Another interesting evening last night.
Mom started asking when we were going home about 8 p.m. I kept telling her that we were home but she would scoff. After a couple of times, she asked, "Why do you keep saying that?" Interesting that she remembered our previous conversations since her short term memory is shot.
After several rounds of explaining that we were home with no success, I decided to turn the tables.
Me: If we aren't home, then where is home? Describe to me where you want to go.
I figured I'd get some form of "the farm" where she grew up.
Instead, I had thrown her for a loop. She was more confused than ever.
Mom: There's something really wrong.
I let it go at that and she dozed off. Then she was talking in her sleep.
Mom: My son is here and if I can't do it myself, I have to get him to help me.
Keen insight into how she thinks. I'm not even sure she identifies me as the son that she is speaking about. Yet she acknowledges that she can't do things and needs to reach out for help.
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My mother kept asking us to take her home to her little house on the boulevard. She never lived in a little house on the boulevard and we never figured it out. One day she whispered to me that she had just found out that she had a son. Why hadn't we told her. My brother, her caretaker, was a bit hurt.
My mom was always asking to go home, especially in the evenings. I'd go round & round with her about "where is home?" and she often answered her address back in Ireland, which she had immigrated from almost 50 years ago. It was so sad that she didn't recognize our family home as her house. She had lived there for almost 40 years and yet it had no meaning to her. She would stand outside our house and look at it blankly. She didn't recognize any of the rooms or furniture inside either.
One day I took her to church and brought her home and was making lunch. She remarked that I was a very nice person but couldn't remember "where she knew me from". I told her I was her daughter. You should have seen the surprised look on her face. She asked if she had other children (yes, 2 others) and then this look of horror on her face set in...she asked if she had ever been married (she was probably thinking to herself that she was some shameful un-wed mother!). I showed her a family picture that was taken a few years earlier and pointed out her husband and children and she had the blankest look I've ever seen. She had no recollection of any part of this time of her life. G*D I went and bawled my eyes out after this. It was a true sign to me that the disease was taking my mom away.
You've been much on my mind here of late- I know the next few weeks and months are going to be a difficult transition for all of you. Not that it counts for much in the grand scheme of things, but my thoughts are with you and yours.
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