She didn’t know me when I visited. No recognition in her eyes. Nothing. She knew my dad. Knew in the sense that he was familiar, though I doubt she had the language to explain her connection. She knew my brother in the same way, kept hitting him, tapping him like she does with my dad.
For my sister and me, nothing. Not the first day, at least. There was more recognition on subsequent days, but her reaction likely was more about repetition than memory.
My mom is in a memory care facility in Las Vegas. Has Alzheimer’s. Is adrift in a mind disconnected from our reality. The caregivers tell us she sometimes wanders the halls and shouts at people who are not there. Sleeps often. Is growing less and less connected to our reality by the day. This is how Alzheimer’s works. It eats away at the mind.
Seeing this is difficult for all of us, but worse for my dad who visits three or four times a week. Sometimes, she will say “he’s mine,” without knowing why. Recently, she told the caregivers he was her son. Then, on another visit, he was her father.
Meds help. They soften the bouts of anger. Even her out. But they cannot slow the progression of the disease, cannot stop what is the inevitable dissolve.
Mom is still in there. Still appears in an occasional phrase. In a look. But they are fleeting. Like her ability to speak. Her sense of time. Space. Her connection to what she knew.
She is approaching three years in the memory care facility. Three years marked by a pandemic that cut off access for us, that may have accelerated her divorce from the world. We can’t be sure. Safety requirements shut my dad out from visiting several times and, while these precautions were difficult, they were necessary. Were effective. They did not completely prevent Covid from inserting itself into the facility — mom caught Covid, but recovered rather quickly without long term effects — but they prevented large outbreaks and kept most of the residents and staff safe.
I saw here just before she went in to the facility. It was a visit marked by anger and fear. She was hard to control at that point — would complain about people who weren’t there, would yell at shadows. Dad was struggling to understand it, to live through it. He is a creature of habit and relied on her for so many of the smaller things in his life, things he may not have even understood. We see it now as he struggles with managing the house.
He would get mad when she would forget something or bring him a soda when he asked for a sandwich. Would get frustrated when she reorganized the kitchen cabinets again and again.
Would correct her when she told people she was at her brother’s funeral almost 30 years before, even though she wasn’t. She would get agitated when corrected, which is typical for Alzheimer’s patients. And I would get mad at him, even though his responses were normal, were inevitable.
Alzheimer’s creates a cycle of grief and anger that is difficult to explain. It robs the patient of her life, of her mind, sends her down the rabbit hole into an unsharable wonderland that we cannot know. Family is left behind and we are forced to grieve while our loved ones are alive. It is worse for spouses, for “mates,” as my dad says. He assumed a permanent symbiosis, a reciprocal love and life, but instead he lives through loss even as she walks the halls of the memory care facility looking much older, but still herself.
I saw her in January 2020 in the facility. She knew me then, smiled, kissed me. Knew my wife, kissed her and hugged her. But two years of pandemic kept me away and, when I saw here again in January 2022, she was cold. She sat with dad and me in the lobby, chewing on her lower lip, an angry look in her eye. I could see her, but could not reach her. I wanted to run, but what would that do? I made a conscious decision when my grandmother went into the homes in the mid-1980s not to see her, not to allow that image to be the last one I had of her. I’ve always wondered if that was the right call. Grandmothers are different. This was my mother and I had a responsibility to stay, to see her, to try and connect even if connecting is ephemeral.
She didn’t know me this time. Didn’t know my wife, though there may have been a bit more recognition. Maybe it was my gray beard, my bald head, the extra weight, my age. Sixty is approaching quickly. Maybe it is just the disease. She didn’t know me, may not have known my brother, though there was some connection.
We walked the halls and she showed Annie and me to her room. Pointed me in as if she was giving a tour. Outside her room is a picture box — they have them outside all of the rooms — and there was just a single photo. She didn’t recognize it. We left.
The next day, she remained on a couch in the hallway. Refused to get up, so we took turns with her before taking a group shot, the first one we have taken in years. I sat on the couch with her and started showing her old photos on my phone, most of which she didn’t recognize. Photos of her, of me, of dad. Photos of family, her brothers, my wife, my sister and brother. I would ask, “who is this?” Nothing. “Do you recognize this person?” Nothing.
Except for one photo. Probably taken in late 1962 or early 1963. My grandfather — her father — is holding a baby. Holding me. He was 57, maybe 58 in the photo. I’m no more than a few months old. I held the phone in front of her and asked her again who was pictured.
“My father,” she said. Smiled. We all smiled. We posed around her, my dad, her three children, a couple of spouses, a grandchild. She seemed happy. It was a good day, I guess.