Karen,
I do understand what you are saying completely because even though I had the greatest of relationships with my mother - I honestly thought no other mother and daughter were as close as we were - my sister had the total opposite relationship. She always felt left out, that my mother was overly critical with her, my mother didn't approve of her and so on. In a lot of ways she was right, not that my mother didn't love her but they had an extremely difficult relationship.
Until my mother developed Alzheimer's. Then, as I felt my relationship with my mother disintegrated, my sister's relationship blossomed. As my sister said, it took 43 years, but she finally had the mother-daughter relationship she wanted.
We all mourn for something - she mourns all the years she never had. I mourn the years I lost. Now, with my mother being so advanced, I feel I'm simply marking time. I go and feed her, tidy her room and do her laundry but I feel totally emotionally cut off from the person who is in the chair, because that person is NOT my mother.
It is interesting - I've thought a lot about how I viewed my mother when I was younger. I now realize that I hero-worshiped her. She was the sun I turned to. It was always her opinion that mattered most to me. All this up until her disease developed and I actually started to analyse our relationship.
You, like my sister, are mourning what you never had. Alzheimer's is a magic mirror - it brings out things we probably would never had realized had it not happened. My sister would never have had her few years with Mum, I would have gone on adoring her unconditionally. I still do - the woman she was.
And what's wrong with being selfish here? Isn't here where we can bring up these things? What is TP for if we cannot exchange some hard emotional truths and try to offer comfort? I always feel an instant bond with someone who has a loved one with AD because they KNOW exactly what I mean. Even if they are only at the beginning of this journey, they understand on a totally complete gut level. I had had a lot of sympathy from friends (I've been very lucky there) but only fellow travellers can really understand.
So, Karen, my lovely fluffy dragon, keep posting. Keep b*tching. Keep putting out all the things you think we should hear. You know us well enough that we'll let you know in no uncertain terms what we think.
Much love,
Joanne
I do understand what you are saying completely because even though I had the greatest of relationships with my mother - I honestly thought no other mother and daughter were as close as we were - my sister had the total opposite relationship. She always felt left out, that my mother was overly critical with her, my mother didn't approve of her and so on. In a lot of ways she was right, not that my mother didn't love her but they had an extremely difficult relationship.
Until my mother developed Alzheimer's. Then, as I felt my relationship with my mother disintegrated, my sister's relationship blossomed. As my sister said, it took 43 years, but she finally had the mother-daughter relationship she wanted.
We all mourn for something - she mourns all the years she never had. I mourn the years I lost. Now, with my mother being so advanced, I feel I'm simply marking time. I go and feed her, tidy her room and do her laundry but I feel totally emotionally cut off from the person who is in the chair, because that person is NOT my mother.
It is interesting - I've thought a lot about how I viewed my mother when I was younger. I now realize that I hero-worshiped her. She was the sun I turned to. It was always her opinion that mattered most to me. All this up until her disease developed and I actually started to analyse our relationship.
You, like my sister, are mourning what you never had. Alzheimer's is a magic mirror - it brings out things we probably would never had realized had it not happened. My sister would never have had her few years with Mum, I would have gone on adoring her unconditionally. I still do - the woman she was.
And what's wrong with being selfish here? Isn't here where we can bring up these things? What is TP for if we cannot exchange some hard emotional truths and try to offer comfort? I always feel an instant bond with someone who has a loved one with AD because they KNOW exactly what I mean. Even if they are only at the beginning of this journey, they understand on a totally complete gut level. I had had a lot of sympathy from friends (I've been very lucky there) but only fellow travellers can really understand.
So, Karen, my lovely fluffy dragon, keep posting. Keep b*tching. Keep putting out all the things you think we should hear. You know us well enough that we'll let you know in no uncertain terms what we think.
Much love,
Joanne
