Slippage

Brain Disease.
Doctors call it Alzheimers or Dementia.
It is a brain disease.

The brain is a functional organ that is the hard drive for our bodies.
When the brain misfires it begins to have Bad Sectors and cannot be rebooted or reset. Portions of memory files are misplaced or become corrupt and lost in in the recycle bin to be lost forever. The brain slips a bit like a vinyl record with a bad scratch. It is not fixable. Files keep slipping away and taking memories with them.
The brain eventually forgets how to tell the rest of the body how to function.  The 'hard drive' begins to have terrible issues as time moves on, more functions are lost.

Well at least this is how I have come to understand Dementia. I decided that since I have to live with that ugly word, I would make it less ugly and call it Brain Slippage.
I've had to explain my MIL's condition more than once to a relative. The best thing I could come up with has been the analogy to the computer's hard drive and system of files.

Once the computer's hard drive is so full of gaps and holes, the rest of the functions no longer work.

I just finished reading The Last Ocean, A Journey Through Memory and Forgetting by Nicci Gerrard.

If you have an aging partner or parent, it is a worthy read. We can never truly understand how memories and the brain function, but the author show us how compassion and caring are so important. How we should not let those with Slippage become unseen and forgotten people.

Are we truly made up of our memories? What happens when those memories are no longer? Are we then something or someone else? What defines us?

These are questions the author asks us.

When I visit with my MIL. I see slippage. What was reality a year ago or even just months ago is no longer. She has lost 10 years of memories which is fine because she is perfectly happy recalling her house on the ridge and not the apartment she moved into.
Will she recall her great grandchildren? Probably as they are something that may be more important in her file system.
She knows me and sometimes I am younger in her mind and sometimes I am in the present.

Does it matter to her? No, she is perfectly happy or so she thinks. She asked me to show her a photo of the building she used to live in. She said someone told her she used to live there. I brought it up on my phone and showed it to her.
She shook her head.

Nope. She couldn't picture it at all. Couldn't recall what the apartment looked like either.
But the house on the ridge, do you recall that?

Oh yes!
I asked if it bothered her at all not recalling the apartment. And she looked me straight in the eye and asked me:

Why would it?

Indeed.
Don't try to convince her that she HAS to remember. That is such a big mistake with those that have slippage. Don't force what they cannot recall.

Trying to make her recall things that have drifted away is only an irritant. It does nothing to make her day happier.
Bingo makes her happy.
Painting class makes her happy.
Meals make her happy.

Visits from loved ones make her whole world. It brightens the day by day routine of eat, sleep, nap, get wheeled somewhere, and look out a window or stare at a wall.

I don't mind it when she falls asleep while I am visiting. I sometimes hold her hand just to be with her. Sometimes I wait for a while and then give her a hug and leave.
She loves hugs.

One day her memory of me may slip into the recycle bin and be lost.

One flew over the Cuckoo's Nest..

Anyone remember that movie or the title?

That is what lunch with MIL is like. 5 people at the lunch table getting their bibs on. I help anyone who asks if they'd like help. Conversations are funny. One lady ~ Joan is a literal blabber mouth. She will talk up a storm! She was rather down today, apparently her daughter doesn't come visit often. 

My MIL's provider visited her today. Asked how she was. MIL said "so-so", the doctor asked to listen to her lungs as she had been treated for pneumonia two weeks ago. The doc asked her if her cough got better. MIL looked at her and said "what cough? I wasn't sick!" MIL dove into her orange slices as the doc listened to her lungs. She told MIL she still had a bit of crackle and pop in the lower left lob of her lung. MIL said "do not," and devoured her noodles. 

The doctor asked how was her OT? MIL said "don't have that. I had more of that when I was in my apartment." Doc explained that the OT was going to change her leg wraps more because she was leaking and had wounds and the diuretics to remove the fluid were no longer working as they should.

MIL ignored her and slurped her Shasta then dove into her biscuit. Finally the doctor asked MIL who I was and I identified myself as her daughter in law. The others at the table watched and listened but mostly just were curious as to who the lady with the stethoscope was. 

Joan went on about something about her hands and her daughter and how she didn't want to eat. She laughed. John who sits across from her spent about 4 minutes recapturing the orange slices off his bib with his one good hand. When he did his face came alive with joy! He got the slices into his mouth and 'mouthed' out the word "WOW!"

Then he tried to creep over to Lisa at the end of the table who likes to close her eyes to put food in her mouth. Lisa saw that and turned herself towards him saying, "I'm fat! I have to drink my water before soda! HI John!" She and he crept towards each other. John's wheel chair was locked but he is a big guy and kept lurching it. Lisa and John got hold of each other to .. heck, I don't know what they intended to do...! But I signaled an aide and we got them sorted before one or the other flipped out of their chairs. Lisa proclaimed it was "Good! Nice day. I don't have to eat today, I'm not coming tomorrow." This as she was eating.

Um. The lady next to her Karen... spoke softly then said "Don't be crazy you have to come tomorrow."

"No I don't."

"Yes I do."

John on the other side was making faces. Joan decided she'd had enough and pushed through Karen's backside to leave. Wheelchair bumper car. More aides and we got that sorted.

MIL asked me who that lady was that had just seen her. I said, "Your doctor."

MIL: "Oh no, she isn't. I think my doctor is in Viroqua. And why do they keep changing my room? Every time I leave they move my room!"

I asked if the lunchroom mob would like me to visit tomorrow as their were no activities due to it being 4th of July. I said we could do a wheelchair parade. 

John mimed clapping with one hand. Lisa said she didn't have to come tomorrow...only on Thursdays. Joan was scooting down the hall and Karen said, "Sure but it isn't 4th of July, it is December but it is too hot."

Of course, that made perfect sense.

I got MIL part of the way to her room. I am not allowed to push her if she doesn't have her leg rests in. MIL was upset I had to leave to get Rich. I found someone to let them know she said she'd need help to find her room again. I turned around to leave and ran into John who tried to high five me.

I think MIL's floor is for dementia patients. Now let me say that some days we have the greatest sanest conversations, on other days I am not sure what is going on. 

I really must say that I do love visiting with these folks. One day Lisa took my hand and thanked me for having the courage to come and sit with them as often as I did. To tell you the truth, I kinda dig them. 

So Charlie will have a long walk early in the day, a bath and then I will decorate him with r/w/b spangly bows on his harness and we will go visitin'. It is supposed to be wretched and stormy so why not?

Just as long as they don't keep me.