New Post about Mom

Dementia is an interesting thing. And by interesting I mean awful.

I spent some time with my mom recently to give Dad and Doneen a bit of a break.  She was actually pretty easy to deal with compared to other times but it was an unusual visit.

You see, my mom does this thing now where she keeps a running, out loud, commentary on everything she is doing or thinking.  She does this in the form of retelling a conversation between two people.  Here is an example from this visit:

I walk in and see that mom is wearing a jacket with no shirt underneath.  I find a shirt, bring it to her and offer it to her.

Me: Hey mom, here's a shirt. Do you want to wear this?
Mom: No, I'm fine. I have this shirt (pointing to the jacket)
Me: That's a jacket.  You might want a shirt underneath it.
Mom: And she said you should wear this.  And I said why should I wear that, I have one already. And she said you need to wear it. And she said what are you even doing here, you're just a kid.

So, she makes it clear that she's annoyed by me but in a really weird round about way. Sometimes she says "she said" and sometimes she says "I said" but there doesn't seem to be any kind of rhyme or reason to it. She is sometimes obviously talking about her own feelings at the moment but will say "she said" rather than "I said". And she refers to herself often with the word "we". "We will be fine"...that sort of thing.

She spent a good hour and 15 minutes looking for a shirt after that and all the while she never stopped talking to herself in this "she said" kind of way.  I actually recorded it for awhile because it was so fascinating.  I offered her a BYU shirt at the very beginning which then sort of stayed in her mind somehow while she went through the entire closet and her drawers talking to herself all the while. Sometimes she just pulled things out and looked at them and sometimes she would try them on. She tried on a variety of shirts and jackets (without shirts) until, in the end, she put on the shirt I had originally offered. (though she may have changed again after I left)  Here is some of the recording (my words are in italics, everything else was said by mom.  Only once did she talk directly to me-that part in in bold):

She said here's a good shirt.
And she said how does it close.
She said, just use the zipper.
She said, oh, theres no zipper.
Me: How about this shirt. (Showing her the BYU sweatshirt for the second time since it seemed like that was what she was looking for)
She said, what are you doing here?
To me: I think we'll be fine.
Me: ok
And she said, that's not a BYU one. That's ok. I saw that one.
And she said, Hooray BYU.
And she said, Is that what this is?
And she said, Ok.
And I said, I'm ok. No need to help me. I can take care of myself.
And she said, I'm just a baby and don't know anything.
I said, well, we're all learning so why don't you go help with your other family and then we can all...I can't figure out what happened to that BYU one.
And she said and so we all work together.  And she said the BYU thing was gone.
And I said, why was it gone?
And she said I think some man stole it.
And I said what man?
I think his name was...Oh this is a...this might be a BYU one.  It's a little backwards.
And I said it's a good one.
And I said I couldn't figure out how to get this thing on and then I realized that it was...
And I said, But it wasn't BYU, it was just a blue one and I already have a blue one on.
And I said, you can go back where you came.
And I said, I like this one.  Oh it's kind of pitiful.
So I said, how about this one.
I said, I like it.
I said, well, it has a zipper.
----
I probably find it horrifying mainly because every time my mom does some new crazy thing I imagine that I will do it too someday.  But if I can be unemotional about it, it is interesting to see how her mind is working and how her thoughts jump around but then they will reconnect later sometimes.

I miss my mom.  I'm happy to spend time with her and be of help to her but I miss the person she was.  My mom was amazing and smart and caring. It's hard to remember her now.

If I do get dementia I hope my kids can read my blogs and scrapbooks and things and remember the person I was. But I sure hope I don't get it.