Mom has always loved to help. She grew up in an era where women did all of the household chores, and my dad was all too happy to let her do them. She did the cooking, the laundry, the shopping and the house cleaning. We had lit candles on our table every night for dinner. She was a Martha Stewart, before Martha Stewart was a household name.
Even with her Alzheimer’s, mom still wants to help. Problem is, she’s unable to in so many ways. Every night she asks, “What can I do to help?” It’s like having a 4 year old that wants to help – it’s so much easier and quicker to do things yourself. A while back she asked if she could help me in the kitchen, so I told her yes, but to please go wash her hands first. Off she goes to wash her hands, which she does, then goes into her room, sits in her recliner, and starts reading. So after about ten minutes, I find her in her room and say “I thought you wanted to help me.” She jumps up ready to help, and I ask her to go wash her hands. “But I already did that.” Right, but I just saw you blowing your nose into the bathroom towel (yes, that’s a thing), so you need to wash them again. She washes her hands and goes into the family room and sits down. That was the point where I gave up, and fixed dinner myself.
The challenge is, she really does want to help, and more importantly, it makes her feel useful when she can. All of us want to feel as though we contribute in life, to our family, to the missions/issues we are passionate about, to the greater food, to society at large. When we get to the end of our life, we want to be able to look back and say ‘I made a difference.’ Mom’s life has impacted more than she realizes, but in this very moment, with Alzheimer’s, she wants to feel she’s contributing today. So, I had to think of something she could do that I wouldn’t need to re-do, or that wouldn’t prevent me from getting dinner on the table, etc. It took me a minute, but I discovered the secret of folding towels. Not doing laundry, but folding things. We each do our own laundry at our house, and the aide does mom’s. It all started when Nate was in 5th grade….
Nate had been a soccer player since coming to live with us. After adopting him at age 7, I quickly realized he loved being on teams; being with groups of people. He was always around lots of kids at the orphanage, so that made sense to me. Hence, we did soccer. But in 5th grade, he wanted to play football. The mom in me was not happy about that, due to the injuries that can happen, but he begged and I gave in. The team provided the gear, but he had to provide his own jock strap, so off to Target the kids and I went. We’re in the aisle looking at the jock straps, and I’ve never done this before, so I say “do you need size small or size large?” I mean, who wants to say they need a size small, right? And Lian, who was trying to figure out how this particular piece of equipment worked, said “What do they do? Roll up their penis into a ball and put it in there?” Nate, completely horrified and embarrassed said “MOM!!! Make her stop!!” and stormed off to another aisle. The only thing I could do was laugh. Lian has no filter in her brain. If it’s in her head, it’s right out her mouth. I think I laughed for five minutes. Nate was NOT amused. Asperger’s and Alzheimer’s. And a regular kid who embarrasses easily. But I digress….
After the first practice, Nate came home with muddy everything, and I decided right then and there to teach him to do his own laundry. I was not willing to wash a muddy uniform daily. So from that point on, we each did our own laundry. All that do say, I don’t have baskets of clothes for mom to fold, and honestly, she struggles folding her own clothes. However, I went to the dollar store and bought a laundry basket and a bunch of towels. I dumped them into the basket, and she was thrilled to fold them. She feels useful, and helpful, and consequently she feels better about herself. So every evening, I mess up the towels in the basket, ask her to fold them, she is delighted to help, and doesn’t realize it’s the same basket of towels every night! And I don’t have to re-do anything! Win – win.
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