Let Me Tell You about My Mom

The evening before she turned 72, my mom did this.

Not very dignified of her, was it?  ;-)

To tell you the truth, I was thrilled to see her acting this way...and so were my boys.  David remembered when Grandma had played balloon ball with him some years ago, and he was eager for a repeat performance.

Connecting the generations, adding fullness of life to my parents in their older years, making happy memories together--this is why we live here.

As I mentioned earlier, we had angel food cake for my mother's birthday.

Some traditions are too good to ever change.  :)

After supper, I showed Mother the picture of her and I that I had put on Facebook, and she smiled and laughed as she read the kind comments people left there, wishing her a happy birthday.

Before my parents headed down the hill to their house that night, I snagged the opportunity to have a picture taken with my two favorite girls...  :)

...and then took one of just the two of them.

There's a lot of love between those two.  :)

Some of you may already know that my mother has Alzheimer's Disease.  I haven't written much about it, wanting to respect my parents' privacy and let them tell their own story, so to speak; but during this past year, they've reached a new level of openness and are, I believe, becoming an incredible example to those around them of how to faithfully love and care for each other, whether times are easy or hard.  So I feel more freedom to write about this area of life.

There is so much I could write about this Alzheimer's journey.  So much.  But for tonight, I'll mention only a few things.

My mother has a fairly strong family history of Alzheimer's, with her dad being her closest relative to be afflicted with it.  Since we knew that Alzheimer's has a genetic link, we've "always" been aware that she might develop it; and for quite a few years of her middle-age-and-up life, there were many times of wondering, "Is this it?  Is she developing Alzheimer's?"  But about 10 years ago, my dad realized that yes, the things he was seeing in her were almost certainly because of Alzheimer's, rather than the "normal" forgetfulness that comes with aging.  I had my revelation of that 9 years ago, when my parents came to visit us in Israel in the fall of 2004; being around her that week made me see things in a new light, and I became convinced that we were indeed dealing with Alzheimer's.

Before I go on, let me say that out of everyone in the whole wide world, I don't think God could have found anyone more suited to care for my mom than my dad.  Dad, being a medical doctor, was aware, through the years, of every medical advance that came down the pike; and he immediately utilized virtually every treatment he heard of to try to help Mom.  Besides that, Dad has been interested in nutrition, natural remedies, alternative treatments, etc. so every time he heard about something in those areas that was showing some success in treating Alzheimer's, he investigated and often got Mom involved in those treatments as well.  On top of his strengths in traditional medicine and alternative therapies, my dad is also blessed with a kind, caring, loyal, compassionate nature.  For MANY years, he used those characteristics to care for the patients in his medical practice.  Now his practice is reduced to basically one patient (along with occasional calls for medical advice for his children and grandchildren!) ;-), and he is doing a superb job of loving and caring for Mother.  I appreciate him more than I can express.

* I should add that my dad also works occasionally at a nearby medical clinic that provides care for the conservative and Older Order Mennonite communities, so technically he does have more than one patient.  :)

For having had Alzheimer's for 10 years, my mom is still in amazing shape and is able to function fairly well--so well, in fact, that if you were to spend a short amount of time with her, you might not even realize that she has this disease.  A longer amount of time would convince you though.

As time has gone by, Mother has lost the ability to do certain things--cook meals, for example, since the numerous steps that cooking requires are too challenging for her mind to follow, and that is one of the reasons why they eat their evening meals with us.  But we rejoice in the abilities she retains.  For example, she...
~ plays the piano regularly for church.  Dad has to tell her what to play and when to play it, and the Sunday mornings when she plays are filled with frequent questions from her and answers from him.  But when she sits at the piano with the music in front of her, her fingers start to dance over those oh-so-familiar 88 keys; and if you were to hear her, you might not believe she even has Alzheimer's!
~ carries wood from the woodpile into the woodshed.  She LOVES to do this--really and truly loves it--probably because it reminds her of her childhood when she worked with wood with her daddy.  With my days full of mothering, homeschooling, and homemaking, it is a huge blessing for me that she takes on this task--and does it so cheerily!  (And, by the way, my boys do some work with the wood, too, and even Jeff on his days off carries in some wood.  But the biggest wood-worker this year is definitely my mom.)
~ picks up sticks from under the trees.  We use those sticks for kindling, and my mom's labor in this way makes it so much easier for me to start fires in our woodstove.  This is another job that she LOVES to do.
~ makes stevia-sweetened iced tea for us.  Almost every evening, she faithfully carries up a gallon of tea for us to enjoy, and Jeff and I are so thankful for this!
~ helps with the dishes sometimes.  Another job she loves to do.
~ loves my kids (and Jeff and I, too, of course!).  She might not remember their names (although she does always seem to remember Moriah's!), but she recognizes them as belonging to us and she loves them deeply.

A few years ago, I was talking with Mom and asking her, in essence, how she felt about the future.  I wish I could have recorded her reply.  With so much peace and calm assurance in her voice, she told me that she isn't afraid of the future.  She said that, when she was younger, she had watched the members of her family care, with an abundance of love and patience, for those who had developed Alzheimer's; and she knew that we would care for her in such a way.  Her acceptance, confidence, and security was astonishing and blessed my heart so much.

Despite the downward progression of the disease and the way it's almost entirely eliminated her short-term memory, my mother continues to have an amazing spirit about her.  She is so grateful.  Every night before they leave our house after dinner, she pauses for a moment to thank me for the food and for the time together.  Every night.  

She is cheerful and cooperative.  If I go down to her house and ask her if she'd like to come up to carry in wood, she smiles brightly and says, "Oh, yes!"

If she wakes up from a nap on Friday afternoon and thinks that it's Sunday morning and starts putting on church clothes, she responds with good humor to being corrected, and laughs as she tells me about it.

She is open about having Alzheimer's and is willing to tell people about it.  She's accepted it and sometimes brings it up in conversation.

She is warm and loving, affectionate, joyful, and most of all appreciative.  I cannot emphasize this enough: her level of gratitude is probably higher than that of anyone I've ever known.  She is SO thankful for Dad and cheerfully leans on him to, in a sense, be her brain.

Alzheimer's isn't a disease I would wish on anyone; and if you've ever been close to someone who had it, you already know the unique challenges it brings.  But I've learned that as we--and our parents--age, we don't really get to choose the path our bodies and minds will take.  Since God has laid out this path in front of us, we will walk it, trusting Him for the strength to face each day and each new stage of the disease.  

And over and over, I'll remember that my dearly loved mother is just about the best Alzheimer's patient in the history of the world!  :)  And I'll whisper "thank You, God" again and again for that.