Let Me Tell You About My Mother-in-Law

 Everyone knows the Mother-In-Law jokes. There are millions of them.  And for some people, those jokes aren't just jokes. They are living those jokes.  Not me.  My Mother-In-Law and I never had any problems with each other.  She was never anything but kind and loving to me.  She always told everyone that she loved me like a daughter.  And she did.  She never treated me any different than she would have treated her own children.

Then dementia reared it's ugly head.

Even during the worst times with this horrible disease, if I took her hands and stared into her eyes and said "Mom, I love you", she would settle down.  It seemed to bring her "back" to us when I did this.  

A while back I wrote another blog post titled "The Wonderful Day" where I described a day out with her with a Dr visit, lunch, prescription pick up, grocery store, and back home. The day started out rocky with her not wanting to take a bath and get her hair washed.  When she finally did, she felt good and we went to her Dr for a check up and for me to slip them a note about her aggression and worsening symptoms.  We then had lunch, pizza (her favorite), picked up her new meds (for the aggression) and went to the grocery store.  She was so cute when she walked past the bakery.  She looked at the packaged fresh baked cookies and said "I like cookies", so we bought some.  She was pretty happy with that!  We came home, and as she took a nap, I wrote my blog post telling how on the way home she said "This has been a wonderful day!" I was crying as I wrote that. Anytime we could see some clarity in her, it was a precious time.  I snapped a selfie of the two of us that day, and I am so happy I did!  It was the last "good" day we had.

And just to let you know the ugliness of this disease, that very night, she came at me with fists and feet flying.  "The Wonderful Day" was over.  BUT...we had that day!  That is what counted.  And when the fists and feet were flying, I knew it was not my Mother-in-law doing it.  Yes, it was her physical body doing it, but it was the Dementia making her do this.

She spent 60 days in the hospital, trying to get the aggression under control and medications figured out.  When we brought her back to our house, she was bedridden, but the aggression was still there sometimes.  We finally found the correct medicine and the "escapades" as I called them ceased.  We tried to find humor in these escapades, but sometimes in the middle of the night, it was difficult to find that humor.  I do remember one particularly funny happening.  I was vacuuming the house, and as I was working in the hallway outside her room, I kept getting frowns from her, so I stopped, went in and told her I was cleaning and needed to come in and clean her room.  She didn't like it, but said ok.  I went in and as I went past her bed, a leg came through the bed railing and she kicked me.  She REALLY didn't want me cleaning in her room that day!  I did find humor in that.  She got her point across to me with no uncertainty!  And it constantly crosses my mind that if she knew all of this, she would be mortified!  This was so out of character for her!  She was certainly strong willed, but she would NEVER have done these things!  But this tiny feisty lady could let you know in no uncertain terms that she was not going to take it...whatever the "it" was at the moment.  So if we could find humor, it definitely helped.  

We had a wonderful caregiver during the day while we were at work.  She spoiled Mom with massages, manicures, etc.  We could not have asked for anyone better.  She came with great experience, and was dismayed at first because Mom would not let her do her spoiling.  At one point Mom complained to me that she treated her like a two year old.  I explained that she only wanted to take the best care of her, and I wish somebody would spoil me like that!  Eventually they fell into a mutual agreement that when Mom was "in the mood", she could spoil her and do her nails, massage her with nice lotions, etc.  When she was not in the mood, the caregiver would sit outside of her line of vision and just "be there" in case she needed something.

Until about two weeks before she passed, she was still singing her hymns.  She loved to sing, and she loved her Lord.  She would belt out those songs and rejoice, and one particular time said to Troy "I just want to meet Jesus!"  So there is no doubt in my mind that she has met Jesus and she is singing in that Heavenly Choir!  She is free of the tortured mind that Dementia brought.  She is at peace.  And she can find all those who went before her and rejoice.

So that's who my Mother-In-Law was.  A feisty, strong willed, faith filled tiny little woman who could without a doubt stand on her own, and find her way through any problem.  She lost everything to house fires twice in her life.  She became a widow at the age of 58, and had to work two jobs to pay for her husband's funeral.  She buried two children and a grandchild.  She fought all her life to survive so many tragedies.  The fact that Dementia won out makes me so mad.  This is a horrible disease.  It is a thief.  But it has taught me so much about love and caregiving and sacrifice.  I would do it all over again without a minute's hesitation. Was it easy?  Absolutely not!  Did I lose hours and hours of sleep?  Sure did.  Do I regret it?  No.  I have no regrets at all.  And I will leave you with this:

If you ever get the chance to care for a parent, I hope you do it.  I hope you learn what I've learned, and I hope you will have no regrets.  And if you ever find yourself in this situation, PLEASE call me!  I will help you.  I will be there for you when you are exhausted at work the next day because you spent the night trying to explain that she/he needed to put their clothes back on and cover up because it is10 degrees outside and you don't want them to get sick.  I will say it's ok to tell them their medicine is for high blood pressure when they don't want to take it, when it's really to combat the aggression.  I will tell you that when they accuse you of stealing their shoes, you can go get them where she left them by the front door and apologize to her for taking them by mistake.  It will all be ok.  Eventually.