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Alzheimers: Starting a journey that no one wants to be on.
Jul 3, 2021, 10:13 AM
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I posted a few days ago about my Ma in law, who suddenly exhibits major symptoms of Alzheimers. She thinks it is 1966, and that her mother and grandmother are still alive. (She is 96 years old.)
I think, as a family, we have not handled it very well, to date. Her son gets upset when she asks him to take her home, and starts yelling at her that she IS home. (She thinks home is where she lived in 1966. But, her memory is a Quantum Leap swiss cheese, because she remembers me, and that I am married to her daughter, even though I did not even come on the scene until 1984.)
My wife would sit right next to her mother, and laugh whenever her mother said something that was obviously wrong. Both the yelling and the laughing upset Ma, and me as well. I finally had a "Come to Jesus" discussion with wife and Bro-in-law. What I said was this:
"Your mother is on a journey right now that NO ONE wants to be on. Imagine if you were an unwilling time traveler, and suddenly you were plunked down in an old persons body, 55 years into the future, looking around a house you don't recognize, seeing people you don't recognize, NOT seeing people who should be there. And on top of that, through some warped memory, you do still recognize your children, but they are yelling at you or laughing at you. You would react EXACTLY the same way she is, you would be scared, you would cry, you would think people are lying to you. And, the above all most important thing is, NONE OF IT IS YOUR FAULT, YOU HAVE NO CONTROL OF THIS SITUATION!"
I told them that God is holding a mirror up in front of us right now, and we should all be ashamed of what we see. I am no better than them, I tried to stay away from the situation for the most part. But, having finally sat through it for an afternoon, I could not hide my shame anymore. I had hit my knees the night before, and prayed for understanding about how this could possibly be God's plan. I am no less a sinner than anyone else in this situation, but somehow, I got a sense that God IS handling it now.
Ma kept asking them, "You all think I'm crazy, what do you want from me? WHAT DO YOU WANT FROM ME? If seeing a 96 year old woman cry like a baby doesn't get to you, you don't have any heart.
I did what was suddenly on my mind. I sat right next to her, and said "Do you know me, do you know who I am?" She nodded yes. I had to speak directly into her ear from very close, because she is nearly deaf. "Do you believe that what I will tell you is the truth?" She said, "I think so." So, I told her to listen very carefully, and said, "You are NOT crazy. Try to imagine that your memories are all books in a great big library. Each time you process any information, you get one of these books down off the shelf, and use it to make sense of the current situation. Are you with me so far?" She nodded yes, again. "Sometimes, at your age, things can happen in your head to cause you to lose your index to the library, and you pull the wrong books off the shelf, without knowing or meaning to. This is why things that really happened awhile ago may seem to be real, right now. Do you understand?" She nodded, but again started to cry, "But I don't know what's happening to me!"
So, in the end, I had no magic bullets. But, at least the way I had tried to explain things to her made an impression on my wife and bro-in-law, I think. They immediately changed their way of looking at it. It's very hard, especially on bro-in-law, who lives with her full time. His mother now thinks she is being held in a strange house against her will, and threatened to call the police on him several times while I was there. She would probably be a prime candidate to wander off if she were physically able to do so. It is probably a twisted blessing that she is too pain ridden physically to be able to do so.
I realize this forum is not meant for this type of thing. But, between all the sports talk and banter, please pray for my second mother and our family. Anyone who has dealt with Alzheimers knows all too well what is ahead, it will get worse before it gets better, when God finally takes her home.
Thank you to all who read to the end, just "getting it down on paper" has helped, already.
Oh, a final word, just to show how cruel Alzheimers can be. Later on that evening, she suddenly began to cry, and hollered out, "Maa (her grandmother), mama and pops are all dead, I ain't got nobody left now!" Her memory suddenly shifted, and she realized they were all gone. Could you imagine how cruel that would be, to suddenly relive losing those closest to you all over again?
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