This is the time when, perhaps, if you are very lucky, a true sense of what it really means to be human, can come about. There has been perpetual anxiety and genuine despair, along with some very good times, during the period when a loved one was living with a dementia in a Home. There was that initial moment, when a decision had to be made for Care to come into play - that role which was once your own, now relegated to others, not by choice, but simply by having no choice. The loved one, through no fault whatsoever of their own, now resides in another place, in another environment. A place which will remain 'home' for the rest of their lives.
There is immense implication in all of this, for both the loved one and those who 'care' for or
who are very close to that loved one. During the journey, the dementia journey, all manner of events and happenings will have sown the seeds of empathy, compassion and awareness, in those who have cared for a loved one with dementia. A profound awareness of what it means to witness true vulnerability in a person, physical and psychological. And a constant uncertainty as to the nature of a disease which inhabits someone so very close to you, in that you can almost feel their pain and their anxiety, yet cannot eradicate it, but can offer the comfort of being there, of taking hold of a hand, of 'communicating' your humanity through unfailing love.
Then, the journey comes to an end. And in my own case, with my late mother, that ending lasted exactly one whole month. In the hospital, each day and night, I remained with her at the bedside. I was there for procedures, to calm her. I was there whist she slept. I was there to offer food and drink, none of which was taken. In the early hours, she would awaken, rather afraid. I would take hold of her hand and calm her and keep hold of that hand until daybreak. And so it went on, day after day. Then, one morning, as I entered the side room in the ward, my mother opened her eyes
and she gazed at me in a way which seemed to encapsulate everything that had gone before - in the whole dementia journey - a poignant 'look' as if from a child and yet from a mother, all of 99 years of age. In that brief moment, I knew that the journey was drawing to a close. A life - a childhood, two Wars, bringing up a family with unreserved love and patience, a fun-loving, sociable being, so very thoughtful and considerate, always so aware of how fortunate her life had been, a loving wife and mother - was nearing its end, amidst that darkening cloud of dementia.
And, on the morning she died, just and hour or so before, she opened her eyes fully and she spoke lucidly to me, as if her Alzheimer's had left her. For perhaps a minute, if that, talking to me like the mother of old. Then, she closed her eyes and from that moment on, I held her hand and held it tight, up until the very end. And in all of this, despite the pain, the actual heartfelt pain, the sense of loss which wells over you and engulfs you, it is when your mind becomes settled again and you see things very clearly, that this has been an enormous privilege. You have engaged in an expression of benevolent humanity, perhaps for the very first time, an authentic thing which cannot really be expressed in words. Yet, a truth all the same. That alone, liberates one from the despair so often borne, day by day, in that dementia journey. And above all, our loved ones are free at last, from all that has gone before in their own relentless journey. And there must be lasting comfort in that.
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