What I Wish I Knew Before My Mother’s Alzheimer’s Death
“They say the disease takes a big downward step and then stabilizes, but that those periods of stability get shorter and shorter.”
“she had lost the ability to walk”
“we finally encountered the real killer with Alzheimer’s—forgetting how to swallow.”
“She hated those—even in her advanced state, she refused those pastel, toddler sippy cups. I could get her to take one or two sips of water from a normal glass, but her eyes would go dark when I tried with a sippy cup. I clung to that.”
“She may have been in the grips of the last stages, but by gosh, she wasn’t going to lose what shred of dignity she still had by drinking from a plastic pink sippy cup!”
“Why is Alzheimer’s so cruel to steal memories and awareness, but leave the emotions?”
“she had forgotten how to cough, forgotten that coughing would clear the airways, that it was important to spit or swallow the phlegm. Instead, she sputtered. It was distressing to see her like this, and we asked, like we always did, “Are you in pain?” For the first time in the eight years that she battled the disease, she nodded yes, yes.”
“I didn’t understand that when she still did a slow tap-tap-tap on her head, it would be the last time she would move. Either I misunderstood the doctor, or I didn’t want to understand the doctor—I thought she would be comfortable, without pain, but still awake.”
“I learned that there is a silver lining to the disease. By the end, the patient is unaware of their condition, unaware that they will die from it. Not like a cancer patient, that is fully aware of the terminal nature of their disease until the end. An Alzheimer’s patient isn’t aware and that is a blessing”
“And that is the one good thing about Alzheimer’s, it makes saying goodbye at the end easier for the family and for the patient.”
