could I do this to her?!? She called me thoughtless, cruel, and blamed me for making her think about my father again. She said some pretty awful things and when I started crying she accused my of "turning on" fake tears.
My way of coping with undeserved blame/anger is to try and not take it personally. My parents were both dysfunctional in their own way. They have a lot of repressed angry and regrets. All this energy needs to go somewhere and unfortunately I was the lightening rod too many times. It has absolutely nothing to do with me. If it wasn't me, I'm sure that one of my siblings would have experienced it instead.
It doesn't make it right, but somethings it makes it easier for me to handle.
Hugs,
db