No one could have prepared me for the day my mother became my child. The very day my stepfather, Roy, passed away was the day our worlds collided. It was a warm, sunny July day when Roy breathed his last breath. Mom, I and his 3 daughters were in the Surrey Memorial Hospital at his bedside. After his passing we stayed for about a half hour, all of us weeping, trying to comprehend what the future held. All of us with different thoughts and feelings.

As I led Mom away from his room and we made our way to the car she said “Have we had the funeral yet?” This was the beginning of a 6 month journey into hell with me as the caregiver of a woman I no longer knew.

Both Roy and I knew that Mom was suffering from dementia. She had been diagnosed while he was alive. She was in denial and it was not something we spoke to her about. I don’t know if Roy was covering for her while he was alive or if she was sent further into the depths of dementia with the shock of his passing.

I stayed with Mom for several days. She was incapable of thinking or acting rationally so I was forced to become “the boss”.  I found myself constantly telling her what to do and how to do it and correcting her at every turn. She rebelled like a teenager and there was simply no way to talk logic with her.

While Roy was in the hospital I had been driving us to and from the hospital. She drove us one day and I realized her license needed to be taken away and that she needed to be forced off the road. It was heart wrenching. You cannot tell a person who is in denial that they cannot drive anymore. I had to tell her that she couldn’t afford to keep her car and I had to take the car away. This left her with no vehicle to get around. She lost her husband and her freedom and the life she knew all in a day. It also became the beginning of telling her many lies, regarding her car and license. I later came to understand this is called “therapeutic lying” or “emotional truths”.

It was 6 months of the worst kind of role reversal imaginable. Mom was helplessly lost and I was hopelessly lost trying to run her life and mine. She was becoming a danger to herself. One of her new found activities was wandering the streets of Whalley looking for a boyfriend. Whalley is the heart of downtown Surrey, BC. I was constantly afraid for her well-being and her safety.

Finally, I came across the Alzheimer’s organization online. I participated in a family care-giving session that surely saved me. I learned a new language. A care-giver’s language:

I stopped arguing with Mom
I stopped trying to correct her
I stopped trying to make her be the Mom that I knew and that she no longer was
I thankfully learned how to communicate with her

I’m happy to report that, after 6 months, I got her moved to an assisted living facility near my home. She was very angry with me and very unhappy for several weeks until she met “the boyfriend” she had been wandering the streets looking for. He too suffers from dementia but neither of them know it. She is no longer lonely. She’s eating 3 meals a day in the dining room with her new beau. She’s put some much needed weight back on. They go out and walk his dog several times a day and they spend most of their time laughing about the same things over and over. They now live together and are both very happy.

Me, I’ve got my life back. For now. Dementia is an ugly demon and I don’t know how long the current situation will last. In the meantime, I regularly attend Alzheimer caregiving sessions for adult kids of parents with alzheimers. I gain valuable insight into handling situations and it’s great to share with people who understand.

Please share your Alzheimer stories with me.

Tags: alzheimer, alzheimers, caregivers, caregiving, dementia