From Mom's Journal - June 5, 1979 - Tuesday

"Really had waves of dizziness & sick at stomach feeling all day - would come over me just sitting in chair - stomach hurts some.

Felt better emotionally today - would like to be able to do more about the house etc but am too weak - "

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Mom's heart disease which was brought to our attention in about 1977 or 1978 was the beginning of the downward spiral in her health. She has lived the remainder of her life being sick, very sick. After her heart disease was diagnosed she was later, many years later, diagnosed with rosacia, osteoarthritis, rheumetoid arthritis, Multiple Sclerosis (MS), type 2 diabetes, and finally dementia. The dementia was probably caused by the accumulation of all the others. To this day, Mom is fighting. Always a fighter. To our dismay, she cannot overcome the dementia and it is slowly taking her away from us. Dementia is turning my mother into someone she never wanted to become. We all have to remember the REAL Marilyn so as not to be torn apart by some of what she says. We all have to remember that this horrible disease also has a voice but a voice that does not belong to the person in which it lives. Dementia is a parasite but one that cannot be cured or killed until it slowly devours it's host. And we, her family... all we can do is sit and watch it happen. But we do have wonderful small moments of her clarity where we can all, including Mom, love and laugh together. So we do our best.

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