Morning, Mom.... 'Night, Mother


My mom is something known as a sundowner.  In the mornings she's energetic and chatty.  Her eyes are bright and she's quick to smile.

Along about lunchtime, however, she begins a slow fade.  Sometimes it starts later than other times, but by 5pm, she's not the same person.  Her eyes are dull.  Her mouth is frowning (just relaxed, not actively frowning), and sometimes we sit there and say nothing because she can't hold up her end of the conversation.  If I try to converse, she gets frustrated because she can't do it back.  So we sit quietly.  I make sure she eats something for dinner.  Sometimes I wipe her face off.  I change her diaper, put on her pjs and make sure she's comfy in the bed.  The TV is on with the volume low and I turn off all the other lights.  I kiss her forehead and tell her I love her and go home.

She's not as bad as some.  Some sundowners get agitated or violent.  Some go walk-about (why most facilities keep the doors locked - so the patients can't leave).  Her sundowning is very mild compared to those, but it's still a drastic change from who she is in the mornings.

Tonight I sat with her, holding her hand.  It had been a long day of physical labor, one I was hesitant to share with her because I was rearranging her former home to make it manageable for my father.  So I just sat quietly.  Her eyes were closed and I thought she was drifting off to sleep, but then she spoke.  "You're very patient."  

I wasn't always.  My ex-husband said I could go from zero to sixty faster than a race car.  Patience is a relatively recent thing for me.  I think it was when I was dealing with my in-laws that I began to learn patience.  My father-in-law was an alcoholic and not a very nice one - I didn't have a lot of patience with him, but my mother-in-law was the sweetest person you could ever meet.  She developed Alzheimer's and it took a long time to take her.  It didn't take long for her to not know who people were, though she always remembered me.  Everyone else kept asking her "don't you remember?" or "remember when..." and of course she didn't.  She would get frustrated with them and they got frustrated with her because they expected her to still be her.  And she wasn't.  Maybe it was because I hadn't known her all my life, but I had no expectations of her.  She was just who she was and I related to her that way.  We were always happy to see each other, but if I didn't turn up for a while, it didn't matter.  Time worked differently for her, and she was happy whenever I could be there.

I think of my mother-in-law as a gift.  She taught me patience.  And she taught me now to relate to someone who's brain function wasn't what it used to be.  She taught me how to be a good daughter to my mother now.  So I don't rush.  And I don't expect.  The Morning Mom and the Night Mother are still my mom and I love them both.

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