Pleasant surprises

I woke up and came upstairs and Kendra and Mother were on the couch watching tv but I certainly wasn't expecting this cute image:

It was so great because  he just went there by himself. Normally, we have to get him in his comfortable dreaming state before getting him to cuddle with Mother but not this time!!

Mother is always concerned with her "baby" so it's cute to see her caring for him like she was in this picture. The next day the kitty was cuddling with Melanie and Mother was jealous so we gave her some baby time.

Go Meredith!

 Growing up Melanie and I played sports all year long and even though Mom worked night shift she came to a lot of our games. She never was much of  cheerer but just seeing her there was always nice. Recently, Melanie and I started playing for a slow-pitch co-ed softball team and since Mother is with us, we bring her to our games. I was a little nervous about it but was completely shocked when I saw how much Mother loved being there. She even cheers every once in awhile. We have tie dye blue shirts and Mother wouldn't stop talking about them and saying, "where's mine?" so we got one for her and as soon as she sees that blue color she always wants to wear hers.

Sometimes, she gets a little anxious and plays the 'up down' game on the bench but it's so relaxed there that we are usually right next to her. She's even made some friends. It's not like you can look at my Mom and be like oh yeah, she has dementia but I guess through the grapevine or just through observation some of the fellow fans adopted Mother into their little group. Last game Mother was with them the whole time; I have no idea what they were talking about but hey, she was enjoying herself. You never really know what she is going to say or if it will make sense. Our pitcher came up to us and was like, "Can your Mother have a chocolate cookie?" and of course we said yes. Mother has been talking about it for days now.

Mother has gotten into the routine of going to our games because we have a double header on Mondays and one game on Wednesday, so, we get to hear, "when do we go?" When we tell her it's game day she will ask us about going for hours beforehand. It's so cute how excited she is to go to the games.

Tell me what you really think?

I'm not sure if it's a blessing or not but Mother is very blunt and will tell you something mean even if she doesn't mean it. I'm just glad most of the time we know what she is saying or trying to say and the other people around don't. I got my hair cut yesterday and of course Mother hates it. She looked at me and said, "Ew, your hair." Hey, at least she is talking to me and she noticed that something had changed. We usually try and tell Mother it's not nice to say things like that but she normally responds with "Shut up, bitch." At that point, we just laugh and so she laughs. Laughter is contagious even with dementia!

Log Rolling

Kendra is an RN so she always has great tips for us when we are not sure how to deal with Mother. Mother is losing her ability to do even routine things like lay in the bed. She will sit on the bed and clearly want to go to bed but sometimes she just won't lay down. We like to handle this issue by 'log rolling' Mother. It might sound a bit harsh or even weird but it is a great technqiue to get her in the bed. Once performed you simply tuck her in real tight, say "I love you", and keep the light on for her. It works well but she definitely will end up getting out during the night and venturing from her room to Melanie's room, Kendra's room or even my room. She doesn't usually go down to my room if she was up in her room because it's two full flights of steps so she wouldn't get to my room until 3 days later. Oh yeah, Mother does not like log rolling but she really doesn't like much these days besides food. Everyone's trying to kill her...She often will make funny noises and moans when we help her into bed and say "you're trying to kill me." Sometimes, you can get her to laugh about it and she quietly settles in. And by sometimes I mean not too often.