With a demented elderly at home, translated…
As I was growing up, I was asked by my school instructor to write about “My Family”, “Home Sweet Home”, and similar subjects, but, as I wrote on, my essays usually turned into “My Mom”. And now, I can, officially, write an article, “My Dearest Elderly Child—Mom”.
My father is a government worker, his wages goes into taking care of my elderly grandmother and raising my younger brothers, plus, the family of six, and, he’d often not had enough. Thankfully for my mom, before my mother became demented, she’s a hardworking accountant, she’d looked after her husband’s family from the sides, and helped the three of us kids, afford our three houses. My elderly mommy kept working until she’s sixty-six, until my father needed help looking after because he’d fallen ill, did she exit the workforce.
wandering aimlessly is one of the “symptoms” of Dementia…not my photo…
Fifteen years ago, my elderly mommy started forgetting her keys as she’d left home, and, entered into the building, but couldn’t find her way to the door to get outside, suspected that the vendors gave her the wrong changes as she shopped…………everything came too fast, it’d left us, unprepared. We took her to get checked in the hospitals, and that, was when we realized, that she has, Alzheimer’s.
In order to delay the aging processes, I’d taken her to the park, to exercise early in the morning. Other than moving her muscles, she could also carry on in conversation with the neighbors too. She loved it when people commend her on how blessed she is, has a daughter close by her side, but, I’m the one, who’s, blessed.
These sort of worry-free days lasted for a decade, but, just like the ads described, “the memories of the elderly is like a bucket of water, what’s lost, won’t be returned.” My elderly mommy went from mildly demented, to severely demented, and, it’d gotten worse more and more quickly, to the point, that it’d made us all panicky too! One cold morn, as the family is still asleep, my elderly mommy put on little clothes, opened the door, was on her way to the park for her morning workouts, and, as she trekked on, she’d forgotten where the park was, and forgotten how to get back home too. In the end, it was, a neighbor, who’d brought her home to us. In order to prevent her from getting lost again, my elder brothers installed the bars where my mother couldn’t reach on the front door, to prevent her from exiting the house; after a short while, as my elderly mommy got up in the morn, she couldn’t make her way to the bathrooms, then, she’d, wetted herself, I’d immediately changed her, she looked at me, said shamefully, “I don’t want you to do this for me!”, although my mother no longer knew me, but, in her blurred-out memories, I’m the one whom she loved most. Dearest mom, this, is what I can do for you, something that’s, so small, not comparable to ten-thousandth of what you’d done for me.
“where am I???”, not my photo still!
Slowly, my mother no longer knew me anymore, one day, she’d, called me “Mom”, I’d, led her to the mirror, to confirm, that she is the mother, she’d turned around, hugged onto me, said, “Yu are mom!”, and, I’d, told her, “Your mom is in heaven!”, it’d caused her to feel so sad, she’d cried so very hard, and ever since, whenever my mother called me “Mom”, I’d taken her into my arms, like how when I was younger, I’d cried out for her, she’d, taken me in hers, loved me dearly.
So, this, would be, the INEVITABLE role-reversal for the children of elders with dementia, because, the elders are going to deteriorate more and more by the day, and, eventually, becoming incapacitated, and, it may be, a very long ways away, but, that, is the progressions of dementia.
Life, the Obstacle Course 