The thing about watching my mom lose her grip on reality is that I feel like I’m participating in some way. For years now, I’ve honed my skills as mom-whisperer: she’s always been a rambling talker and I’ve learned to decipher the meaning. Now, though, my mental habit of pulling multiple threads of conversation together into a meaningful web is making me feel a little crazy myself. I find myself grasping for a throughline that is fading fast.
It’s been a taxing day. It was already going to be busy, covering for a staff member on the day after a holiday. Then mom called, wondering where everyone was. I heard her tell a nurse that she and her family arrived last night and Jeremy was still at the hotel. The hospice aide, bless her kind heart, was covering for the usual aide and so knew very little about mom. She was as confused as mom when I talked to her on the phone.
My mind was shot for the next two hours. I worked in a haze. The reconciliations came out right, which honestly surprised me. As I made tea, I found I needed to concentrate.
I went over to the assisted living facility this evening to take some medicine refills and see how she was doing. I talked to her about Darcy’s new job and she more or less followed. But then she drifted into talk that made no sense to me. Eventually I figured out that she thought she was at home, no longer in the assisted living facility. She asked, “How did the furniture get here so fast?”
“Oh, we moved it.”
“Today?”
“Well, recently.”
And so I played along.
The fifteen minute drive home lasted lifetimes. Twice I thought, “I’m still driving? I still haven’t talked to Rachel and Darcy?” The church sign I pass every day looked strange.
I don’t know how long this will go on. I hope not long, for her sake. For my part, I will come out intact on the other side. Still, I do not want to forget how the utterly familiar can twist, suddenly and irreparably. Already, writing this comfortably at home, the day feels like a dream.