My mama died the other day but she was not the mother I grew up with she was a mother who had dementia, you may call it what you want. Just when you catch yourself saying “poor thing” I can tell you that it wasn’t all bad and she handled it like the lady she always was.
Mama began the transformation about 20 years ago and everyone thought she was just acting “socially inappropriate” but I knew she was changing against her will. It was as if she couldn’t really stop what came out of her mouth and swirled around in her head and I spent many a night mourning the loss of the mother I had known.
About 4 1/2 years ago her fluffy little kitty bit her finger leaving a deep wound that literally festered overnight in to a deadly septicemia and Mama was found writhing on the floor of her bedroom and rushed to the hospital. She writhed and seized until they found an antibiotic that was specific to the infection and she recovered but never lived at home again. She couldn’t as her hands were left permanently curled, damaged by the heat of the infection in her brain and the swelling that had affected nerves in her hands. I suspect it was a little like melted wires on an electric panel.
At this point we had a diagnosis, Alzheimer’s, and everyone panicked but suddenly became more compassionate and understanding. Well everyone except one very determined brother who was not going to let his mother have Alzheimer’s. Despite his best efforts Mom could no longer put her world together as she once did and she found refuge in a nursing home, Northern Lights in Washburn, Wisconsin. Her new home was filled with kind and skilled human beings who grew to love and respect my mother, the new one (personality does change) and the old.
That was 4 1/2 years ago and this week she died. My daughter and I were by her side and it was dignified and kind. Those fine people that cared for her all this time cried and mourned her loss almost as much as we did. They knew all her stories and all of us because they took the time to listen to her ramblings. They would sit with her in their down time and hold her hand and tell her they loved her and really made her last years count just like all the other years Mama had on this earth.
You may ask, what is my point in writing this particular blog? It is a tribute to Mama in a sense but it is a lesson for us all. Dementia is not pretty but it is not always the horror that we read about. It can actually be kind because often the folks that were closest to us and died come back to stand by our side and lead us in to our next destination and Mom talked about their comings and goings almost daily. If we find ourselves impaired and have the good fortune to spend our final years in a well run nursing home (key words “well run”) you can actually enjoy your days surrounded by people who tell you they love you, who celebrate your birthdays with you and make the transition from this life to the next the best it can possibly be.
I think the challenge for all of us is to acknowledge that we, too, may need nursing home care. Once we can face the possibility we need to contact our senators and congress people letting them know that our tax dollars need to go to funding these facilities more completely. Nursing homes barely make enough to keep their heads above water and pay their staff next to nothing to do all the basic things that we all may need to have done for us. If we are lucky, very lucky, we will never live in a nursing home environment, we will always have our partner by our side but if our luck runs out it would be nice to know we will be taken care of and not left to lie in soiled diapers in a dark unkempt room, unloved and unknown.
