A journey through my mother’s dementia.
This is hard to type. After my granddaddy died with Alzheimer’s twenty-something years ago, I’d prayed this disease would never darken our family’s doorstep again. Watching my vibrant, healthy granddaddy whither slowly away was one of the hardest things I’d ever experienced in my thirty-nine years. The funny thing is even at the end of his life, he knew who I was. Just a week before he died, he told his nurse that ‘Patty is my granddaughter and a nurse. She’ll take care of me.’ It was a comfort to be remembered.
We’ve not been as fortunate with my mom. The first time I realized she thought I was someone else, it felt like someone had taken a sledgehammer to my chest. The shock of it shuddered all the way down to my nerve endings, and for a moment, I couldn’t breathe for the pain.
Momma and I have always been very close, more friends than mother/daughter. We never had the kind of drama most mothers and daughters have, and rarely argued. We had the kind of relationship others envied. When I moved to Michigan, Momma cried as if she’d lost her best friend, and I felt the same way. The truth is we loved being with each other.
And now, she doesn’t remember who I am.
I understood I’d lose her in pieces, that each visit would bring another loss. But this is more than just being erased from my momma’s memories. It’s a reminder of another painful time a long time ago. But I lived through it and came out stronger because of it.
Another thought. How is all this for Momma? How scared she must be, being surrounded by people she doesn’t recognize? How hard it must be for her? If this separation is painful for me, what must she feel?
