It's a documentary on HBO that I've recently been watching and it makes me wonder, especially with my family's multitude of genetic disease, including Alzheimer's. I keep imagining what it will be like IF/when my mom, or my dad, find themselves in that predicament. I've yet to watch an episode without a tear or two. See, my great grandmother (mom's side) has dementia, she never knows who I am, and her sister, brother and sister-in-law had/have Alzheimer's. It's inevitable that someone closer to me will have it, it may be years but it's something to consider now given my Nanny's current situation. At family functions I no longer approach Nanny Rhea, I dunno if it's fear or what, but I'm afraid that, should I approach her for the usual hug, she will look at me and ask, "who are you?". My sister and I have never been close to our Nanny Rhea. She has a HUGE family and lives in Dallas, so growing up in Gunter, we only saw her on holidays. On those occasions (and less than 5 years ago), we always saw her with her pearls and a dress on, looking at us saying "hug my neck" and "I've lost 10lbs, can you believe it!" (she always looked the same, but you had to love her consistency). Now she sits there, with her walker and looks at you as though she has no idea who you are. Again, I've never been close with Nanny Rhea but I'm afraid my mother will follow in those footsteps, perhaps years from now but this show has made me think of it. It just makes me sad that's all. Damn HBO!
***Can't we just go back to the previous post DANG!***
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3 comments:
Weird. Immediately after posting this I called and spoke with my mom, I found out that my Nanny's brother, Jim, passed away last night from cancer, he was married to the aforementioned sister-in-law, Mary, that passed away from Alzheimer's. Strange right?
I'm right there with you on avoiding Nanny. She always asks me if Emma is mine.
I know she is thinking "that little girl is really dark"
I hate to think about taking care of our parents as they get older in general. There is a John Mayer song about this called Stop This Train and I always cry when I hear it.
In recent years I have found myself pulling away from my grandmother who seems to have the beginnings of dementia. I haven't really figured out why I do that because she still knows who I am but it is just hard to be around her.
Sorry to hear about your mom's uncle.
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