Here we go again…

I’ve been absent from here for a while. I just couldn’t write, nothing would come. My brain was frazzled and my fingers just sat limply on the keyboard, not knowing what to do, whereas usually I can’t quite keep up with them.

But mostly I didn’t even have time to sit at the keyboard and search for words, mostly I was packing and organising and throwing things out and not throwing enough things out and filling boxes, and taping up boxes and labelling boxes and then not labelling boxes and then carrying boxes, and more boxes. Then a bit of unpacking of some boxes. And then more packing and not labelling and carrying.

Basically we have not been very good at this house move thing. There have been some mitigating circumstances, which I won’t go into here, but suffice to say that it’s been something of a rollercoaster, not knowing from one week to the next if the house move would be on. or if it was, exactly when it would be. And then there were the weeks when it felt like becoming homeless could be a real possibility.

But here we are now, the day after another Christmas Day, and finally having time to reflect on things.

I visited mum yesterday. I walked along that brightly lit corridor, turned right and then saw that her door, the first one on the left was closed. This usually means that carers are in with her, so I gently knocked, but on getting no reply opened the door a fraction anyway.

The bed was empty, made but empty. And there was a gift bag on the end of it, with her room number written in wee letters at the top. A present from the home no doubt, to make sure all residents get something to open on Christmas Day. I had brought Mum nothing. And I feel no guilt, no shame about that, just a tinge of sadness, remembering how she would clap her hands with joy when opening something she loved. And recognising that this is something I do instinctively, have never realised it is Mum’s trait too. But nowadays, there would be no joy in receiving a gift, no clapping of those hands which mostly remain curled up under her blankets.

There were no staff about to ask, but I reckoned they had got Mum dressed and into her chair, to wheel her along to the dining room for a Christmas lunch. It was now a couple of hours after lunch would have finished. I walked back along the empty brightly lit corridor, and turned left at the end, towards the dining room. The doors were wide open, and the dining tables were mostly pushed aside. Set out in a semi circle in front of the most enormous television were four elderly women in wheelchairs, none of them paying much attention to the television, though not exactly asleep. Apart from Mum. There she was at the end of the semi circle, in her great big padded armchair on wheels, asleep, slightly off-kilter in her chair, leaning off to one side. I stroked her hair and kissed her head, called “Hello Mum” to her.. and before I had a chance to say “It’s Loïs” she opened her eyes and smiled her big gap-toothed smile, and slurred “L O I S”. I told her everyone was sending their love, and named her closest family. There was little recognition with this string of words, names of her most loved, now mostly not remembered.

Matthew Bourne’s Sleeping Beauty continued noisily in my background, the other residents stared into the middle distance. This did not feel like dignity, did not feel like a Christmas wish for anyone. But it’s reality. And Mum is comfortable, and generally peaceful and serene.

I told Mum that I was going home to make supper, but that tomorrow I’d come back and bring some homemade biscuits. She perked up at that, and managed to slur what sounded like “That’s my best thing to look forward to”. I left, telling her I love her, blowing her kisses. But she was already asleep again.

Today she was back snuggled up in bed when I got there, with my home made biscuits for her. She opened her eyes when I stroked her hair… but then gently closed them again and was back sleeping almost immediately. The sun was streaming into her room, creating tiny dancing rainbows as it caught the light of the crystal, a gift from my cousin Bushy. Mum was peaceful and calm, and really not interested in my biscuits, nor my gentle chatter about who was sending their love and hugs to her.

This. This is now Mum’s life. And I come to realise that although the umbilical cord was cut nearly 60 years ago, we are still connected. Through all the threads of our lives, through the choices we have made, through the values we hold, through the life we seek to live, through the people we love.

But now, as The Captain and I start living in what was for years her home, it is beginning to be easier to make it our own. What is ahead, who knows, though we do know that at some point Mum will no longer be with us. At that point will I feel differently about this house? The stuff still in it? Will I regret the things I threw out, sent to charity shops, gave away, burned in the fire? (My old chest of drawers from when I was a child made very good kindling). We’re making the best decisions that we can for now; and if I have regrets in the future, then I’ll deal with them then. But I am confident that I will never regret taking the 20 boxes of books that I would never read to the dump.

***

Thank you for reading this.

If you want to read more about my relationship with Mum and her dementia, then you could start here at Taking smock of the Situation. Or just dip in. After all, if I’ve learned anything this last few years it’s that chronology and time are less important than we might believe.

Finally, if it’s not too much to ask (I know, it is, apologies) I would really appreciate it if you could make a donation towards Alzheimer Scotland. They’re doing stuff that makes living with this more bearable for so many people. Thank you, thank you, a thousand thank yous.

Tags: Christmas, dementia, family, inspiration, LinquendaLife, memories, Mum Has Dementia, short-story