Well, it wasn't really the last supper and it wasn't
really supper, but I took my mother to lunch in the big dining room
today, hoping to see my favorite server, Piyush, and maybe the woman we ate
with all the time, Margaret. I was in luck; we saw both.
When I got to Atria at 11:15, they told me they thought she
must have been awake all night because she was sound asleep. I guess
sometimes she spends the night walking the halls (I wonder what she'll do at
Eldervilla). I managed to wake her up and she was quite verbal, but
making no sense. Talking about "she wanted me to it but I didn't think
it was right." She couldn't say who "she" was or what "it" was but she
certainly was emphatic about it all.
I tried to get her dressed and put her in the shirt she wore
yesterday, but she told me it didn't fit, so I put her in a different shirt
and when I tried to get her pants on she said she had to go to the bathroom
to pee. I said "OK...go to the bathroom" but that was entirely too
confusing for her. She kept asking what she was supposed to do and
when I answered "go to the bathroom" she accused me of trying to confuse
her.
Anyway, she finally disappeared and I assumed she was going
to the bathroom but when I went to check, she wasn't there. I had
visions of her wandering the halls in her shirt and Depends. I got
Ali, one of the staff, to look in other people's rooms for her and she
finally found her--in the bathroom. I don't know where she had been
when I looked there. Maybe her roommate's bedroom?
I tried to get her to put on her shoes. The new shoes I
bought her are too small and the second pair I bought has disappeared, along
with the framed photos of seven of her siblings and several photo books I
had made for her. I wonder what we are going to find when we start
packing up the place! I finally got her to understand she needed to
put shoes on her feet (which was also too confusing for her to
understand) and as soon as she had completed that, she took them off again
because I hadn't explained that she should leave them on.
We eventually were able to leave the memory unit and go to
the main dining room, where she ate 3x a day for 4 years, but she didn't
have a clue where we were. Even seeing people being served food she
didn't know what kind of place it was.
We both had chicken soup and then fish and chips. The
chicken soup came with visible herbs in it, which she was convinced were
bugs. She took the "bugs" out of every bite, but managed to finish the
soup, leaving a pile of herbs at the bottom of the bowl.
Piyush came to say hello and I told her it was the last time
we would be there at the dining room. Then I saw Margaret leaving the
room. I called to her and she came over. Margaret is someone my
mother ate with every day for about 2-3 years and it's weird her reaction to
my mother. She acts as if she is not there, never looks at her and
didn't say anything to her, but did ask me about her. My mother, of
course, had no clue who she was and just kept eating and picking "bugs" out
of her soup.
The strangest, most surprising thing about Margaret is that
she mentioned that Robert, a veterinarian we used to eat with, just
celebrated his 102nd birthday. She said "He's just doing great.
I'm 79 and not nearly as good as he is." I always assumed Margaret was
in her 80s and I still can't believe she's Walt's age!!!
My plan had been to take her to SuperCuts after lunch because
she sorely needs a haircut and I wanted her to look nice and tidy when she
moved into Eldervilla. But I left my purse in her apartment when we
went to lunch and I didn't think she could make it all the way back to the
memory unit and then all the way back to the car...and even if she
could, I wasn't sure I wanted to.
When we got to her apartment, I sat down to call the Atria
beauty parlor again (there was nobody there yesterday) and found out they
have an opening at 2 tomorrow, so that took me off the hook for SuperCuts.
When I turned around to look at her, she had taken off her shoes and was
back in bed, so even if I wanted to try SuperCuts, she wouldn't have wanted
to go. But this will be better. The timing is perfect and they
can get her all fixed up and she won't sleep on the hair until that night,
so it will be fresh for Eldervilla.
I was glad we didn't have to go to SuperCuts. Days like
this just take so much out of me, trying to deal with her dementia. I
had planned to go the CVS and buy toiletries for her but didn't have the
energy. I'll do that before I go to Atria.
When I left the memory unit, there was one woman letting us
out the door whom I recognized and I told her that we would be moving her
tomorrow. She asked where we were going and when I told her she said
her husband works there occasionally had has nothing but good things to say
about it...and he loves Simba (the dog). Another good review for
Eldervilla!
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