Dementia tests everyone.
You never know when the tests will come. There are moments that happen. Opportunities. You muddle through, then look back and wish you had said or done something else. Anything else. Like the time my mom tried to tell me she might have Alzheimer’s. She was worried about what it would do to the family. She had been through it with her dad, and she didn’t want to put any of us through that.
I could have said, “Mom, we love you. Even if you have it, we are willing to go through whatever it takes to be there for you.” Maybe that would have given her some sense of comfort, to know that she was valuable enough to us to suffer with her through her affliction. But no. I said, “What are you talking about! You’re not going to get Alzheimer’s!” I completely dismissed her and her feelings of concern. I failed the test.
Maybe that’s why I’m writing this blog. I want to give you some class notes, so you won’t fail as many of the tests as I did. Believe me, dealing with a disease like this in the family will show you where your strengths and weaknesses are, and your weaknesses can and will haunt you! I’m a person who needs information to process things that are happening in my life, and when we went through it with my Mom, very few people were talking about it. So, I’m talking. I’m telling. At least from my perspective, you’re going to hear what it’s really like. Then maybe you can get through the tests better than I did.
Dementia Land 