Phillies

We were watching the Phillies game and then Mother went to bed and then in extra innings she came back. It was a few innnings later and Mother had fallen asleep, so, I didn't want to wake her. I sat and watch the game and all of the sudden the never ending game had ended and the Phillies were announcing about Charlie's new feats and also the teams new feat...Mother woke up and said, "Wow" and now she is back to sleeping. That's my sport's Momma!

Big girls are beautiful

We were just joking around and Melanie started singing, "Big girls are beautiful" and my Mother went hoot, hoot, giggling like a mating owl. She hasn't had a sensor now for years but it's still funny when she reacts to certain jokes or statements. I'm not sure if this is my Mom's sense of humor or just Mother's disease...I don't have enough memory of my Mom to differentiate  the two. I just knew my Mom has this kind sensitive woman and not someone to make such jokes. Of course it's funny but I don't think that's how Mom would react especially because she gets upset when we make fun of each other. Good or bad there is still communication and love, i'll take it.

Keeping it together

Even though it's hard to deal with, it's more important to keep it together for Mother's sake. When she is upset or crying it's so difficult to not cry or dwell on the issue because even though it's about her, we are affected too. There's time and a place for me to deal with the disease but when Mother is upset it is necessary to remember she is hurting, too. She cries more, is confused more, and becomes less and less dependent each day. I never imagined picking out diapers for my Mother nor did I think that making it fun for her would make her day. Life is strange.

Days and nights get more and more difficult. Today, when Mother started crying and talking about her thoughts (hallucinations) it was really hard to stay calm myself, let alone calm her down. She kept talking about my father and her father. Neither of which led to a happy ending. My Dad and Mom have been divorced since I was 10, but, things are cordial between them. She gets upset about him sometimes; I usually just try to distract her with something else but tonight was hopeless. After that, she wanted to talk about her Father. She said he was here and telling her he wasn't just made her cry and say, "I know, I know." Needless to say these last 36 hours have been quite interesting and stressful. I know by keeping her safe and reassuring her that all is okay what really matters. She is now watching her favorite Phillies and mumbling about the Fathers...let's go Ativan.

Let me show you

Mother gets concerned about the strangest things. She made me follow her around the house while she pointed to different things.  She pointed to the kitchen floor and since I'm fluent in dementia I knew she was on her home renovation kick and wanted to get new flooring for the kitchen. After this, she brought me upstairs and pointed to our extra flooring we put in the foyer and said, "It's so big; can I have it?" Of course I told her it was hers and she told me that she was going to do the flooring. This was short-lived. She quickly turned her attention to wondering if the people were out.

The stealthy sloth

We always have to have a close eye on Mother because even though she moves a little slower than most (and by most I mean everyone) she still manages to secretly do things. I went upstairs for 5 minutes and returned to find Mother with a snack of hers.

I giggled and said, "Mother, what are you doing?" She pointed and started talking about the babies. I know how she works and she was just trying to distract me from her box of honey buns. Every time I mention her doing something intentionally she always smiles. Sometimes when she gets upset I will say are you just playing with me or being silly and she smiles. This is a sick but funny game she is playing.

Our little sleeping beauty

Mother likes to sleep a lot; she lives the life of a cat. Most of it is because of the medicine but also I secretly think that when she is sleeping she is in a state of bliss. Here's our sleeping beauty in action:

Crickets!

Mother was eating her special ice cream and all of the sudden there was a cricket on the ground and it absolutely  freaked out Mother. She was going crazy for about 20 minutes. Even the word cricket made her get scared. Her ice cream that night was mint chocolate chip and for some reason she thought that the chocolate pieces were crickets. She had already eaten half of the ice cream so we wanted to make sure she ate the rest because it had her medicine in it. After removing the cricket from the house we tried to get her to eat her ice cream and this is what happened:

Patience is the key with dementia. Try, try, and try again. Also, notice her best friend next to her? :)