Getting it right with dementia is what I have the privilege of doing each day. But it is also very personal for me, and the heart behind my efforts on behalf of those living with dementia.
I’ve written about my Grandmother before, in my blog titled, “She Loved Life”. In that blog, I spoke about what she meant to me, and what a gift she was. What I did not share was the reality of her dementia journey and how I hated what I witnessed.
My Grandparents moved into a senior living community in Western Nebraska when their ranch got to be too much. After my Grandfather passed away, my Grandmother’s mind started to change, and she moved into the assisted living wing. I was confused as to why it got harder and harder to reach her by phone, and I was frustrated that the staff did not seem motivated to figure out why. When I visited her, it was obvious that she was spending too much sitting, with too little interaction with people, and a lack of good enough reasons to get up out of her recliner. It hurt my heart, but I did not know what to do about it, other than just love her as best as I could.
The time came that the facility asked that she be moved, as she was requiring too much care for assisted living. She became one of the many residents at a nursing home nearby. She spent too much time in her wheelchair there. She was not happy. She was not thriving. She asked my brother to get her out of there. She was quickly fading from this life without decent dementia care.
I don’t blame the staff; they were a well-intentioned group of people working in one of the toughest jobs.
But I promised myself then that I would never allow another person I cared about to suffer the same miserable demise that my Grandmother had.
Now, I just happen to care for a whole lot of people. People living with dementia. Their families. Their friends, their care team. And my team and I work each day to model what good dementia care looks like so that the world can become a more dementia-supportive place.
The DAWN Method taught me how to get it right. My work each day lets me see the hope that can be part of the dementia journey, and that the journey can be okay.
How I wish I had known then what I know now for the benefit of my beloved Grandmother. But that is not the way life works, so I will move forward each day getting it right with dementia, while I hold my Grandmother in my heart.
For Gram,
Jill
©Jill Couch
