As I sit quietly in my wheelchair, gazing about my room, many thoughts fill my mind. I question the changes in my life and I complain about this new place I’m forced to call “home”. The years have taken away my ability to live on my own and care for myself, yet my heart was not ready to part with most of my belongings; belongings that signified so many years of precious memories. Nor was I prepared to come to this new place, where I have to rely on strangers to care for me.
My children had always promised this would never happen, however, what they failed to realize was that they too would grow older and it would become increasingly difficult for them to care for me. They no longer possess the strength to lift me nor the stamina to provide round the clock nurturing I often need at this point of my life. They tell me of the sleepless nights they spent and of the many tears they cried before they could come to make the difficult decision to place me here.
They have assured me that although I have a different roof over my head, my family will always be my family and their love for me will never change. They visit me often and they never fail to assure me of their love for me. For this I’m so grateful, even though I don’t always relay that to them. . . you see, the person I’ve become is not the person I used to be.
Please be patient with me if I seem irritable or ungrateful to you, my precious family, to the staff (my dedicated caregivers) or to my fellow residents, many times I know not what I’m saying or doing. There are times I see you as loving and caring and yet there are times I see you as strangers I fear intensely. I have no control over the changes in my body and mind nor do I have control over how to handle these frightening changes.
I beg of you. . . please try to love me for the person I once was and please try to be understanding and gentle to the frail, scared person I’ve become.
If only the GOLDEN YEARS were as “perfect” as I had once dreamed they would be.
Written by: Lois Cole, through the eyes and heart of her mother, Sue Giese, an Alzheimer’s patient.
