Mask

Our beautiful Mask died a few weeks ago. She was 18. Mother loved her baby. Thankfully, we weren't home when she passed. We kind of thought that she was going to kick the bucket because she was actually quite silly. She was Mother with fur!

The morning of her death she kept trying to take a shower with me (the cat was not Mother). This wouldn't of surprised me so much if it had been Mother. She seemed off. I knew her time was approaching so I took a moment and cried it out in the shower. I thought about so many things. Mother especially. I mean, me being a hot mess is one thing but hot mess Mother is another. Then I went to work for 12 hours.

Upon returning I asked Melanie how my baby was doing and she promptly said we will talk about it later. Clearly, we couldn't talk about it in front of Mother. She's already a cry baby. Just takes one thing to get her going and the water works won't stop. Well, it eventually does; thank you Ativan. Anyways, with those words I knew Mask died.

Melanie had the task of telling Mother the news and needless to say Mother was sobbing into the blanket about her baby being gone. So thankful Melanie was there because she deals with the sobbing better. When I deal with it there's about 25 % chance that I'm going to be fighting back tears. I was so worried that she was going to ask about the cat all the time but for once the dementia gods were listening. Mother really didn't ask too much about her after the first few days and now nothing.

I can't believe you did that!

Mother just woke from sleeping and she's gone coo coo! She's crying and she says Melanie stole her dinner from her and ate it. Then she started sobbing even more saying, "I can't believe you did that!" Man, this demented side of Mother is trying to find a way for us to secretly laugh. She's been on a crying spree so we will see. Some dementia days are better than others.

Happy Annie didn't last too long

Mother had a good run going on of happiness but it didn't last. These happy moments I talk of our brief moments of glory out of many longer and drawn out moments of hmmm...DEMENTIA! Unpredictable and well, crazy. She still loves me tons which I continue to share with Melanie and Kendra. Hey, you never know when she'll not like me and turn her love to Melanie or Kendra so I have to take what I can get. Good thing she calls us all Mom and/or Meredith so either way I just pretend. Let's not forget that we in no way even compare to her babies (the dog, Max, and the cats).
Yesterday Mother was upset a lot. I'm really not sure why but she cried a good bit and was worried. She was medicated and all but sometimes she's just overwhelmed. When she stopped crying she kept her grumpy face on and basically sat with her arms crossed. It passed, came back, passed, and came back. She must have been missing me, ha ha. I returned in the evening with a piece of cheesecake from the cheesecake factory for her. She wasn't even impressed. I didn't even get a little sparkle in her eyes when I gave it to her. Sometimes when you bring Mother goodies she gives a wee smile, her eyes light up, and your heart melts. She wasn't one bit excited for it but it didn't stop her from inhaling it. I'm not sure she even tasted it. She looked at it, thought fire in the hole, and devoured it. That's my girl!
Below is my lady wearing one of my work shoes; they are 1.5 sizes too small for Mother but it didn't stop her from stealing them, I mean, one of them.

Happy Annie

I was gone all Monday and returned to the house on Tuesday afternoon to a joyous Mother. I walked in the door and she said, "Oh, honey, there you are. I missed you." I clearly was pumped by this and ran over to give her a hug. I'm used to giving a hug to Mother and not getting anything back. A one-sided hug. I like to put her arm around me sometimes to pretend she's actually hugging me back. Oh was I shocked when I wrapped my arms around Annie Bannie and she hugged me back like really hugged me back. I could tell she definitely put some emotion into it. Now that's how I like to start off my days. I definitely gloated to Kendra and Melanie about what happened. They're totally jealous.

Later in the day Mother and I were hanging out and all of the sudden she says, "Well, are you going to work?" and of course I think she is talking to me so I look over and see her looking at Max, the dog. Then, she says, "Hello, I'm talking to you. Are you going to answer me?" Oh Mother. She just likes to make sure her babies are taken care of. For the first time the other day I saw her trying to give Pepsi to the cat. I was quite impressed because she usually only tries to give it to Max; she's now expanding her sharing skills. Thatta girl.

Little moments

Mother loves her avon and her avon magazines. Kendra will buy her stuff and always brings her home magazines. Mother will carry them around with her for days and show you different things. She has them right by her side and will randomly pick them up and look through them. Today she has showed me the magazine a few times and I ask her what she wants. Sometimes there's not much talking on her end but she loves just being engaged in a conversation.

Yet again Mother picked her magazine up and this time asked Melanie if she would like to look at the magazine (in dementia language of course) and Melanie responded, " No thank you. Maybe later." This did not please Mother at all. She put her frowny face on and looked away. If anyone looked at her face they would have thought that she just received really sad news. Poor girl. I looked at the magazine with her. Those little puppy eyes got me.

After our magazine time I returned to my seat and for about 10 minutes Mother was quiet until she suddenly sat up and said, "Mom? Where are you?" She then turned her head, saw Melanie, sighed with relief and said, "Oh, whoo." Oh, my silly Mama.

On the road

Mother's Mom is in NY right now (in from New Mexico) so we are on our way to visit her. Mother has only asked about it 40083388 times this week. It's the typical routine of her getting fixated on one thing until she forgets about it. We try not to mention certain things like this so she doesn't get worried about it and also to avoid hearing that we didn't tell her about it.

She's pretty excited about it. She's currently resting her eyes in the car. She has a 'injury' right now which is really tuckering her out. She's really not injured. We checked. She just needs some extra attention. Oh, Anne.

Mother never sleeps alone.

As previously mentioned Mother has a spare bed in Melanie's room because she doesn't like sleeping alone. She had been in a real routine of just going straight to Melanie's room but lately she has been sleeping in her own bed; I think it's because she has new friends sleeping with her.

Make over

Mother let me do her make up last night. I do it every once in awhile. Last night was so funny. Every time I asked her to open her eyes she'd close them and vice versa. I thought well if she is playing opposite day with me then I will say them opposite and that'll work, NOT. It was a lot of fun. She had fun and was smiling the whole time. I sat right next to her and it was a really nice bonding experience. 

She was so happy about her new look that she peed on me. I'm not joking. I was sitting there and thought wow, this heated blanket really gets warm and then I realized it wasn't the blanket. Come on, depends, you're not being very dependable. haha.