Do I Have to

12/24/2014

Do you remember when you were a child and your parent or guardian told you to go clean your room the standard response was, "do I have to". Well, when Alzheimer moved in I think my response was, "do I have to". Just like when you were a child you really did not have any choice. That room was going to get cleaned one way or the other. If it was the other way than you may have had all the toys on the floor put in a large black garbage bag and told that they were being thrown away. After the temper tantrum that you threw and sulking around for a week than the toys miraculously reappeared in your room on the shelving. Little did you know that your parent or guardian had put them in the attic or some other hiding place and just pretended to throw them away.

Well, when you find out that one of your family members has been diagnosed with Alzheimer's the first thing that you do is think, "do I have to." Not only is your life never going to be the same but there is some stuff mixed in there that you could have done quite nicely with out, thank you very much. The one thing that most care givers do is think that they can do this all by them selves. Mother has insisted on doing everything and not let anyone help. I don't agree with that but she is the Mother and I am only the child. I can voice my opinion but chances are she is not going to listen to me. When I mentioned having someone come in from the Alzheimer's Unit at the V.A. to help with JW's personal care you would have thought that I was asking for the Queen of England to come here. JW said under no circumstances was he going to have someone come in here and wash him. I said that if you were in the hospital you would not have a say about someone washing you. Needless to say. I lost that battle.

The one thing that I do have that I have not had before is my husband's family. When we got married I had 6 people in my family picture. He had 187. I am not kidding. I went from virtually very few family members to family overload. My brother and sister-in-law's could not be better if I ordered them special made. They listen to me talk and cry right along with me. They have been very understanding when I cannot make family functions because they know that I am home with my parents. You have a lot of emotions to deal with when you are dealing with this hateful disease. I know that if I had to call any of them in the middle of the night they would be here for me. Today we had Christmas Eve dinner as a family. 22 people. That is only the immediate family. Tomorrow we will have Christmas dinner for my parents and James and I. We will see the kids in a couple of weeks when they can spend the whole day with us and they will not have to run off to visit other family members.

I guess the answer to my question is, "Yes, we have to". You may not like it but you will do all you can to make that family members time left on this earth a little more bearable. If you can, let someone help you with the daily chores. The chores will change and there will be a lot of things that you will not expect to happen. Keep your sense of humor and my constant mantra is, "Give me Grace." I may not know exactly what I am doing some of the time but I need to be mindful that this is someone's life that I am helping to take care of. This is private club and we are NOT going to invite anyone to join. In case you do get recruited  just remember, "Yes, we have to".