The Beginning of the end...

Have you ever been some where witnessed something then looked around for someone to share it with but no one was there? This happens all the time now. The absurd and hilarious, the tragic and heart breaking all the moments in life that matter, I need a witness. Even if it turns out I'm really alone, the idea that there is someone to laugh and cry with me is important. Oh and I have laughed and cried, laughed and cried, laughed and cried with my dear wonderful family, I just thought, before they go from my dear sweet wonderful family to my board, eye rolling “this is all you talk about" family I would give this a try.

Mom had a stroke September 10^th 2001, the day before 9/11. Absorbing crisis while in crisis is a strange thing. Things get looped and tangled in ways you don’t understand. She recovered and was at my wedding the next year and for the birth of my daughter 2 years later. She was there but we all knew that we had lost a part of her that day.

The decline was so slow it is hard to say when it became obvious, she couldn’t quite follow a game of cards anymore, she lost things then found them in "strange" places, she couldn’t follow conversations about a third person who was not present. We encouraged Dad to see a Dr. but they insisted that it was the stroke. She has two sibling, one older and one younger, who were both being treated for Alzheimer’s, surly there was something else going on.

Denial is a strange thing; they had spent their lives together, 58 years of marriage. When someone, someone in charge, tells you it is one thing the desire to believe them is overwhelming, even when faced with the evidence to the contrary. When Mom finally started meds to slow the progression of the disease she was already living moment to moment.

She recognizes us as family even if she can’t always come up with a name.

For that I am grateful.

We moved Mom into a care center in May 2013.

 I have dinner with her once a week.