Caring for a parent I imagine must be an almost insurmountable undertaking. There are the emotional, social, financial, physical and mental stresses to contend with. Many have families of their own to raise and support. Often daughters are not equipped to physically lift a parent. There is also the generation gap to contend with. As the illness takes its toll, parent regresses in time. Their memory is not unlike a box of tissues, 'last one in is the first out'.
When they wish to 'go home' and set off, do you really know of the time and place they are mentally in? When my wife attempted to 'make her way home' on many occasions I, like many a wife/husband knew only too well it was to their childhood home. A place of comfort and safety and I was happy to chat about her home as we 'made our way there' till she tired. For me, that place hold a special memory. Though the home she wished to return to no longer exists, I often reflect on the warm welcome I first received when greeted by her family. It was my first real experience of family life.
It must be difficult for a daughters/sons to imagine what life was like for their parents in the war years and after, with food rationing etc. The speed of change in the present world is confusing enough for many of us older ones, consider what it must be like for a loved one with Alzheimer's. A journey back in time to when a parent was a child can be very rewarding when it come to understanding where they might mentally be. Sadly few wish to listen to the ramblings of the old ones.
When they wish to 'go home' and set off, do you really know of the time and place they are mentally in? When my wife attempted to 'make her way home' on many occasions I, like many a wife/husband knew only too well it was to their childhood home. A place of comfort and safety and I was happy to chat about her home as we 'made our way there' till she tired. For me, that place hold a special memory. Though the home she wished to return to no longer exists, I often reflect on the warm welcome I first received when greeted by her family. It was my first real experience of family life.
It must be difficult for a daughters/sons to imagine what life was like for their parents in the war years and after, with food rationing etc. The speed of change in the present world is confusing enough for many of us older ones, consider what it must be like for a loved one with Alzheimer's. A journey back in time to when a parent was a child can be very rewarding when it come to understanding where they might mentally be. Sadly few wish to listen to the ramblings of the old ones.
