Today was Saturday with Maggy, my very part-time gig as a caregiver for a woman with Alzheimer's. She was in great spirits today, if a little bossy, but I don't mind too much. Even when I have to make her eggs over again because they aren't soft enough. I pride myself on being patient enough to grin and bear it.
We decided to go to a movie, "The Time Traveller's Wife." This wouldn't have been my first choice in movies, but Maggy wouldn't have appreciated "District 9" either. The movie is basically about a man who can time travel, but can't control when and for how long he does it. In the process he gets married and the story line focuses on this relationship. The most gut-wrenching part of it all was when he, "Henry," randomly time travels at really bad times, making his life chaotic and unpredictable. And in a way, this is just like Maggy's life. She has no control over what she can and cannot remember. She fades in and out like a light bulb that's about to go. And she certainly time travels. Sometimes when I see her, she's 90 year old Maggy, grumpy and bossy. But sometimes, like today, she is 20 year old Maggy, asking me to call her mother to let her know where she is, and thinking the senior discount is for seniors in high school.
Usually, I over think all this stuff, wondering how it relates to my life, what meaning am I supposed to glean from these experiences? But today I'm taking Maggy's advice, "just be happy. It's just the easiest thing to do. The easiest way to be."
Showing posts with label Alzheimer's. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Alzheimer's. Show all posts
Saturday, August 22, 2009
Friday, June 26, 2009
In anticipation of Saturday
Tomorrow is the day I pick up Maggy. Every Saturday I go to her house and start all over again. Maggy is 90 years old and has Alzheimer's. I've been care giving for her the last three weeks but it has already impacted my life greatly. I decided to create this blog so I could just get my feelings out, maybe contemplate life a little.
Maggy is surprisingly spry and takes care of most of her own needs. We do cook for her because she has a hard time remembering the steps and gets really frustrated with that. The question I can't help but ask is, why? If our souls choose their own life paths, why would she choose this? Her short term memory is at this point really only about thirty seconds. Sometimes she will surprise me and remember something from last week or something, but this is rare.
Last week when I went to pick her up I was wearing an orchid colored sundress. She kept going on about how she wanted one just like it although the style would not be becoming on a 90 year old woman. It was as though, in those few hours, she'd transformed into her former twenty-something self. She told me she needed to call her mother to let her know she'd be late for dinner, she even giggled like a young girl over my wedding album. So here's where I admit that I'm a young girl, only 26. Was she somehow relating to my identity because she couldn't remember her own?
And what is this thing we call an identity anyway? Who exactly are we if strip it all away? Take away the memories, take away the relationships, take away everything we've learned. We'd still exist, she still exists. This seems now as if this is the point, the reason her soul has chosen this path. I am. She is. We are still here if you take away everything. But who exactly?
Maggy is surprisingly spry and takes care of most of her own needs. We do cook for her because she has a hard time remembering the steps and gets really frustrated with that. The question I can't help but ask is, why? If our souls choose their own life paths, why would she choose this? Her short term memory is at this point really only about thirty seconds. Sometimes she will surprise me and remember something from last week or something, but this is rare.
Last week when I went to pick her up I was wearing an orchid colored sundress. She kept going on about how she wanted one just like it although the style would not be becoming on a 90 year old woman. It was as though, in those few hours, she'd transformed into her former twenty-something self. She told me she needed to call her mother to let her know she'd be late for dinner, she even giggled like a young girl over my wedding album. So here's where I admit that I'm a young girl, only 26. Was she somehow relating to my identity because she couldn't remember her own?
And what is this thing we call an identity anyway? Who exactly are we if strip it all away? Take away the memories, take away the relationships, take away everything we've learned. We'd still exist, she still exists. This seems now as if this is the point, the reason her soul has chosen this path. I am. She is. We are still here if you take away everything. But who exactly?
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