Deciphering Mom

“Have you sat in that rocker?” I ask.

“No. I don’t want to move them,” she replies, referring to the stuffed teddy bears sitting in her chair. “Their mother died a week—more like two weeks—ago.” She says this with obvious distress.

I’m not sure how to react to such comments. Most of what Mom says still makes sense, even if only to people who know her very well and can provide the missing context. She frequently forgets vocabulary or what she wants to say and handles it well. Usually she just laughs at herself. Her positive attitude and trust that people have her best interests at heart continually amazes me.

Mom is well liked, but surprised by that fact. I told her that women at the pharmacy had asked how she was doing and said they missed her. Mom’s response was to worry that perhaps she acted too proud. “What do you have to feel so proud about, Mom?” “My clothes are nicer and I fit in them better.” It’s the truth. She has a fine 89-year-old figure.

The things that do bother my mother always amuse me. A few years ago she was very put out because the bagger at the grocery store insisted on carrying her bags to her apartment down the street. Mom does not consider herself to be frail. She still does her “fast walk” every morning (or thinks she does) and thinks she’s in good shape. She’s one of the few residents who doesn’t use a walker. And considering how her body pretty much ignores the pneumonia virus, I have to agree.

You should never call my mother elderly. Medical records all label her as a “frail  and elderly woman.” This is not OK with her and she has told her primary care physician this. She will never be elderly. In her mind the elderly are centenarians drooling in their wheelchairs. She’s too vibrant to be elderly.

She’s also very tired of hearing “good job” when she’s at doctor’s appointments or swallowing her pills. It makes her feel like she’s a dog hearing “good dog.”

She is sometimes worried about what others think about her. She’s a little concerned that the staff at her home are tired of waking her up all the time. All the other residents sleep in their chairs but she feels like she should be up and doing something. For Christmas she asked for a sweatshirt with a kitten on it so she’d look more like the other women at the home. But she’s no longer concerned about having everything she wears clean and pressed. And she’s given up on lipstick. But she still puts perfume in her hair.

There have been several times when she has insisted that the jeans she has on aren’t hers. She doesn’t remember buying them so thinks they are either mine or my sister’s. She’s a size 4 petite and my sister and I are both quite a bit larger. Twice now she’s given a pair back to staff who have just washed them. They give them to me and I put them back in her closet.

I’ve heard that it’s fairly common for someone with dementia to think someone has broken in and put new clothes in their drawers. She just thinks people have left their toothbrushes in her bathroom. I think I’d feel violated if someone left their toothbrush in my bathroom and I’d immediately throw it away. Not Mom. It doesn’t seem to bother her at all. She just wonders where her own toothbrush is. My niece just labeled her brushes so we’ll see if that helps.

My sister told me that during her last visit with Mom, she told Mom the same story three times and Mom laughed each time. I love that. Mom’s a much better audience than she used to be.

Update 8/16/2010: I visited Mom today and got the clue I needed to understand Mom’s comment about the teddy bears’ mother dying. It was a resident who had hundreds of Beanie Babies and bears in her room who died. I understand why Mom thought of her when she saw her own stuffed bears.