How to cope when they don’t recognize you.

The first time my mother did not know who I was it almost killed me. It was like a kick in the stomach. It was a physical pain and it hurt.

I knew the day would come when it would happen but nothing prepared me for the emotional hit when it arrived. I wanted to cry but I couldn’t do it in front of her because she would have been distressed to see me upset. It marked a major turning point in my life.

To her, I was someone who was familiar but that was it. She knew she trusted me and that I was a friend even if she had no other idea who I was.

One day I heard her say to someone – “Isn’t she lovely?”

“Who?” they asked.

“The girl in the green sweater” she replied looking over at me.

That meant more to me than words can ever describe and is one of those moments I will carry with me for the rest of my days. It was about three years before she died and she never knew me again – EXCEPT FOR ONCE.

I walked into the nursing home and she saw me from about twenty feet away. She lifted up her hands, the light came in her eyes and she said:

“There you are. How are you? How long can you stay?”

Everyone was stunned. We sat and talked that afternoon for about two hours. She chatted away like she hadn’t done in a long time. We talked about people and places in her life and I learned things that afternoon that I had never known.

It was like a gift from God. In that room, at that time, we were totally at peace and it was a real lesson in ‘living in the now’.

Next day, she was gone back into her new world and she never again came back from it.

Another day, when I visited her, she asked me – “Do you know what my name is?”

I said “Yes, I do.” I told her what her name was and asked her “Does that mean anything to you?”

She looked at me doubtfully and replied – “Well, now that you say it, I think you might be right.”

I said – “Yes, that’s definitely it.”

She replied – “Now, isn’t it great that you were here because, if you hadn’t come, I would have had to find somebody else to ask.”

I though how cruel this disease is that you are left not even knowing your own name. It also took some of the sting out of her not recognizing who I was. I kept thinking that, if she didn’t know her own name there was absolutely no way that she could be expected to know mine.