Mom gets nervous and fearful when she has to have any medical treatment, but particularly so for her cancer. When she's facing a multiple-hour inter-venous drip, they usually give her a small dose of a Valium-like drug to relieve her anxiety. On Tuesday they gave her a bit too much and her resulting disjointed speech, thinking patterns and behavior brought me right back to Dad's last year of living with dementia. And to my horror, I found myself responding with the same frustration, anger and fear as I sometimes did with Dad.
I realized today why non-family members are sometimes better at dealing with a person with dementia ~ they don't know that person "before." They don't measure the "today" person with who he was before dementia began taking him away. And they aren't desperate to get that person back.
My anger on Tuesday was at the drug-induced behavior, not at my Mom. My anger on Tuesday was at myself for reacting the same way again.
I do not understand what I do. For what I want to do I do not do, but what I hate I do....For what I do is not the good I want to do; no, the evil I do not want to do-this I keep on doing.... Romans 7:15,19
1 comment:
Hugs to you. The "cure" and related effects are as bad as the disease. And I can say that because I'm heading to the cancer center now for a shot that will hurt for a week following.
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