Yet more with dementia

As time goes by the dementia changes make life for us more interesting. My mother is now in assisted living and we visit her every few days. Each day a different person greets us (even though it's always mom).

For the first couple of weeks it was always "when can I go home?". When we asked where home is it was always where she lived 10+ years ago. In fact she can't recall where she lived for the past few years.

Other times it is "am I still getting my social security checks?". Then it's "I don't have any money." Of course in the assisted living place everything is available without the need for money.

Most recently she commented that it was nice of us to visit so she has someone to talk to. When we mentioned that there are more than 100 people living in the same place she said "I don't want to talk to them."

That's like her walker. It was prescribed at her last hospital episode but she doesn't even look at it. "Those are for old people." She holds on to furniture and walls as she walks, but simply refuses to even consider the walker she now owns.

But she still remembers my wife and me and asks how the kids are doing. She refers to her room as her "apartment - but I wish I had a kitchen."

An interesting experience for all of us!

Misplacing Things

Another aspect of dementia is misplacing things. This happened this past week. Mom uses a hot water bottle because she's always cold. On Wednesday she carried it into the kitchen and put it in the cabinet with the snacks. She didn't say anything, nor did we. Yesterday I told her I was going shopping and asked if she wanted anything. "Get me a hot water bottle," she said.

I told her she put her hot water bottle in a strange place but we assumed she knew what she was doing. "What did I do, put it in the freezer?" I then took her to it. No comment.

She now has the hot water bottle back - for now.