Comment by Andrex

3 days ago

34M. I live with my mom who's had it for a few years.

It sucks. It's so easy to forget who they were before the disease. This is them now and it's hard as hell.

Simple things that take 1-step for us take 50+ steps for her. She doesn't readily communicate that she's hungry or thirsty or needs to use the bathroom, we have to constantly ask. She's always exhausted and walking around in circles but reacts aggressively to most suggestions to go to bed or take a nap (no matter how we word it). She can't focus for more than a few seconds, so she has no hobbies to occupy her time, and even the TV loses her interest after a minute at most. Her speech is one unbroken babble, and she gets annoyed if someone starts a conversation near her but doesn't let her interject.

Not sure how much more my dad and I have left in us. The disease stripped everything from her and it's stripping everything from us. In-home care is the likely course but she hates all strangers and is always paranoid about anyone other than us being in the house. There's no good solution.

Tell your parents you love them.

I've had just the smallest touch of this caring for my elderly parents, and you have my deep empathy. It's exhausting and really really hard.