FAMILY | DEMENTIA
Dementia Took Your Memories so I Abandoned You
A letter to my late grandmother
Dear Granny,
I can still hear the vibrancy resonating from your voice. My earliest memories involve the times you babysat me on weekdays; was I two or three? I loved hugging your gentle floppy-eared Labrador, he had such regal stature and the softest coat. You watched over me as my protective guardian, ensuring he didn’t accidentally hurt me.
If only I protected you when you became vulnerable.
As I grew up, I only saw you on special occasions like birthdays and Christmas, I was a typical teenager by then and took you for granted. Frankly, I didn’t appreciate any of my surviving grandparents as I should have, but how many teenagers do? Your love of Labradors rubbed off on me however. I had one of my own and you eventually came to know him well. He even attended your funeral with a blue balloon tied to his collar.
Midway through my first year of university dad called and told me you weren’t doing so well, you were still heartbroken over the suicide of your eldest son five years prior, your pain must have been excruciating. I reluctantly came home from Melbourne to visit you for the weekend, believing it would be a one-off. I loathed my hometown.
We bonded over politics, you bowled me over with your wit and humor, we chatted for over two hours. I hadn’t seen you for six months yet here I was sitting in my widowed 94-year-old grandma’s loungeroom eating dried biscuits and enjoying myself?
I had been experimenting with my sexuality in the big city, I knew you were vehemently conservative by nature, so I hid my truth. You were a sign of the times and people your age grew up in such a different era. I visited you every second day without fail over the next few months, whizzing back from university after classes and arriving at your door with my cat Claude, or my beautiful black Labrador Bailey.
Are they with you now? Bailey charmed you, he knew you as ‘granny’ just as I did, you had no dogs of your own anymore, and he was so cautious not to nip your fingers when you handfed him snacks. He lit up your world, I had him sitting beside me when I told you I was gay one wintry evening, you were the first person to learn my secret and your response was so warm and unexpected.
You never wanted a grandma, of course you didn’t, young people are out having fun! Us old folk have had ours, I never cared much for my granny either! I’ve always loved you and was looking forward to meeting my great-grandchildren, so I wanted you to like women - but if you’re gay then I’ll just have to love you more as the great-grandchildren aren’t coming, are they?
Not only had you let me off the hook for being a shitty grandson, I no longer wore a mask around you. I write this paragraph amidst tears streaming down my face, I want to scream out loud and tell you how grateful I am, to have truly known you. The beautiful and brave moment shared between us that night was bittersweet as your invisible illness changed everything.
A few months passed and dad called. Money in your purse was missing, he was finding soiled clothes hidden around your house, and we both noticed you weren’t watching the nightly news or your favorite political shows anymore. I took a leave of absence from my course and moved back to my hometown so I could visit daily on a trial basis and help with cooking and cleaning.
You were giving $100 to home care workers who were employed to assist you with showering and hygiene, it wasn’t technically theft as you didn’t have your formal diagnosis yet, but hell it was immoral. I replaced your money with Monopoly notes and reported them. I opted to attend to your personal care, changing your continence aides twice daily was confronting, but I didn’t trust anyone else to do it.
You knew my name but you didn’t know much else about me by this stage. Remember when you wouldn’t let me in because it was too late in the evening? It was only six o'clock but you were losing track of time. You were declining so rapidly.
After a year of being your champion, I met someone special, he turned out to be my first love and my visits with you became less frequent. I moved back to the city to be with him and resumed university. Dad had you diagnosed by a specialist and the geriatric team at the hospital secured accommodation for you at a nearby aged care facility.
I was 20 and had no understanding of ‘Frontotemporal Dementia’, I thought you were just a walking zombie when I saw you wandering around that musty nursing home for the first time. You were carrying a small, stuffed teddy bear, giggling at random intervals. You claimed you were “going off to work soon” even though you spent your entire life as a homemaker. I even brought Bailey to visit and you told me he was “dirty” so you wouldn’t pet him.
I thought there was no soul left so I abandoned you.
I lived it up a world away while you endured neglect and incompetence from staff. You broke your hip twice as your sensor mat next to your bed wasn’t plugged in. You lost weight as nobody spent enough time feeding you. After you passed away the facility was sanctioned by the Federal Government for serious breaches of care.
When you were moved to the palliative unit I maintained a vigil by your bedside, not because I truly cared, I just wanted to appease dad. I had told him so many times you were already dead, your body was just a shell, I’m now so ashamed of my words. On your final night on earth, your skin was sallow, each breath was hoarse. I prayed for death to arrive swiftly for your sake.
We sat close as your consciousness dimmed. Though your eyes were open, they were glassy and bloodshot, your wrinkled hands had a purplish hue. Hours passed before you exhaled for the final time. I can remember my entire body filling up with adrenaline, as you were released from your suffering, I embraced mine. I ran to hug you and shook you gently, asking you to come back, pledging I would care for you again if you reanimated. Yet you remained motionless.
I wouldn’t let the nurses near you so they gave me 30 minutes to say goodbye to your vessel.
I never processed the trauma of watching dementia eat away at your personality in those years, grief had crept up on me and knocked me over the head, the strong-willed woman you once were deserved a better ending than passing away in that hideous place and I acknowledge that now. I’m so sorry granny.
I’ve since qualified as an aged care nurse working exclusively in dementia wards because of you. I educate the families of my residents to look beyond the disease and into the hearts of their loved ones because of you. I understand the progression of Alzheimer’s and different forms of dementia because of you. I work damn hard and finish my shifts in exhaustion because of YOU.
I have devoted my professional life to improving the welfare of people afflicted by this insidious specter, maybe I’m seeking your forgiveness in doing so, though you can never grant me that. I’ve visited your gravesite enough times to ask. I love and miss you even more as the years roll by, and PS, many gay couples have children these days via surrogacy or adoption.
If I ever have a daughter I’ll know what to name her.
© Edward Swafford 2023 All Rights Reserved
