e peel the onion...and shed our tears...Today was Friday 13th! I
My mom is 91 and losing her memory, it has not been slowly coming on it came on like a freight train...very rapid! At first it did only affect parts of her memory like repeating things she had told me over to me again and then again...but now its affecting all her thoughts... she can't remember how to do simple things like the laundry...its as if her thoughts are incomplete...she will declare she understands and at that moment she does...then seconds later she will have no memory of what we just discussed.
The problem is I fall into the trap of taking for granted she is understanding...like today we had a shopping trip to do I really NO longer enjoy taking my mom on shopping trips and these days shopping for our household means groceries and basic necessaries. We don't really bother with much else..
On the way she found a $100 dollar bill in her wallet she thought it was a $10. SO I told her she should have just left that at home...but she said that is her lucky $100 bill...okay I understand Lucky and Unlucky! :o) so she tucked it into a secret flap in her wallet.
So Mom wanted to go into Roses its a small discount store right next door to the grocery store so I got her a cart, took her inside the store and she reassured me she was fine I should go on and do the grocery shopping while she browsed inside the discount store...I kept saying are you sure, "Yes Im fine, I will wait right here for you to come get me when you finish."
So I shopped and put the groceries in the van, and headed to Roses...I went in and she was right by the door waiting..I could tell something was wrong instantly..
"I've lost my pocketbook"! I don't even know if I had it with me when I came in here." She did cause I made sure it was in her cart...
So I asked where she was when you realized she didn't have it?
She was at the check out and when she went to get her wallet her purse was gone. So I said let me ask if a purse has been found, cashier said nope..so then I tried to help her retrace her path...she had gone to the bathroom. That's the first place I checked no bag...then I went back to where she waited and one of the store employees asked if I had lost a bag since one was turned into the office...
It was found in the ladies room....
Every thing was inside, but poor mom was so shaken she could barely stand up all she could think of was her $100 dollar bill!!
So that was probably the last trip alone in a store for mom it makes me sad to see the layers of independence being ripped away one by one...
But we decided to blame the Friday 13th Goblins instead!!
Oh, bless her heart! Watching my dad slowly die for the past two years has made me want to slow down and enjoy life more. He was two weeks shy of 85 and still mentally sharp. I sometimes wonder if a brief loss of reality would have been like a vacation from knowing what was coming. I miss him so much. Treasure that time you have left.
ReplyDeleteHi Kathy...I am sorry of the passing of your dad...it hurts me so much to see my Mom's mind fading she is very aware of it and it does affect the quality of her life I feel such a loss already....
ReplyDeleteIm here reading some of my old writtin's just to make this day feel better to reconnect with past thoughts...Mom passed on Nov 12th 2019, and I wanted to add the rest of the story to this one. The last 4 years Mom would check her pocketbook daily to make sure the $100 dollar bill was in it. She would move it around into various spots. She began requesting that she be allowed to sleep with her pocketbook under the covers with her, and she was. Then one day the bill went missing. We looked in every nook and cranny of the purse, and eventually we found the $100 note...on that day I took it to the printer and made a one sided copy of it, I cut it out and folded it over so only the printed side was showing I took the real McCoy and put in the locked strongbox...Mom's fake was not real counterfeit since it was only printed on one side, but she took it for the real thing and all was well in her world. When she passed we deposited it in the bank to become part of her estate, the fake one I will cherish till the day I die.
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