I was so happy when I woke up from a dream where mom didn’t have dementia. They started after mom died, and I hadn’t realized that for the last few years of mom’s life, she always had dementia in my dreams.
For the first time since mom passed away, I had a dream about her with dementia. Oh, it was awful and when it flooded back into my brain in the shower, I spent a few minutes crying it out. It’s been ten months since she passed. As sad as it was to absorb her death, I was also thankful.
Yes. I tell you that with some guilt. However, I know that my mom had hoped she wouldn’t have to live with dementia as she watched happen to her own mom. The odd thing was as my mom moved deeper and deeper into dementia, how hard she fought to live after each set-back. She never really bounced back and with each issue became more frail and in need of more care.
I’m perplexed by how we will get better at this as a society. The right to life movement doesn’t apply to people with dementia. It’s important to have those individuals who would step in to help you understand your wishes and beliefs completely because they will have to make choices you can never imagine nor can prior guidance cover. Statistically, 9 out of 10 of us will need someone to make choices about our last days on this earth.
I had choices to make and am thankful my siblings agreed with the final choices we needed to make on mom’s behalf. We knew she didn’t want to extend the qualify of life she was living so worked with the medical team to offer her a comfortable ending. I still carry some baggage and know much of it is still part of my grief.
I still miss her and I know that while the pain may subside, the loss will never truly heal. Changed.
Thanks for your honesty Kay: this post will be helpful to so many of us as we travel on this unforgiving journey.
Strangely my husband had a dream about my father recently. He says it’s the first time he has dreamt of him since his death almost two years ago. In the dream dad had dementia and was lost and my husband woke in a terible panic.
Thanks for sharing. I still wonder what my brain is still tying to work out.
The brain works in its own mysterious way. I think we’re not very good at allowing ourselves to take as long as necessary to grieve. It’s almost as though society gives us a certain length of time then we should tidy all the tangle of emotions away, whether we are ready to do so or not.
I hope you go back to dreaming of your mum without dementia.
Me too!
Kay, I still share many of the same feelings as you do with my Mom’s passing over seven years ago. This experience is traumatic and it changes you after being forced to witness it in a loved one. We may always feel this way, but I hope that time will heal these wounds some.
Harsh realities of life. I also do sometimes dream of my father who left me years before. And agreed with katherine totally. The days I passed in neurologist massapequa nyc. I miss him.
Thanks for sharing. It is nice to know you aren’t alone.