What I Learned While I Sat With My Dying Mother For A Week In Memory Care/Assisted Living.

I sat with my mother in her Memory Care Assisted Living apartment for a week while she took her end-of-life journey recently, and I learned an awful lot I wasn't aware of. My DH & I visited her twice a week the past 6 months, and at least once a week prior to that, so we had contact with the staff, the facility, saw her apartment, the grounds, knew what was going on, for the most part, it's safe to say. What we did not realize was the quality of care she was getting or how happy she was in general. To hear mom tell it, she was sad & lonely, miserable & praying to God to let her die. That's the message she saved for me and for her niece in New York, which made us feel terrible, when she'd ask us to 'pray for me to die', or accuse us of not praying 'hard enough' because she was still alive. I lived with a constant low-level of guilt & a feeling of not being a good enough daughter due to mom's chronic complaining about everything from the food to the weather to the lack of activities in the MC. No matter that I (nor anyone else) could NEVER reach her on the phone for her being busy in the activities room.

What I learned while sitting with her for many hours each day for an entire week was that the caregivers went out of their way to shower mom with love & affection & attention. They came into her room every 20 minutes to see what she needed; to kiss her forehead & tell her they loved her. Some stayed AFTER their shift ended to sit with her! They'd pull up a chair and sit next to her bed, hold her hand, and recount stories of the time they'd spent together. There was a constant stream of CGs & other staff in and out of her room for an entire week. When going through her things, I found dozens and dozens of handwritten cards from former caregivers that had quit and moved away; they wrote mom cards to let her know how they were doing! Or if they'd gotten married or had a baby! To let her know they were thinking of her and missed her. One gal named Angelica told me she was honored to know mom at the end of mom's life and at the beginning of HER life, b/c she would carry her memory with her for life. The testimonies I heard were mind boggling.

As it turned out, mom was always positive, upbeat, smiling & happy as a resident in Memory Care (and in AL before that). She was the cheerleader for all the residents! Always the first in line for the activities and to encourage the others to join in! Who knew? Not I, that's for sure.

This was the woman who made my life so difficult on every level for 64 years. Led me to believe she was so unhappy and sad in Memory Care in spite of me KNOWING she was well cared for, fat & happy. I could never get her to admit it , not even once, in the nearly 3 years she lived there. I did everything humanly possible for the woman to make her life as comfortable as possible, and I succeeded, I just didn't KNOW it until I witnessed the testimony from the staff during the last week of mom's life.

And I got a call from the Assistant ED the other day, telling me that the trail of emails that went back & forth after the staff was notified of mom's passing was THE most incredible thing she'd ever witnessed. The communication between the Assisted Living bldg and the Memory Care bldg was huge, all the caregivers & nurses expressing their sadness at her passing, and offering condolences.

For those who feel 'guilt' at having their loved on in residential care, just take heed. Things aren't always what they appear to be.

Rest in peace, mom. I know I have a sense of peace, finally, that I really WAS a good daughter after all.