Mom & Me Two Archive

    It finally came to my attention that this discussion was necessary. She not only awoke late today (I allowed her this), but she slogged through day (about which I can do very little; if she's going to slog, she's going to slog). The problem today, though, is that her late awakening time combined with her long nap and her generally slow attitude pushed her meals and meds so far out of whack that we were just lucky that we still had "Just Desserts" around. I'd made plans for three well spaced, nutritious, delicious meals, which would also appropriately space her meds. As well, I haven't been worried about her "under the weather" days. But, I did help to create this monster in October by accident and then in November on purpose, so, I decided, it's time to modify the monster so I don't have to scurry by habit in order to make sure she is well fed, well med-ed and gets in some quality "up" time.
    I opened the subject by expressing exactly what I wrote in the paragraph above. Not only can I not see any reason not to be truthful and to take responsibility for my part in her life but it seems disrespectful to me to either order her around without reason and discussion and/or have "pretend" conversations that are created out of undignified assumptions about what she can and can't understand or remember.
    After my opening I suggested that we try a 1000 wake up time for the next several days to see how it goes. Despite reminding her that she awoke at 1018 of her own accord the day before yesterday, she was shocked by and not completely happy with my suggestion. She understood the necessity of it, both from my point of view and from the perspective that it might do her some good to be up a bit more than she's lately been. I thought about reminding her of the couple of days when we did "informal" exercising and how she either delayed or forgot about napping on those days but decided, no, unnecessary information.
    She's agreed to "give it a try". We start tomorrow. I'm looking forward to this.

    I've been thinking today, as well, about the mechanics of my mother's memory in connection with her short term memory's inability to hold information. What I've noticed is that the information isn't dumped. It's as though any current information is immediately whisked out of her short term memory (perhaps doesn't stop there) but is stored in her medium and long term memory for retrieval when necessary. Two incidents today caused me to consider this. The first I can't remember (Oops...do you suppose it's catching?!?) but the second I doubt I'll ever forget. When I returned from Costco, awoke her and announced that I'd managed to gather everything we needed for the Christmas dinner we agreed upon yesterday she said, "I thought you decided you didn't want to celebrate Christmas this year."
    This came as a surprise. I didn't think she'd remembered this. "Well, yeah," I said. "But, you know, we talked about it a couple of days ago and decided a special dinner would be nice. Then, after changing my mind a couple times, we decided on the tomato sausage biscuit pie."
    "Yes, I remember," she said. My mother's sense of personal dignity is not tied to her memory so she would not have said this if she didn't remember. "But, I figured you'd abandon the tomato pie just like you abandoned the pork roast."
    Whoa! She remembered the pork roast! "Are you disappointed?"
    "Not at all. You just seemed to need to do Christmas the way you used to, this year."
    I was flattered she remembered and pleased that she was accepting of my No Holidays This Year decision. "Well, I still feel like that's what I'm doing. Even when I lived alone I'd occasionally do something special on the holiday, like go see one of the movies that started on the holiday or fix myself something special to eat, maybe something I'd never tried. So, this isn't that much different. Except I'm doing it with you. Which is very nice, by the way."
    "Good," she said. "You did say you got the cheesecake, didn't you?" Some things obviously brand one's memory.
    "Are you disappointed about not seeing relatives this year?"
    "No. Not at all. We can see them any time and the holidays are so rush-rush. We don't really get a chance to sit and talk."
    This isn't completely true but she knows it isn't and we both know what she means. On almost any holiday there's the clatter of "special, special day" in the background, drowning out any possibility of sitting back and chatting over coffee.
    I've noticed this before, that information isn't lost to her, it's just shuffled around so fast she can't keep up with it in the short term. But, given some time it all comes back and settles into its appropriate places in the puzzle.
    Later.