Alzheimer's: Will I Be Next? by Jack Turley

Author:Jack Turley
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Gentle Heart - an imprint of The Fiction Works
Published: 2011-12-02T00:00:00+00:00

Chapter 20

“She gets confused sometimes”

The roommate Mom referred to in one of her letters was a sweet but muddled little woman named Agnes. She also suffered from dementia, although hers was in an even more advanced stage than Mom’s. Agnes had a purse, a large, black, nondescript bag that bulged with unknown contents. I never saw her open it, she just held onto it as if her life depended on its instant access. The purse was Agnes’s security blanket and she carried it with her everywhere—to the dining room, to the bathroom, even to bed.

Agnes was an amiable soul, blissfully unaware of most everything happening around her. She seldom spoke but there always seemed to be a smile on her face, a benign, unoffending smile. There were those times I secretly wished some of Mom’s occasionally-stormy temperament could be swapped even for a little of Agnes’s perpetually-numbed contentment. They might have both benefited from the exchange. But perhaps the contrast in personalities was the very thing that enhanced and maintained their compatibility. Apparently it did.

As in most pairings like this, when disparate dispositions must share close quarters, there were moments when Agnes’s erratic but forever-docile behavior could be vexatious for Mom. On one particular occasion, I found myself caught in a small tempest between the two roommates. It was a dispute which took on unintentional comic overtones and I had to hide my amusement as I tried to remain the neutral party. I’d flown in for another visit with Mom and we were having a chat in her room. Agnes was also there, a silent and smiling observer. Holding the handbag securely clamped to her lap, she rocked her chair in vacant delight as she listened to our conversation. Agnes enjoyed having visitors in the room. It didn’t matter who they had come to see, she liked them all. As far as she was concerned, every visitor was part of her own family.

As always, I wanted to make these few days I would be there a special occasion for Mom—but I was running out of ideas on ways to keep her entertained. After the two of us went out to lunch, I had brought her back to the nursing home so she could take her usual afternoon nap. This was a standard ritual. Mom’s daily nap was a chance for both of us to take a break from my determined efforts to fill every minute of our time together with some kind of activity. Mom could rest and I could go off somewhere and recharge the batteries. In this kind of stressed atmosphere, it is a difficult job posing as the constant recreation director.

Mom didn’t want to take a nap on this particular day; she seemed exhilarated and eager to continue our visit. I was caught off guard, not sure what I could do to enhance this unexpected extra time together. Just sitting and talking had become a frustrating business because Mom tended to drift away from a conversation—or she would start the same one over again from the beginning.

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