Many thanks for your reply Hazara8. Mum doesn't have a care plan yet so i need to follow this up. I am going in today to try and help her eat Sunday lunch. I worry so much and have spent so much time with mum over the last 8 years she has been diagnosed that i have become tired and jaded which I know won't help her. I spent 2-3 hours feeding her little bits in hospital, now when she spits out the food a couple of times I tend to give up. I was hoping the Home would have more success as they must have seen this sort of thing before. She also keeps her eyes closed for a lot of the time so she can't see the food. I talk to her the whole time saying how nice the food is. I'm not sure she sees much even with her eyes open (nothing wrong with her vision as far as I am aware). I will keep trying but mum and I are both exhausted from fighting this terrible disease.
Like so many others here, who have direct experience of this aspect of dementia, one can but appreciate the sheer burden of effort and relentless expectation which is one's lot when dealing with a loved one, reluctant or simply unable to receive food and drink. The hospital environment I am only too familiar with, having 'nursed' my own mother for one month, striving to offer food and drink, but to no avail. There was no question of forcing anything, but simply that innate desire for the one you hold so very close to your heart, to simply sustain life. At the end, I was using a syringe to lubricate her mouth, as it had become parched. A very difficult time. Mother never returned to the Care Home. But your mother
has. Therefore, one simply takes each day as it comes, with close attention to any changes in habit and so on. Dementia can play havoc with eating and drinking. But I have seen what looks like a desperate situation, transform into a positive one. Every case is different. My mother too, kept her eyes shut for long periods. It would take some effort - gentle coaxing - before she would open them and look straight into my eyes and smile widely. I was probably the only one she genuinely recognised towards the end, having lived with her for twelve years. So, you carry on and you do everything that is humanly possible to care and to comfort. Beyond this, dementia makes all the rules. But, amidst what so very often feels like a merciless and hopeless endeavour, there exists something
very special and which does not always transpire in the normal way of things. And that is, a depth of relationship which is brought about solely by the nature of dementia itself. There is, what I personally name 'a secondary bonding'. By this, I mean that the 'parent/child' relationship, apart from taking on a role-reversal process, becomes in some way intensified by way of the process and progression of the dementia with all its challenging and seemingly heartless onslaughts upon your loved one. Like a mother with a newly born child, nurturing, tending, aware fundamentally of a vulnerability, an innocence, a precious life - embraced by a love which cannot be put into words - when that is present, regardless of all else, it tells you very clearly about your humanity. And so, if there can ever be anything 'positive' to say about dementia, perhaps this is it. That 'secondary bonding'. And for me, it has remained as life-enhancing a reality now, no less than when it came about, without invitation, during that period not so very long ago. With very warm wishes.