On Saturday my brother went, but on Sunday he couldn’t, so I did. We got out of the car and a girl coming out said mama was telling everyone that her daughter had left her at the circus and never came back. I rolled my eyes, and knew what I faced in there. We went in and an aid said” Boy are you in trouble but she’s right about the circus part. We all laughed. Mama was busy gripping about the fact that we hadn’t come yet. She said well, it’s about time and I said, “Why are you always gripping“? She thinks I have no life outside of her. She’s selfish. But that’s not new. Sometimes I thought I was going to spend my life in the nursing home, before I am old enough to be there myself. Irv asked her if she had been to the circus and she said she didn’t remember. Mama says, “You all been to church.” WELL, At least it was Sunday this time.

It’s the last day of January and when we showed up at Hudson, mama was sitting there with the mean look, that we have come to know so well. “Well, I had given up on you coming to see me ever“, she says. Beverly rolled her eyes and I knew how sick she was of mama. Heck, I’m sick of mama. That’s awful, I know, but my nerves are gone and if I can hardly stand her for a few hours, how does Beverly feel living with her day and night. I went to talk with Beverly and she said she had hurt mama’s feelings, ’cause she told her to shut up saying that no one was coming, over and over. She also told her that she was spoiled by her family. I told her, yes she is and she wants what she wants, when she wants it, and Beverly said, “Tell me about it.” All you hear out of mama is me or I. If I don’t go down there she will drive them nuts and if I do, she will drive me nuts. I tried to tell mama what she was doing and that no one would like her if she didn’t quit, but it doesn’t change anything. It’s hopeless. It’s Alzheimer’s. Then when she started the stay with me stuff, I told her that she would have me stay 24 hours a day and that wouldn’t be enough. I had a little life left and I wasn’t staying with her. She whined that she didn’t have anyone. I said, “Mama you are the ONLY person in this home that has someone everyday.” Most of them have no one and some have a visitor every week or so. She started her, BUT, and I turned and walked out. I was too tired.

Here it is Feb 1 and I walked to the door and could hear Beverly say, “It’s not time yet” and mama say, ”No one’s coming today either”. Beverly looked up and shook her head, when she saw me. I took mama out to the dining room and I told her that she’s rotten and she says” well I don’t stink yet.” She knows she’s spoiled. Then she says,” it’s a long time from one Sat to the next.” And I said, “It’s Bill, that comes on the weekends, I’m here everyday”. She says” you are?”

My friend Johnnie, who’s in there because of a stroke and can’t talk, her son just died and her family had come in to tell her the news. They told her about her son’s death and I felt so bad for all of them. Sometimes you get to thinking you are the only one with problems. Then you see someone else. They were going to take her to the funeral home to see her son and she’s is bad shape but wants to go. There’s a lot of stories going on in there all the time. It wasn’t very long after her son’s death that Johnnie died. The next day, Ladonna (a resident) had mama by the fireplace. When I went in Ladonna said, mama was going to X us. I assumed she meant hex, but whatever, I knew what mama was doing. Mama’s grandson called to talk to her and mama told him that she had been to church, hasn’t eaten lunch and it was 3pm and then she handed me the phone. I would talk to him a minute and then say to mama, “guess who wants to talk to you” and she would say “who“? And I would hand her the phone back and as if it was the first time, she would tell him the same thing and hand the phone back to me and this went on for over a hour. Each time she got the phone back, it was as if she had never talked to him before. At least it took up time and I needed it.

Poor mama’s eyes are watering so bad and getting worse each day. They are red and like little slits and she has to keep wiping them. I’m so afraid that she’s going all the way blind. She will still tell us that she walked when she can’t walk, that she can feed herself when she can’t and that she can do everything for herself and could live at home. She can’t even go to the bathroom without an aid wiping her and she wears diapers but doesn't know it. She was on one of the, How old am I , today. Over and over she would ask how old she was and then say, “that’s old” and I have outlived my mama and daddy, grandpa and everyone and then in a second she would go again. She had forgotten about her brother and that was a blessing and had quit asking to go all the time and that was a blessing too. She told Mary that we had gone off again and didn’t take her. That will always be, I guess. Mama is getting to the point that she can’t stand a lot of people around or a lot of talking. She will get real agitated. I took her to her room and told her that she didn’t have to worry about anything, cause Beverly would take care of her when I wasn’t’ here.( Poor Beverly) there’s not one thing I can do but what I’m doing. It must be awful to be lost and scared all the time. Mama doesn’t know where her room is, when she’s within a few feet of it, yet she always wants to go home but so does all the rest. Almost every resident spends their day looking for a way out. One lady asks you to help her get to her car, one asks if we will take her home, one says she’s waiting to be picked up, and took home. They ALL want to go home and none of them know where home is.

It’s Saturday, the middle of Feb and mama was sitting hollering, ”Have you seen them, Have you seen them, to everyone that went by”. I got her and she said,” There you are, I knew you would come and eat with me, I was waiting to eat“. I told her that she had eaten lunch 2 hours ago. About that time, my brother came in and had a piece of cake and gave it to her, and she told him she hadn’t had lunch yet and we had to get the aid to tell her she had lunch a long time ago. Mama took the napkin and started folding it like she did in the hospital with the sheets. She worked and worked trying to fold it and she just shut us out, like we weren’t there. The nurse walked up and asked how we were and I said” we’re just watching mama folding” and she said” well, I won’t say more, you already know and I said, yeah, I’m afraid I do.”