(Imagine the scene at police HQ "We have three incidents - a mugging in the city centre, a three car pile up on the roundabout, and the Quine is quaffing lattes in a coffee shop despite her airing cupboard being full of unironed clothes)
My housekeeping will never reach those dizzy heights: unironed clothes in this house live in a basket on top of the fridge-freezer and get ironed when the pile is high enough to reach the ceiling or we run out of clean clothes, whichever happens first.
<votive> for Intrepid Mrs S. We went through this with Mother too - in the last couple of weeks she didn't even seem to be aware we were there - and it's very hard.
My ironing gets set on top of the ironing board, which fits very conveniently in the walk-in wardrobe. It gets pulled out and done when I want to wear a bit of it or (at the moment) before there are viewers for the house.
My ironing board is permanently set up. Its so useful to pile all kinds of things on top of.
Much like mine. I find it quite handy for clothes that have to lie flat to dry. (My iron lives in the cupboard -- not sure when it last made an appearance. )
I have not ironed in a very long time and gave iron away when I moved here. Bad move.
The others have not found either iron belonging to two households since they arrived here in July last year. Have looked and looked. Possibly in a box in garage but DIL knows pretty much what every box has. Son and DIL went to a wedding a couple of weeks ago and had to borrow an iron to do his shirt. Ironing board is behind laundry door, but no iron to match.
Iron lives on the bottom of the closet, board is in the garage, once a year I drag the board up the steps to iron my Mother's monogrammed white linen napkins for Christmas Dinner. Part of it is sentimentality and part is I like the satisfaction of producing a crisp smooth linen napkin. I do have to watch that I do not end up folding it like a purifacator through.
DH is in some ways very traditional and insists on using a white linen napkin.
Not so traditionally, he usually eats in his armchair, not at the table, so makes a mess on said napkin.
I insist that HE irons the napkins ( he only does it about every 8 weeks, when he has run out of napkins ). He does not iron anything else.
A new low here, I'm very sad to relate. Yesterday The Dowager didn't know who I was. Didn't recognise me at all; thought I worked at the home, and when I said 'No, I've come to visit you, I'm your daughter' she came right back with 'Being a daughter doesn't mean you can't work here'.
Getting back to ME, several friends have suggested that she may just have been having a bad day, and that she may yet realise who I am. Given the general downward trend of her mental state, and the fact that the senior nurse in whom I confided didn't offer any such comfort, I think it unlikely, but can anyone here advise me please?
I know some of you have been on the receiving end of this, and I thank you for your kind words - have any of you known memory return in such cases?
Honest answer is no I have not known memory of who I was to return. It is some years ago now, and I am trying to remember. I seem to remember that it was my expectations which I had to change. I needed to remind myself that this was not a deliberate slight to me, but a function of the dementia. I tried to look past it to more positive memories of the dad I had once known.
This sounds harsh and was certainly hard but it was the only way I could see of dealing with things.
I am so sorry to hear this of your mum and to see how it has affected you. Sending love and hugs for you.
My grandmother recognised me off and on. Gran was at my wedding, but had forgotten, so for a while that confused her in a "you look like my granddaughter, but my granddaughter's not married and doesn't wear a wedding ring " sort of way. She recognised me when prompted.
Then her memory deteriorated further and she didn't always recognise me. On one memorable occasion I asked her if she knew who I was and she said "Yes. You're me." Which is actually a memory I treasure. There were occasions after that in which she recognised me.
I think it depends which kind of dementia she has. Some - vascular seems to be one - have better and worse days while still on the downward path. But it is probably better just to grieve and go forward. Hope deferred makes the heart sick.
Can you place a reasonably large, recent photo of you in a prominent place in her room, with an easy to read label that says “Mrs S, my daughter” on it? I wonder if very frequent reminders like that may help.
I am just speculating though - it is in the same vein as a dementia whiteboard. I wish I’d seen that idea before my mother passed away.
Others may have better ideas and be able to answer your question directly.
I saw a lovely dementia whiteboard in the local hospital last week. It said "You are in X hospital in Y town. If Z (name of wife) is not here remember that her love is still with you and that A,B and C (names of children) care about you very much."
The patient (one of my elders) has been waking in the night and, as I said to him, asking the existential questions - where am I and who cares?
Mum has Alzheimer's but her loss of memory is not consistent. She seems to carry scraps of memory from different times and then tries to make sense of whichever are at the front of her memory at the time. When recently in a&e she knew I was her daughter or at least behaved towards me as if I was. However, I have normally presumed that I am a mix of family members. Sometimes she will cuddle with Dad and call him mister ( a family nickname) other times she will just ignore him. It's in my experience a random walk in a general negative dire
Dad has vascular dementia, that is a saw tooth shaped decline. They have sudden drops and the get steadily better and the decline again.
Like your mother Mrs S, visual clues are of no use to my mother, and when I tried her with a talking clock she hid it as she thought I was trying to treat her like a baby. I think the most upsetting thing about your recent visit to the Dowager was not that she muddled you with someone else but she appeared to think she was someone she didn't know at all. I think she may well be better next time, but still think you are her sister or another family member. My mum has gone from telling everyone I'm her daughter while at the same time asking how my mother is to now thinking I'm her sister. I think it is more a case of forgetting what the different relationships mean. She still knows I'm someone she wants to see.
I do hope things are better next time. Maybe go with someone else so it doesn't feel quite so personal and intense?
Thanks all - sadly her sight is very poor so visual clues are no use any more
Her hearing varies, and she has had no sense of smell or taste for some years. Life is not a bundle of laughs!
Mums eyesight is limited (astigmatism, short sight, macular degeneration and cataracts) especially as she no longer wears glass, she also has limited hearing. That does not stop her sometimes picking up when it is someone who is family and she is in end stages dementia, it is just not reliable and has not been for over two years.
What made my mother's lack of knowledge more poignant was that the last time she recognised me, she was full of 'you're all I've got' (not true, but...) and she said 'it would be so easy to lose touch'. I had assumed that she meant I'd stop visiting, not that she would drop her end of the thread.
Thank you for the positive notes all of you - I feel better about the prospect of another visit now.
I unexpectedly spent an hour with my Mum today. We will leave out why just in case I start ranting. She was noticeably frailer than the last time I saw her, but I did manage to stop her slapping a nurse by telling her that nurse was not her daughter and therefore she had no right to. She also at one stage asked who I was to which I replied 'Jen' and that satisfied her. Apart from that she managed two coherent exclamations. One was 'why?' when the ambulance crew were going over bumps and the other was 'eina' .
Did she know who I was? Not so I think I existed outside someone who was being caring towards her and felt familiar.
I didn't want to face it. I had explained to my nephew that dementia is as aspect of Parkinson's but I didn't want to actually face that he has it. He's only 2 years older than I am and for 6 years we were the only children. It was much easier facing it when mum had it, but this is the brother was born with a brain injury, who I fought with furiously, yet who I'd always tried to protect from bullies at school, who bravely taught himself to walk over the high bridge to the railways station, even though he was terrified, and who, as a child annoyed me intensely because he was always so slow. Because of his brain injury he was more susceptible to Parkinson's (which we never realised ) When it was discovered I was beyond angry - it seemed so unfair that someone whose childhood was so difficult ).
{{{Huia and her brother}}}. I have a friend whose brother with Downs Syndrome developed early on-set dementia. Sometimes it all seems so bloody unfair.
Today was a good day in that my mum and I thoroughly enjoyed ourselves as part of a flash mob dance at the local shopping centre. I'm not at all sure that mum understood what we were up to, but she sure basked in the attention and being told how wonderful she was. Here's to as many good days as we can squeeze in while we can with our aged Ps.
Hogmonay at my parents is a lot of work for Mum. It involves her cooking a big evening meal eaten at 6pm on the 31st, sausage rolls etc at midnight and a big lunch on the 1st. Plus, Mum observes the superstition that everything has to be clean and put away by midnight, so all the dishes etc have to be done in the evening of the 31st; she has a dishwasher, but everything left over after it has been filled has to be done by hand.
Plus, as the North East family stay over, there are the extra beds to be made up / towels washed afterwards. And there's all the shopping beforehand.
As I may have mentioned before (eyeroll emoji) Mum doesn't accept help.
Last year she agreed to me bringing some food to help out, only to change her mind on the 28th and phone me up in tears saying that I would ruin Hogmonay for her if I didn't let her do it all single handed. It was all very stressful.
This year my father has asked us not to visit at all, but instead have a day trip through, probably on the 4th Jan, for lunch. This would be fine by me, but Mum keeps crying, saying that her greatest pleasure in life is having her family round her, eating her food, and that she's devastated at the thought of having no family at Hogmonay. My brother and his family are likewise swerving Christmas Day; they are going to drop in past my parents at 4pm for a cup of tea. Mum, therefore, will have minimal family at Christmas and no family at Hogmonay. Which is pretty rubbish given that she does have a full complement of loving family members and we're all avoiding her with the best of intentions.
I hate the thought of Mum spending Christmas and Hogmonay in tears, but I also hate the thought of spending Hogmonay sitting on my arse watching my elderly mother exhausting herself with the massive effort she puts into hosting her family. Her hip hurts; she winces a lot and it's hard to watch. Plus Dad doesn't want us there, though he's probably persuadable if I had a cunning plan.
That's a tricky one @North East Quine . It seems a case of whatever you do it will be wrong and like Elizabeth Bennett your actions will upset one or other of your parents. Hope you find a solution.
I'd hoped this year to spend Christmas in my own home, something I haven't managed in the seven years we've lived here. Then one of my sister in laws phoned up asking us to go to my Mother in Laws as otherwise no one would be there. Organised that, including a sensible stop to see Sister in Law and nephew on Christmas Eve on the way up (my brother is still in hospital). Now it turns up everyone will be at my MiLs except sister who persuaded us to go. This is something my MiL wants, but she gets totally overwhelmed when there are too many of us there. I'm sure it will be fine, and I like all my in-laws, but I'd love to be home with just my husband and son one year. My mum won't get to see me at all, but we intend to take her out between Christmas and the New Year and the Care Home will have tons going on, so I don't think she will miss out.
You really are impaled on the horns of a dilemma, aren't you? I wish I could think of a solution, but short of turning up unannounced, but with a shedload of food* ready to be heated up so that your mum sort of has to accept it, I really can't think of one.
* possibly made with the connivance of your brother and his family
@Sarasa - that basking in adulation is so much a part of what I'm witnessing with Mrs Z. Perhaps in societies that don't value age it's understandable? Crumbs that fall from the table. But as a not very nice son it gives me the mega-iritz, as AP relates over and again how someone said she was amazing for her age, or someone else the same, or someone else said the same ...
And the bloody frustrating thing is I guess she's right - and there's not many other sources of happiness when all other aspects of existence turn to custard.
But yeah ... iritz to the max (and you wait until I'm a suitable age. I'll be Just the Best. And tell everyone. Mwahaha).
I am so glad it was my mother who initiated the No/Low Christmas. She was perfectly happy to give up the prepping, and go out to a restaurant.
I would stay home. Visit at another time. Say things like 'I know you want to do this, but we can't enjoy it because it is so much work for you'. In hopes this might start a discussion on what would induce you to come - ie being allowed to do the catering.
It's not a problem that is going to go away, so as well draw a line now.
My parents finally realized that no one was going to give them the welcome that they deserved - they hosted family over and over for weeks at a time and yet, when they would go up to visit, would get a blow up bed/couch, etc., to sleep on. Their solution to was book into a motel and never discuss it. I'd say, NEQ, to invite as many as want to go to your parent's place and drop by around 2 p.m. with a large order of take out Chinese food or your equivalent there. Invite her round to the hotel for a late supper and go back to the house for tea and cake or whatever it is you do. Just don't tell her a word and show up with everything looked after. Keep saying, we wanted to be with you. Let her serve the food or whatever to feel helpful. I wish I had your problem!
I know that I am extremely lucky to be in my mid 50s, with both parents alive, in reasonable physical health and both completely mentally with it. Apart from visiting / phoning, I don't have to do anything, and, when I visit, I get fed excellent meals. Compared to the issues others on this thread have, I know my issues are nothing.
If I showed up with food, Mum would just cry and cry. Mum will accept, with lavish praise, something like chocolate crispy cakes from a grandchild. But the fall-out if I showed up with food would be unbearable. I don't know what the fall out would be, but it wouldn't be pleasant.
A few years ago, we met up for a family picnic. Mum said she would do all the food, but I had a cabbage going spare from my veg box, and made a large bowl of coleslaw. Mum set the picnic table, which was completely covered by the food she had made, then put my coleslaw on her chair, and she sat on the wet grass. Obviously, we were all horrified, but Mum said she couldn't see any other solution to the "problem" of my bowl of coleslaw other than to give up her own seat to it. So my coleslaw was removed so that Mum could have a seat, and I took it home untouched. Mum was in her late 70s at the time.
If I just showed up with food, something would happen to make me regret it.
Can you play on the aspect of your father’s preference that you not come? You’ve mentioned before that your mother sees her role as to wait on him hand and foot. Can this be spun as a matter of respecting his clearly-expressed wishes? Better yet, if he has said not to come because it does create so much work for your mother.
Clearly food is some core identity thingie: cede that and she surrenders her raison d'etre.
So the only options seem to be:
- don't visit
- meet only in restaurants
- visit only for periods/occasions which do not require large amounts of catering (though from what you say, she seems capable of producing 14 different cakes for morning coffee).
If she is willing to accept offerings of food from grandchildren, could you get them to do the food? (with plenty of help from you, of course) Or are they too old to be allowed to usurp the catering?
...though having read the story of the coleslaw, it sounds like whatever you do is going to be wrong.
It doesn’t sound as though there is a solution to please everyone.
If your mum is prevented from doing the cooking she feels she has to do, will she be unhappy enough to make everyone miserable?
If Mum is incapable of being happy (as she will be in physical pain and somewhat stressed by producing food that meets her standards), what solution will make everyone else happiest?
NEQ, you are a saint. If I had a mom who would pull passive aggressive crap like putting my food on her seat and sitting on the ground, I would dump out the slaw into the nearest receptacle and have the hissiest of fits, go home, and not talk to her for a month. Under the circumstances, accept that it pleasures her to be a martyr and show up for the whole rigmarole and ignore any indication that it causes her any suffering at all. Ignore tears and winces. Laugh and chat and act like you are having the best time possible. And hope it will rub off on Mom and Dad.
There was an Aged Parent in family I knew of who had the art of tears and emotional blackmail down just pat. Very difficult to live with but some finally stood up to the blackmail and it collapsed.
Thank you for saying that, I have thought it many times. I wonder if your mother is waiting for you to do something like that - sort of wrapped up in a pattern of behaviour as she is. Honestly, I would not be tip toeing around her as you do. I just don't have it in me.
It may be necessary. I had to do something similar to mine, and it cost us a year of not speaking to each other. But it was so worth it in the end. (not that I got the .. pissed-off-ness?... up to actually do it till I was 50)
NEQ, you are a saint. If I had a mom who would pull passive aggressive crap like putting my food on her seat and sitting on the ground, I would dump out the slaw into the nearest receptacle ...
I think I would have chosen to dump it on her head, but that's just me.
Well, if I put it in the trash instead of on her head, I'd feel I still had the high ground no matter how weepy she got. Anyway, I still think if she wants to wallow, let her. Shrug. Remind her that that's the way she likes it and if she wants some of the load taken she knows how to ask.
I went - with some trepidation - to visit The Dowager yesterday. Mindful of the fact that last time, she had no idea who I was, I was delighted to find that she was thrilled to see me, remembered all the family, and generally was a pleasure to be with. She even remembered some people who had visited her, which is a first. I'm so pleased I can't tell you <where's that spinning smiley?>
Apparently her latest trick is to perambulate the corridors with her walker, reciting the Lord's Prayer, or at least the last few lines. To which the rest of the residents reply in loud voices 'Amen!'
Comments
My housekeeping will never reach those dizzy heights: unironed clothes in this house live in a basket on top of the fridge-freezer and get ironed when the pile is high enough to reach the ceiling or we run out of clean clothes, whichever happens first.
<votive> for Intrepid Mrs S. We went through this with Mother too - in the last couple of weeks she didn't even seem to be aware we were there - and it's very hard.
Much like mine. I find it quite handy for clothes that have to lie flat to dry. (My iron lives in the cupboard -- not sure when it last made an appearance. )
The others have not found either iron belonging to two households since they arrived here in July last year. Have looked and looked. Possibly in a box in garage but DIL knows pretty much what every box has. Son and DIL went to a wedding a couple of weeks ago and had to borrow an iron to do his shirt. Ironing board is behind laundry door, but no iron to match.
Not so traditionally, he usually eats in his armchair, not at the table, so makes a mess on said napkin.
I insist that HE irons the napkins ( he only does it about every 8 weeks, when he has run out of napkins ). He does not iron anything else.
Getting back to ME, several friends have suggested that she may just have been having a bad day, and that she may yet realise who I am. Given the general downward trend of her mental state, and the fact that the senior nurse in whom I confided didn't offer any such comfort, I think it unlikely, but can anyone here advise me please?
I know some of you have been on the receiving end of this, and I thank you for your kind words - have any of you known memory return in such cases?
Mrs. S, honestly asking
This sounds harsh and was certainly hard but it was the only way I could see of dealing with things.
I am so sorry to hear this of your mum and to see how it has affected you. Sending love and hugs for you.
Then her memory deteriorated further and she didn't always recognise me. On one memorable occasion I asked her if she knew who I was and she said "Yes. You're me." Which is actually a memory I treasure. There were occasions after that in which she recognised me.
Can you place a reasonably large, recent photo of you in a prominent place in her room, with an easy to read label that says “Mrs S, my daughter” on it? I wonder if very frequent reminders like that may help.
I am just speculating though - it is in the same vein as a dementia whiteboard. I wish I’d seen that idea before my mother passed away.
Others may have better ideas and be able to answer your question directly.
The patient (one of my elders) has been waking in the night and, as I said to him, asking the existential questions - where am I and who cares?
Dad has vascular dementia, that is a saw tooth shaped decline. They have sudden drops and the get steadily better and the decline again.
Her hearing varies, and she has had no sense of smell or taste for some years. Life is not a bundle of laughs!
I do hope things are better next time. Maybe go with someone else so it doesn't feel quite so personal and intense?
Mums eyesight is limited (astigmatism, short sight, macular degeneration and cataracts) especially as she no longer wears glass, she also has limited hearing. That does not stop her sometimes picking up when it is someone who is family and she is in end stages dementia, it is just not reliable and has not been for over two years.
I’m so sorry. It is such a hard road to walk.
I knew that dementia is part of Parkinson's, but somehow I had avoided realising it.
What made my mother's lack of knowledge more poignant was that the last time she recognised me, she was full of 'you're all I've got' (not true, but...) and she said 'it would be so easy to lose touch'. I had assumed that she meant I'd stop visiting, not that she would drop her end of the thread.
Thank you for the positive notes all of you - I feel better about the prospect of another visit now.
Mrs. S, reassured
Did she know who I was? Not so I think I existed outside someone who was being caring towards her and felt familiar.
I didn't want to face it. I had explained to my nephew that dementia is as aspect of Parkinson's but I didn't want to actually face that he has it. He's only 2 years older than I am and for 6 years we were the only children. It was much easier facing it when mum had it, but this is the brother was born with a brain injury, who I fought with furiously, yet who I'd always tried to protect from bullies at school, who bravely taught himself to walk over the high bridge to the railways station, even though he was terrified, and who, as a child annoyed me intensely because he was always so slow. Because of his brain injury he was more susceptible to Parkinson's (which we never realised ) When it was discovered I was beyond angry - it seemed so unfair that someone whose childhood was so difficult ).
I'm still yelling at God.
Today was a good day in that my mum and I thoroughly enjoyed ourselves as part of a flash mob dance at the local shopping centre. I'm not at all sure that mum understood what we were up to, but she sure basked in the attention and being told how wonderful she was. Here's to as many good days as we can squeeze in while we can with our aged Ps.
Hogmonay at my parents is a lot of work for Mum. It involves her cooking a big evening meal eaten at 6pm on the 31st, sausage rolls etc at midnight and a big lunch on the 1st. Plus, Mum observes the superstition that everything has to be clean and put away by midnight, so all the dishes etc have to be done in the evening of the 31st; she has a dishwasher, but everything left over after it has been filled has to be done by hand.
Plus, as the North East family stay over, there are the extra beds to be made up / towels washed afterwards. And there's all the shopping beforehand.
As I may have mentioned before (eyeroll emoji) Mum doesn't accept help.
Last year she agreed to me bringing some food to help out, only to change her mind on the 28th and phone me up in tears saying that I would ruin Hogmonay for her if I didn't let her do it all single handed. It was all very stressful.
This year my father has asked us not to visit at all, but instead have a day trip through, probably on the 4th Jan, for lunch. This would be fine by me, but Mum keeps crying, saying that her greatest pleasure in life is having her family round her, eating her food, and that she's devastated at the thought of having no family at Hogmonay. My brother and his family are likewise swerving Christmas Day; they are going to drop in past my parents at 4pm for a cup of tea. Mum, therefore, will have minimal family at Christmas and no family at Hogmonay. Which is pretty rubbish given that she does have a full complement of loving family members and we're all avoiding her with the best of intentions.
I hate the thought of Mum spending Christmas and Hogmonay in tears, but I also hate the thought of spending Hogmonay sitting on my arse watching my elderly mother exhausting herself with the massive effort she puts into hosting her family. Her hip hurts; she winces a lot and it's hard to watch. Plus Dad doesn't want us there, though he's probably persuadable if I had a cunning plan.
I'd hoped this year to spend Christmas in my own home, something I haven't managed in the seven years we've lived here. Then one of my sister in laws phoned up asking us to go to my Mother in Laws as otherwise no one would be there. Organised that, including a sensible stop to see Sister in Law and nephew on Christmas Eve on the way up (my brother is still in hospital). Now it turns up everyone will be at my MiLs except sister who persuaded us to go. This is something my MiL wants, but she gets totally overwhelmed when there are too many of us there. I'm sure it will be fine, and I like all my in-laws, but I'd love to be home with just my husband and son one year. My mum won't get to see me at all, but we intend to take her out between Christmas and the New Year and the Care Home will have tons going on, so I don't think she will miss out.
You really are impaled on the horns of a dilemma, aren't you? I wish I could think of a solution, but short of turning up unannounced, but with a shedload of food* ready to be heated up so that your mum sort of has to accept it, I really can't think of one.
* possibly made with the connivance of your brother and his family
And the bloody frustrating thing is I guess she's right - and there's not many other sources of happiness when all other aspects of existence turn to custard.
But yeah ... iritz to the max (and you wait until I'm a suitable age. I'll be Just the Best. And tell everyone. Mwahaha).
I would stay home. Visit at another time. Say things like 'I know you want to do this, but we can't enjoy it because it is so much work for you'. In hopes this might start a discussion on what would induce you to come - ie being allowed to do the catering.
It's not a problem that is going to go away, so as well draw a line now.
If I showed up with food, Mum would just cry and cry. Mum will accept, with lavish praise, something like chocolate crispy cakes from a grandchild. But the fall-out if I showed up with food would be unbearable. I don't know what the fall out would be, but it wouldn't be pleasant.
A few years ago, we met up for a family picnic. Mum said she would do all the food, but I had a cabbage going spare from my veg box, and made a large bowl of coleslaw. Mum set the picnic table, which was completely covered by the food she had made, then put my coleslaw on her chair, and she sat on the wet grass. Obviously, we were all horrified, but Mum said she couldn't see any other solution to the "problem" of my bowl of coleslaw other than to give up her own seat to it. So my coleslaw was removed so that Mum could have a seat, and I took it home untouched. Mum was in her late 70s at the time.
If I just showed up with food, something would happen to make me regret it.
So the only options seem to be:
- don't visit
- meet only in restaurants
- visit only for periods/occasions which do not require large amounts of catering (though from what you say, she seems capable of producing 14 different cakes for morning coffee).
...though having read the story of the coleslaw, it sounds like whatever you do is going to be wrong.
If your mum is prevented from doing the cooking she feels she has to do, will she be unhappy enough to make everyone miserable?
If Mum is incapable of being happy (as she will be in physical pain and somewhat stressed by producing food that meets her standards), what solution will make everyone else happiest?
Apparently her latest trick is to perambulate the corridors with her walker, reciting the Lord's Prayer, or at least the last few lines. To which the rest of the residents reply in loud voices 'Amen!'
Mrs. S, who has much to be grateful for