A strange dream.
That her nursing home had been a space station and that I was still there, supposed to be
packing up all her stuff, and all the things I had taken there. Ambivalent. Liking the people
there and the place. Apprehensive of the journey home (I don’t like the travelling bit of
travel…). Writing a note to my husband : “ I am not coming back”. Scoring out the “not.”
there and the place. Apprehensive of the journey home (I don’t like the travelling bit of
travel…). Writing a note to my husband : “ I am not coming back”. Scoring out the “not.”
I miss her. Just two of us now for Sunday lunch. Something thrown together rather
than planned beforehand. No Perry Como playing.
But who is it I miss? Gone before the process of dementia could do its worst, she was
different from the person I’d known before. In the eighteen months before leaving sheltered
housing, she was often a young and loving mother busy with family - buying extra fish,
peeling extra potatoes, preparing food for them as they slept, waiting for them coming home,
laughing as she watched her boy play outside “making cheeky faces at me through the
window”, contemplating walking up to the shops “with the baby in the buggy”. Happy,
contented.
Away from her house, for short times, her boy was still her focus - worried about
him being on his own, wondering if he had his keys.
But also, she was a loving daughter, with thoughts full of her parents. Sleepy during the
day because they had been round the night before with friends. Setting off her door
alarms in the early hours of the morning and explaining over the phone: “we’re having a
great time here - it’s a good laugh”.
And the thoughts often turning to concerns - setting off so often to see her parents, to
help her dad look after her mum. At times not feeling safe at home - packing bags to go to her parents: “if I can just get there, I’ll be OK”.
And, in the nursing home, wondering if her parents knew that she was there; wistful when
no card came from them for her birthday; anxious still about not being there to help her
dad; asking us, when she was unwell, if we had let her mum know.
Love - for her son, her husband, her young brothers, her parents - was topmost in her mind,
when dementia had stripped everything else away.
And so the woman I miss is a love-filled mother and that love-filled daughter; trust in her
voice when I took hankies out the drawer for her, or took biscuits out of a cupboard for her,
or, on cold mornings, put a hat on her head and she told me that her mother had left them
there for her.
Love. It's never wasted. It's what remains.
different from the person I’d known before. In the eighteen months before leaving sheltered
housing, she was often a young and loving mother busy with family - buying extra fish,
peeling extra potatoes, preparing food for them as they slept, waiting for them coming home,
laughing as she watched her boy play outside “making cheeky faces at me through the
window”, contemplating walking up to the shops “with the baby in the buggy”. Happy,
contented.
Away from her house, for short times, her boy was still her focus - worried about
him being on his own, wondering if he had his keys.
But also, she was a loving daughter, with thoughts full of her parents. Sleepy during the
day because they had been round the night before with friends. Setting off her door
alarms in the early hours of the morning and explaining over the phone: “we’re having a
great time here - it’s a good laugh”.
And the thoughts often turning to concerns - setting off so often to see her parents, to
help her dad look after her mum. At times not feeling safe at home - packing bags to go to her parents: “if I can just get there, I’ll be OK”.
And, in the nursing home, wondering if her parents knew that she was there; wistful when
no card came from them for her birthday; anxious still about not being there to help her
dad; asking us, when she was unwell, if we had let her mum know.
Love - for her son, her husband, her young brothers, her parents - was topmost in her mind,
when dementia had stripped everything else away.
And so the woman I miss is a love-filled mother and that love-filled daughter; trust in her
voice when I took hankies out the drawer for her, or took biscuits out of a cupboard for her,
or, on cold mornings, put a hat on her head and she told me that her mother had left them
there for her.
Love. It's never wasted. It's what remains.
"And now, these three remain; faith, hope and love. But the greatest of these is love" (1).
Footnotes:
(1) https://www.biblegateway.com/passage/?search=1+corinthians+13%3A13&version=NIVUK
Footnotes:
(1) https://www.biblegateway.com/passage/?search=1+corinthians+13%3A13&version=NIVUK
