Beautiful! I lost my mom to this dreaded disease as well. She didn't know me--and yet, when I took her hand in mine, it didn't matter.There was calm and connection. So horribly painful -- and, of course, we worry that our children may have this same awful experience. Praying for speedy medical research/preferably preventative. Thanks for your beautiful piece -- glad you are finding some peace.
My Mom had a difficult time seeing the good in me, my sister and brother. She was worried how others would judge her throughout her life, most likely stemming from her childhood. In her early 90s elderly dementia set in. My sister and I moved her to a beautiful assisted living facility. It was not long after she was settled there that she forgot who I was. The good news was she thought I was her sister-in-law, a woman she really liked. For 18 months she showered me with compliments instead of criticism. It was strange at first but I just went with the flow and enjoyed seeing her smile back at me during our get togethers.
4
So painfully beautiful. Raw, yet delicate, and filled with such yearning.
2
It’s heartbreaking when you’re talking to your mother, who doesn’t remember who you are. This story was so sentimental. It’s best if we all spend time with our family. The littlest things could be the biggest things you’ll miss. Their smile and laugh will always be there. But their memory of you won’t. When you’re parents want to talk to you, but you ignore them because you’re of your phone can be the biggest regret people have. Hating yourself for never telling the people you love “I love you.” Just the simple things. Wanting to talk to your grandparents after all those years of ignoring their invitation to a phone call conversation, to find out they are no longer walking on this world. When my mother calls me through the phone, she always asks how I’m doing, and if I have eaten breakfast yet. I always try to end the conversation to continue watching Tv. Biggest mistake. No, I didn’t lose her, thankfully. By biggest mistake, I mean I always get nightmares of her passing. I always chose to ignore them. Thinking it was just a dream, and nothing much. Just my mind messing with me. I starting putting more thinking into it after reading this story. I’m terrified one day I hang up on her, can be the last words I hear from her. I want to make the days last when I’m with her now. We should not take anything for granted, just because we see them everyday.
2
"When My Mother Forgot Me" not only shows us how the narrator felt when her mother actually forgot her, but how it was progressively happening over time. Perspective has been a big a part in these articles I have read over the summer. Relating to the article in which we see how astronauts try to adjust back to their normal lives after years up in space. In this case in this article, we see how a daughter may be affected with a mother with Alzheimer's. This article was also one of the most touching as a "Mother-Daughter relationship is often times unbreakable in most situations.
1
It's amazing how much familial love is innate in humans. “You are so wonderful,” she said. “I love you so much.” I mean, this woman didn't truly know who her daughter was anymore, but knew she had an unbreakable, loving bond with her. It's just more proof that blood is thicker than water. No matter how much it may seem that your family has it out for you, or gets on your nerves, the majority of the time, they really do love you. They might have problems you don't know about, or they might just not be very good at showing that they love you.
You only get one family, and the relationships you have with your relatives are the most important and fulfilling relationships you will have. And even if there are members of your family who are holding you back, or who don't have your best interests in mind, there are other members who will love and cherish you. Life is too short to hold grudges against your family. Neither you, nor they will be alive forever. Love each other while you can. It'll make you and everyone else in your family much happier at the end of the day.
1
This article interested me because Mrs. Neuman appeared to me as a daughter who is very supportive. I can only imagine what unbearable pain she went through to see her mother's memory come and go. She talks of her mothers memory as flaking off and flying away. This article showed me how we must look at our mothers not as invincible but rather people like us who will one day need our help. I envy Mrs. Neuman as she is a prime example of a compassionate daughter who is willing to lose herself to save her mother.
1
I was grasped by the love this daughter had in her heart for her sickly mother. Yes, I believe we would all tend to our own mothers if they fell ill one day. Although, I would rather reject the notion of my mother not being invincible than believing she could suffers so much that she forgets moments in her life. I credit Kate Neuman for being supportive of her mother in her darkest hour. Not only was her mother suffering from this disease, Mrs. Neuman must have been traumatized knowing anyway that her mother might forget her daughter's name. I envy Mrs. Neuman not only for writing this article but as well as being a prime example of the true love a daughter has for her mother.
1
Those of us who are already members of this awful club (people whose parents have or had dementia) know the almost unspeakable pain that comes with it. My siblings and I don't always get along, but at least we have each other to share the experience and keep alive our own precious memories of the exceptionally kind and brilliant people are parents were. I worry about my daughter, who I adopted by myself and who has no siblings. I'll probably get dementia too, and she'll have to face that by herself. I hope she'll at least have a few very close and supportive friends.
6
This is heartbreaking. My Mom also has Alzheimer's although not so far along yet.
When we, as a society, decide to put real substantial resources into looking for treatments and cures for a disease we have successes. Compared to what the U.S. (not to mention all nations combined) spends on military defense I am always surprised at the small amount we spend on eradicating diseases. The slim possibility of being killed by a terrorist can inspire us to spend trillions but the all-but-certain fate of being taken by disease (and usually one of only a handful of diseases) doesn't motivate us to nearly the same extent. In my mother's case she is in very fit physical condition, she's very active, and were it not for the Alzheimer's I expect she'd live well into her 90s (She is 80 now). It is true when people describe it as a most cruel disease. When someone in good health (from outward appearance anyway) wishes to continue living their life and their ability to think and remember is being taken piece by piece it really is tragic.
I wish the we, as a society, would recognize diseases as the attackers that they are (often caused by organisms too small to see with the naked eye.) When we realize we are being attacked we mobilize & fight back with enough force to win. I believe the way we view diseases as just things that happen leads us to simply accept them as inevitable in a way similar to how grazing herds view predators when banding together they could overwhelm the predator
3
There are different ways to lose the ones you love. Not better, not worse, only different. My oldest sister took us each summer from the time I was 6 until I was 18. I knew and loved her in-laws. Her mother-in-law had two bouts of lung cancer, with a year between them. There was time to know what was coming and to say and do the things you wanted known and done before she passed. Her sister-in-law got ALS. In the time she had left, she spent her family's life savings and alienated her children from her husband. They still don't speak. Her father-in-law lived a quarter-century without his wife, and passed away at the homestead they built starting in 1940 at the age of 101. Her son died in the basement of their house on a Saturday morning at the age of 23, for no cause the coroner could determine. Different, but no less difficult, were all these passings.
My father-in-law was diagnosed with dementia and bladder cancer at about the same time. He figured there was no point to saving his life if he was going to lose his mind, so he left the cancer untreated. As hard as that was, he recounted stories that amazed and delighted my wife, who was sure that without the cognitive decline, he would have taken those stories to the grave.
Our kid's godmother's parents both got Alzheimer's. He got the mean kind. She visited her mother, who asked who she was. In disbelief she said "You aren't my daughter. You are old and ugly, and my girl is beautiful."
Different and hard.
5
@Nick67Truly, there is always something worse.
The year my mom forgot my birthday was the year I stopped celebrating my birthday. It's been over ten years since she died (and the incident was ten years before that), but it's still hard to receive birthday greetings and know that our connection was cut short.
2
I lost my mother when she was in her early eighties and I was in my early forties. Given family longevity, I'd expected to have her longer. Hers was a fast demise, just a few weeks from diagnosis to surgery to death. It seemed so unfair, too soon, too unprepared. Now, watching others watch slow and agonizing deaths, I am grateful that she was spared a long twilight of not being herself. She would have hated that.
11
My mother suffered from dementia as well - it was probably a 10 year journey altogether. However, I refused (maybe to protect myself) to believe that my mother did not know me...it was just that she couldn't always communicate it. There were many times I saw her be (even briefly) "clear" or she would comment on things and be totally on track, so I chose to believe that I wasn't always with her during those moments which I know she had. I know I was living in denial, not about her decline, but about a mother not knowing her child. How could that ever be possible? My mother stopped talking about a year before she passed away and when I visited her I carried on conversations (albeit it one-sided) with her like we always did. I chose to believe she knew me and could understand me. I'm not sure either is true, but it was what I needed. She had a grandmother who was considered "mad" and I know that greatly impacted her. One time she told me she felt she was becoming crazy just like her own grandmother.
I have many questions for my mom and dad when we are reunited, however or wherever that takes place. I believe my mother had mental health issues (depression) that were never discussed or acknowledged. I want to hear her story and let her know she never needed to be ashamed, which I believe she was. My dad was always so protective of that in my mother.
Thanks for sharing your story in such caring, loving words.
9
thank you for this beautiful story of loss
7
My x and I shuttled our son back and forth via United. On several occasions (out of well over a hundred flights) they left him asleep on the plane as everyone, including crew, exited. I eventually got to know security so that retrieving him was not a hassle. Even with repeats, every time it happened I had that parental spike of uncertainty -- was he really on the flight? where was he now? Most unpleasant.
5
@LawyerTom
If this happened to my child once I would not send him off alone 100 more times.
2
@Consuelo Sometimes we do what we have to do. We don't know what she did to avoid the same thing happening again - she does say that she got to know security really well.
2
Beautifully written. I've recently lost both parents and appreciate your words of love amidst the loss.
7
An officer in the USAF once told me, "If you want to see a woman as she will be during marriage, look at her mother." I see this as applicable here as I see the special bonds between women and their mothers. I tread lightly on this subject as it is fraught with tremendous hazards.
I would like to ask women to think, how many of them saw themselves in their mother's eyes and tried to live up to that?
I do hope that the answers to that question might lead to more insights.
9
Due to mental illness, and bouts of electro-convulsive-therapy (ECT), my mother went through periods in my childhood and adolescence of not knowing who I was and was often hostile. It was a very weird experience. Decades later, in her dementia, she became kind and sweet, although again she wasn’t quite sure of who I was. On one of my regular visits to the nursing home, she looked at me appreciatively and said “You’re so faithful!” I replied, “You know, I’m your daughter.”
She patted my hand and said something like, “ Well, thank you.” I realized over time that if “mothering” happened between us, maybe it didn’t matter so much in which direction it flowed.
21
The victim of a stroke, my mother left me suddenly 15 years ago. Reading this I am reminded how I was spared the pain of that gradual loss that you describe so touchingly.
14
I’m very sorry that you, and so many others, are going through this. I recently lost my mother. She had Parkinson’s and, towards the end, some dementia. She was so unhappy over the last years that she was never, never happy and she blamed me .... so my mom never forgot me, but she hated me. She blamed me for everything and railed at me, occasionally reversing herself completely and going into paroxysms of gratitude and distressing expressions of extreme love. Our relationship was rocky - I was so hurt by her accusations that I was very angry too before I realized she was making accusations out of confusion. As she died, I apologized for hurting her. I couldn’t make out what she said, but it seemed that she rolled her eyes and made a dismissive comment. And now I will never know.
Dementia is horrible.
22
The 2019 Academy Award nominated animated short film (10 min) called Late Afternoon is a loving depiction of a mother with Alzheimers and her daughter.
7
I miss my mom. Physically she died on November 30. But mentally she began "leaving me" eight years earlier due to dementia.
It was always the two of us. My dad died of cancer four months before I was born. She never remarried. From her I inherited the love of fashion, travel, theater and the joy of reading a truly great book.
Although she'd be left alone, she encouraged me to go away to college, something she never could afford to do - and join a sorority so I'd gain "instant" sisters. After graduation, she financed my move to NYC from Ohio so I could pursue a dream career as a magazine editor.
We talked almost every day. She came to visit. I married and she became a grandmother.
Those memories seem like yesterday. I'm grateful that I have them. Yet fearful that one day, like my mom, I'll lose them.
40
I miss my mom. Physically she died on November 30. But mentally she began "leaving me" eight years earlier due to dementia.
It was always the two of us. My dad died of cancer four months before I was born. She never remarried. From her I inherited the love of fashion, travel, theater and the joy of reading a truly great book.
Although she'd be left alone, she encouraged me to go away to college, something she never could afford to do - and join a sorority so I'd gain "instant" sisters. After graduation, she financed my move to NYC from Ohio so I could pursue a dream career as a magazine editor.
We talked almost every day. She came to visit. I married and she became a grandmother.
Those memories seem like yesterday. I'm grateful that I have them. Yet fearful that one day, like my mom, I'll lose them.
4
This profound piece hits home for me. As others have written here, I also lost my mother to Alzheimer's. You beautifully capture what it is to see one’s mother slip away for good. Before the lights went out, I was also blessed with moments of joy,
Thank you!
12
My mother also died with or of dementia. She forgot almost everyone but her closest family. I used to bring her photo albums when I visited her, hoping to jog her memory, because whereas her present was fairly vacant, her past was somewhat more preserved, as is typical. She looked at pictures of my father, who had died decades earlier, and identified him as her brother, whom she also adored. When she saw a picture of her last husband, with whom she had her longest marriage, she could not remember his name, but did say "he was a nice man." He certainly had been that! It wasn't exactly memory, but in a way, it was.
14
The only 'advantage' of losing a parent o dementia (and I am experienced with this) is that the parent dies a thousand times before their actual death, little by little, so when death happens, the grief is not overwhelming.
31
@Piemonte. So true. When my mother finally died after years of increasing dementia, I was more relieved than anything else. I think she was, too. Everyone assumed I must be grief stricken. Actually, having other people not understand what I actually felt made me feel much more lonely than losing my mother.
Can’t we just make it socially acceptable to acknowledge that people have a variety of reactions when a parent dies?
26
@Piemonte
A good friend wrote me, the day after my mother died this past November after several years of debilitating dementia and physical infirmity, “Don’t feel guilty if you are relieved.” It was such a godsend to read that because I did feel relieved — and guilty. I also worried that my happy memories of her were lost forever in the blur of her suffering, but as they’ve come back I miss who she really was more each day. And that’s a relief too.
8
@Suzenn I so agree w you. My father was total care for my mother for the last 12 years of his life, it was an exhausting existence for her. During the last 18 months he became increasing childlike; he wasn’t anyone I knew and I felt nothing but relief, for him, for my mother, for those of us who were powerless, when he passed away 11 years ago. I told very few people I felt that way though, it seemed disloyal to both of my parents.
2
Shortly after being diagnosed with Alzheimer’s, my grandmother started calling me by mother’s name. Over time, my grandmother called me by her sister’s name—a relative I never met and who died before I was born.
My mother and I did not get along well—as her only daughter, my life never quite measured up to hers and she delighted in reminding me. While she was in the Alzheimer’s Assisted Living facility, I would be sitting with her when other relatives dropped by to visit. She wouldn’t remember people and sometimes talked nonsensically while chuckling softly and smiling sweetly. People would shake their heads sadly and kiss her goodbye. After they left, her demeanor would change as she glanced at me sideways and would sharply answer anything I commented on. Exasperated, I asked, “Do you remember who I am?” She always answered, obviously annoyed at being asked yet again, “My daughter, Nancy!”
So she would called me by my name—but only when no one else was around. When other people were present, she sometimes called me by other names but when it was just the two of us, her eyes would sparkle as she would needle me with my name.
So, of course, no one believed me when I explained that she still had lucid moments. Not even my dad believed me when I said that she still knew my name every single day—since it was always just the two of us when she used it.
And I think she enjoyed her little joke.
21
@Nancy Moon, you know there is something called video. Record the moment, if you want to gather proof. Why let such a mean woman get away with it, bys shaking your own sanity, even if this turns out to be your mother?
Ok, you can call me vengeful, but I don't believe that we have to cut people slack, just because we are related by some trace of blood. There was one aunt on my father's side, and one aunt on my mother's side, both of whom treated my respective grandmothers (paternal side and maternal side) really badly. I know I should have forgiven them for what they did, but I don't have that in me. Somehow I don't feel as guilty as I know I should feel, for holding that grudge.
12
@ tiddle. Your response brought tears to my eyes—it means so much to me to be believed! Thank you!
Yes, I actually did try to record her on my phone. She immediately shifted into her schoolteacher persona and lectured the phone nonsensically before losing her train of thought. Then looked around confused as if wondering what happened to the classroom. The recording doesn’t help prove my claim.
My mother was endlessly described by everyone else as nice and sweet. Maybe I was just her scapegoat or maybe she felt no need to hide her true feelings from me?
At her eulogy, one brother spoke at length about her love of cooking. She detested cooking! She was not a terribly good cook, didn’t enjoy it and positively resented being the one cooking on holidays. Furthermore, she was horrid to anyone in the kitchen while she cooked. As the only girl, I was the one stuck in there. As an adult, I took up running and incidentally discovered the Turkey Trot on Thanksgiving mornings. Finally I had a legitimate (to everyone except my mother) excuse to miss the kitchen preparations and bring a couple of dishes as my contribution. I even ran 5k on holidays when there was no formal 5k event—loved being able to breeze in just before time to eat and miss out on all the kitchen drama. To hear in the eulogy about how she loved nothing more than being in the kitchen whipping up family meals... oh the irony!
18
Our time with our parents is always too short.
They may exit our lives abruptly through a fatal heart attack or slowly through dementia.
We realize there are so many things we forgot to ask and so many new events in our lives that we cannot share.
There can be loneliness there, but if so, it has been part of life since time immemorial and we should not be paralyzed by it.
So rather than dwell on the hole in our lives, we must find peace by growing a little, cherishing the memories we have, and using the lessons learned to build our own lives.
And if you believe in a hereafter, look forward to the time you will meet again and share what you made of your life.
Peace,
-Jim
who did lose his father at age 12 and has lost his mother to dementia in her 90s.
18
How this story touched my heart! I had supported my dad with Lewy Body dementia for the past 4 years and now my mother has Alzheimer's. A dreaded disease however, I have found joy in those moments when there is love and moments of memory. I also find a good sense of humor never hurts either. Thank you for sharing!
21
This is such a beautiful, haunting essay. I look forward to many more from this author -- I love her writing.
15
This is a beautiful piece of writing and a heart-wrenching subject matter. This is almost an unimaginable kind of pain and my heart goes out to the writer and every person dealing with this terrible kind of "forgetting."
What I experienced with my mother was equally as painful. What do you do when your parent experiences a traumatic event, like the death of their spouse under tragic circumstances and all they desire is to die to be with them?
How do you attempt to rally them and convince them that life is precious and worth fighting for? In the end, it's their choice and all you can do is the best you can do.
When the end finally arrives, it's the wreckage and an almost unendurable aftermath that consumes you, until you find acceptance and peace.
16
I brought my mother to live in a nearby assisted-living center in Connecticut when dementia made it impossible to live without care-givers. My sisters and I divided up furniture and carpets from the family home, happy to have the memory-laden objects. When I brought Mom to my house for a meal, she once said," I don't know the people who own this house, but they have a lot of my furniture..."
64
@Anne- When we moved our aunt into an assisted living facility we faithfully recreated her studio apartment, down to the pictures hung and the accessories on her desk. We joined her in the community room where we had left her during the set up and said we were going to accompany her "upstairs" to her apartment. We walked down a hallway to her room and she looked around, sat in her favorite chair and said "they finally put in a new carpet" !
40
Well written. Is it OK to say I enjoyed this piece, when the subject matter is not a happy one?
16
Beautiful.
8
What a beautiful piece of writing!
My tears fall for the author, and for all of us mothers and daughters who know this growing emptiness for this or any other reason.
You touched my soul, Kate Neuman. Thank you.
28
I lost my father, mother, and 72 year old sister to dementia. I was able to be near all of them till the end. It was devastating and I sympathize with everyone who has to go through the trauma of these diseases. I am swimming in the deep end of the dementia gene pool and it concerns me very much. I do not plan to have my family have to live with this trauma if it happens to me.
38
My mother still remembers me and the twins my wife and I never had or ever were going to have but Mom continues to ask. "How are the twins? I bet they are cute as buttons."
Unlike death which brings about a definitive departure Alzheimer's dissolves our parent right before our eyes and in the process sometimes deeply buried fears and dreams float to the surface. It has taken me a long time to reorient myself to this new reality, but now I don't dwell on what has disappeared as much as what is here and how to make the experience as enjoyable as possible for both of us. So "The twins are fine".
50
@ScottInInd
My aunt used to struggle with every conversation with my grandmother. My aunt would loudly (grandma was hard of hearing) insist on explaining who she was, who I was. It was a relief when grandma and I were alone together, because I just wanted to hear her stories. She was a fantastic storyteller. She may not have known who I was, but she remembered many adventures from her youth, and it was a pleasure to experience her childhood along side her. I miss her terribly.
33
My Dad had Lewy Body Dementia so for the last year or so of his life he could not communicate clearly enough for me to know if he really knew who I was or not. He did, however, call me Schatz until the end long after he no longer called me by my name. I chose to see that a sign that he at least knew me as someone he loved.
14
" -- filling in the gaps of her memory with shadows of old truths. " This is a tragic topic but a beautiful and haunting way of expressing it.
21
I am sitting with my father, who can not remember me, as I read this article. Mothers, fathers...it doesn't matter. The loss is so personal and painful. My heart breaks for the fear he faces everyday in the confusion of living without anchors. I can not offer any summary wisdom....
58
I started to write something true but generic. Yet this sort of loss, of the memories and the shared past, is both commonplace and terribly specific. Perhaps all daughters keep looking for what we never received from a mother, until it dawns - with literal death or the absence imposed by dementia, that we had best accept what they - and we - CAN give.
24
As cognitive capacity in loved ones diminishes, I think one of the hardest things we have to do is to train ourselves to accept them as they show up in any given moment, meet them where they are at, and participate in the journey.
They become great time travelers, moving from past to present and back so quickly. It is futile for us to try and hold them in any one place or time.
58
@JBC
I 've learned the same lesson: meet them where the time machine took them, if you can. There is nothing at for them to gain by trying to "orient" them to "reality."
34
@cheryl I think the reason people try to orient loved ones is because they have not faced the truth that they are loosing them. I think they feel helpless and desperately want them to come back.
I watched my husband do this with his mother, it hurt so much to see the trauma he was going through and to see the once lively woman dwindle into nothing. This is a disease that I hope and pray they find a cure for one day soon. It is too horrible to allow to go on. We are only the collection of our memories, if we have none we are no one.
3
@JBC
This is probably the most graceful and lovely thing I have heard. Thank you for posting this comment.
1
Bless your heart. Thank you for so lovingly describing such a terrible disease. I remember when I turned 50 and my mom didn’t remember me but we agreed to pretend that she did.
28
I remember the day that my mother turned to me and said, “ You seem very nice. Do you have children?” When I answered her, mentioning my two boys, she said “ How lucky you are. I was never able to.” She smiled so kindly at me that I thought my heart would burst. You take what you can from this dreaded disease.
125
@Bill M. I'm unable to express just how deeply your comment has affected me this morning, except to say thank you.
37
My mother and her brother both suffered from severe dementia. My uncle was the worst off, he knew NO ONE in his family for about 10 years. Once he hit (hard) one of his daughters when she brought him a glass of water....
My mother was very active, she still drove, belonged to seniors clubs and so on up until late in her disease. Among things she did: bouncing checks all over town, which I had to frantically scramble to cover; leaving the water on the sink until the floors were flooded; taking off her blouse to try on another one on the floor of the store, as opposed to the dressing room....and so on.
Toward the end, when she lived with us (for about 4 1/2 years) she would argue endlessly with me about the "boy" we supposedly (in her mind) competed over in high school.....
Its really NOT all "I love you" and other flowery things! She once threw a box of meds in my face when she was angry with me for some unknown reason....
Its really NOT all "I love you" and other flowery things!
69
@RLiss- Having lost my father to Alzheimer's (2000), then my dear Auntie(2012) and my Mother(2018) to dementia, I know full well the range of behavior that is thrust towards the caregivers. It helped me to understand that the rage was not about me but about their fear and loss of control and to look for both the humor and the tender moments. As time passes the brighter memories prevail.
14
What a gift to have your Mother love you even though she doesn’t “know” who you are. That should be the most liberating, life-affirming and glorious thing.
12
@CC
I dont agree with you. Nothing glorious about it, just pain.....
1
Beautiful insights...thank you
10
Your words are profound, and your writing is why I love to read!
Using your mirror analogy, I can identify with your life. I, too, have grown up using and seeing the same reflections in this mirror. It's as if we have lived the same experience!
The essence of your article captures the fear I fear most! Her death. Whether it's Alzheimer's, cancer, I don't think it's the way she dies. I believe for myself; it's her ultimate dying that overwhelms me at times.
At this moment, she is engaged socially with her friends, active physically with pool exercise classes regularly, and enjoys her supportive family, and periodically attends with preventative her health professionals. Physically, she maintains an ideal weight. Her beauty is truly one of a movie star. We are talking Grace Kelly looks still!
We live close by, and she recently decided to retire her half of the joint business we have had together for 17 years. I believe she has done so because she knows the impact it will have on me when she dies. She has also put more distance between us. And I am going along with this. Why? We both know the pain I will endure someday as a result of her death. What more could a daughter ask for? She is demonstrating her love for me by slowly letting go and letting me live my life more independent of her. I admire this, and our love for each other will never cease even after she dies. I am thankful, feel blessed, and grateful for a mother's undying love for her daughter.
16
A truer thing couldn't be written. The love of a mother is as deep as the ocean & as powerful too. And the loss of recognition is like an earthquake in our lives.
20
Such a poignant journey that you have undertaken. The love is still important even at this late stage.
6
Thank you for this moving essay. The subject of mirroring between mothers and their daughters is very, very important...and not discussed enough.
30
I don’t know where I heard this story, but it sustained me while we cared for my mother.
A therapist who works with dementia patients and their families counseled a woman to stop asking her husband if he knew who she was, because his “no” was breaking her heart. One day she reported that when she entered his room and asked her daily question, his response was “I have no idea, but I know that I love you”.
94
I cannot help but wonder if Alzheimer's is caused by our recent exposure to chemicals and detergents. These are my reasons.
1). Alzheimer's was rare until 1970. After that it increased rapidly and is still. increasing. Something had to change.
2). Twice as many women get Alzheimer's as men and it is women that are exposed to cleaning chemicals and detergents.
3) The blood brain barrier allows oil soluble chemicals to pass into the brain while blocking water soluble ones. To defeat this process detergents or surfactants are added to medications to enable them to pass through this barrier. In this process toxic materials may pass also. It also makes our use of surfactants questionable. ( We add detergents to some ice creams.).
4) It may be that Alzheimer's is not a brain disease but a disease of the blood brain barrier that allows toxins to enter the brain.
If this is true then maybe there is little profit to be made in studying ways to keep the brain healthy. The answer may be a lifestyle change. This leads to little or no research.
18
@Allan
As the population ages this could account for the increase in Alzheimer’s disease. When I was kid in the sixties they used to call it hardening of the arteries when my grandmother could not remember things or acted strange.
39
Oft called senility too ? Research into the causes physiological, lifestyle driven or environmentally related are important beyond blaming detergent. Agree that an ageing society and medicine sees a shift in proportional end-of-life maladies. Even cancer was less common in percentage terms 50 or 100 years ago when life expectancies were shorter. And the chances of survival of a heart attack were lower too.
16
@Allan:
you may be right, but we don't know.
Research into the epidemic of dementia of all sorts needs to be funded in the way research into polio years ago was done, or the research into HIV was done in the 1980's.
As the Boomers age, it will only get worse.
7
My mom had Alzheimer's too. I even wrote about it in a book, "My Mother Has Alzheimer's and My Dog has Tapeworms: A Caregiver's Tale." My mom mostly knew me, but sometimes that wasn't a blessing, but a curse, in that she'd yell at me for having no control over certain things, like the weather. This article mentions mirrors. My mom couldn't recognize herself in one. It's almost as if she could say, "Mirror, mirror on the wall, I don't recognize you (me) at all." She, too, envisioned having a current job offer in NY, (where she grew up). Funny enough, she wanted to tell someone (here in Atlanta) that she had to pound the pavement, looking for a job (an accounting job) in NY after college, but what she said was, "I walked the streets of NY, if you know what I mean." My mom might have been a sweet talker, but she wasn't a street walker. I only hope that soon, Alzheimer's can be a memory, (one that I'd like to forget).
13
I also lost my mother to dementia. She wasn't a very good mother but did the best she could with what she had. However, in her last years I learned to love her so much -- somehow it all worked out. And my husband was so wonderful to her that when we would visit she would look at him and say. "I don't know you but I think I like you." It was terribly sweet. She would also look at me and say, "You look like me." And I did and I do.
83
Beautifully written, thank you. You reminded me of my mom who I lost similarly. Made me cry.
22
Thank you for writing one of life’s toughest stories concisely, precisely, lovingly and longingly.
I know it’s not over, but I hope the hardest part is. As you continue your writing, you might want to visit “Losing My Mind” by Thomas deBiaggio, a very accomplished Alzheimer’s victim from whom I learned much.
Hugs to all,
Francesca
20
Your writing is stunning, Kate, and I'm so sorry for your loss.
35
Beautiful but sad. It brought back a memory: my mother turning to me in a supermarket and asking, “You know, I have such trouble with names. What’s your name?”
40
A thoughtful and gracious memoir. And sad. I am glad you are moving forward in your life in a way that is good for you and your son.
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