She has been a bit restless in recent days, even when she’s
sleeping. Her dreams are more real to her and she often calls me by her sister’s
name when she wakes from a dream to see me sitting in her room with her. She is
also seeing people in the room with us now and then, mostly family. Tonight she
asked me twice if I “can see that” and pointed at the space at the foot of the
bed. Following the lead of one of our caregiver’s I asked her what she was
seeing and she said “him”. I asked if it was Bill, as she has mentioned seeing
him several times, but this time she said no. I asked if it was her father and
she said yes, then hesitated and said that she didn’t know.
I told her that I had the house locked up and the alarm
turned on, so any men she is seeing in the house now are family and they are
welcome to be here. I then asked her to tell them Hi from me and she giggled
and said that she will do that. I don’t know if this means we are entering the
dementia phase, or if family is checking in on her as we move closer to time
for her to go home. I don’t think she is that close to leaving, but the visits
are becoming frequent occurrences at night and even happen during the day time
now and then.
I am not unnerved by these visits anymore; although the
first time she told me there was a man in the house I was a bit distressed. She
kept talking about The Man and she finally pointed to the bed where she and dad
used to sleep and said, “The Man who was there! He is here.” Well, I had run
the dog through the house to be sure we were alone, even though the alarm was
already on, and I put the pistol out on the table right beside my bed that
night, but I also whispered to my father to stop bugging her that night because
it was driving me nuts with worrying about it. After that she seemed to stop
seeing him for the night. My Dad is, apparently, still taking care of us and
watching over us. I’m good with that!
On a different note, we are keeping fresh flowers in Mom’s
room all the time now. We used to keep them in the family room for her, but,
since she seems to be more bed bound these days, we are keeping them in her
bedroom now. She enjoys them when she looks up and sees them. Even if she doesn’t
mention them often, we will keep them in the room for her because she always
loved flowers and I know she would want them there. They are a reflection of
the joyful beauty that she always saw in the world around her; that she and my
dad tried to plant in our world at every duty station to which we moved. They always had a garden and it was always
full of flowers. That’s the world they tried to create for us and that’s the
world we will maintain for her.
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