When you send your child off to day care for the first time, there’s a process.

You evaluate different facilities

You read online reviews. You ask your friends for recommendations. You tour places and ask questions you never knew you needed to ask.

There’s a checklist.

What to pack.  What to label. What to expect. Best practices for smooth transitions.

Infants and toddlers have an attachment to their parent and there are loads of information available to help both parent and child navigate the transition to a new normal with minimal anxiety.

You prepare.  Because that’s what we do when something big is coming.  You prepare.

When you send your child off to a sleep away camp for the first time…

Again, you start with research.  Online reviews… Recommendations from friends – especially stories from others who sent their kid to camp and they loved it… or at least came home unscathed.

There’s a checklist for that, too.

Label all of their items so nothing treasured disappears.

Pack some sun screen and bug spray – things you know they will appreciate having.

Maybe a care package of their favorite cookies and treats to remind them of home and enough to share with their cabinmates.

And while you pack, you imagine what’s ahead.

New Friends… New Experiences… Campfires and canoeing and adventures they’ll share when they get home.

You miss them even before they’ve left, but that longing is mirrored with excitement.

Because they’re going somewhere to experience more of life.

When you send your child off to college

You guessed it… there’s research for that too.

You evaluate schools based on their desired course of study.

Visiting campuses to get a feel for the culture.

You look at the campuses their closes friends are attending and reading up on the schools that make the short list.

And once the decision has been made and the acceptance letter recieved?

There’s a checklist.

Because of course there is.

You might not be writing their name in their underwear, but you are gathering little pieces of home to send with them.

The lamp that they studied by for the last 12 years

Pictures of friends and family to adorn their bulletin board or wall.

Favorite clothes so they can walk into class… or a party… and feel like the best version of themselves.

You imagine the people they’ll meet. The new friends… the impactful instructors… the boy or girl they suddenly can’t stop thinking about.

You consider the experiences they’ll have… the clubs… the parties…

And you can’t wait to hear all about it.

Another transition.  Another checklist.

Another version of letting someone you love go somewhere without you.

But then… there’s this one…

When your Parent needs more care than you can give at home

There’s still the research.

There’s still the online reviews and recommendations from friends who have traveled this road before you.

There are still tours and questions and lists…. but this time?

Everything feels different.

Heavier.

We spent months visiting and interviewing facilities… evaluating cost against benefits… staff to resident ratios..

This facility has cameras in all the rooms but costs more.

That one doesn’t have cameras but includes in room bathrooms and costs less.

How do you assign dollar amounts to things that don’t have dollar amounts?

How much is peace of mind worth?

Eventually you make a decision… Well, Dad shouldered that responsibility with my support and luckily we were in agreement on the next move.

And then you wait.

Because of COURSE the best facility in town has a waiting list.

So you wait for a phone call you desperately need and want while simultaneously don’t want….

And then the call comes. A room is available.

Suddenly logistics take over.

which, for me, is a blessing.

I spent the last week and a half washing mom’s clothes and affixing labels with her name.

Iron on labels where I could

Embroidered names on her blankets and quilt

Laundry markers for the rest.

The room was furnished, so we only needed a few things to make it more her own…

a complicated task though when there are few things she recognizes as hers or feels attached to.

Pictures of her and Dad.

Pictures of Grandma and Grandpa.

Pictures of her.

Photo books that the staff can “read” with her – her life in pictures.  Glad I made that…

Facebook photo books mom made about 10 years ago.

A pretty lamp

A wreath for the door

A flower arrangement, because mom should always have pretty flowers in her room.

And the bolster pillow she had to have because it had bluebonnets on it.

All the doing served a purpose beyond getting her room ready…

It allowed me to compartmentalize the reality of what was actually happening.

Wash. Label. Pack. Organize.

Make another list.

Check another box.

More doing.

Less feeling.

Because feeling was going to be a problem.

Move in Day…

When your parent has Alzheimer’s do you tell them they are moving?

I don’t know… and I don’t know if there’s a universally correct answer here.

Telling mom ahead of time meant running the risk of days, weeks, months of anxiety and fear and resistance… all over something she couldn’t understand or remember.

We chose not to.  Right or wrong that was the decision we made.  Dad and I.

That morning, we tried to accomplish the grand feat of a shower.

That wasn’t happening.

Mom was angry and confused and afraid.

Normally she’s happy when I visit.  Even though she doesn’t know who I am, she likes to see me and her eyes light up.

This morning though, she became angry and told me she hated me.

Multiple times.

I know that’s not her.

I know it’s the Alzheimer’s.

I know she loves me

I know she’s scared

And I also know that there is absofuckinglutely nothing I can do to make the scary thing less scary for her.

We went for a drive…  Told her we were visiting some friends.

The staff at the chosen facility was wonderful.

Patient.  Gentle.  Genuinely caring.

Even in her confusion, they managed to take all of vitals and move her out of the main sitting room.

And that, dear friends, is when the dam broke.

My face started leaking from my eyeholes uncontrollably.

I’m not “sad” per se.  Not exactly anyway.  Maybe I am but I don’t feel like that word fits quite right.

I know that this move is NECESSARY.

I know that Dad and I (mostly Dad as he’s with her 24/7) can’t continue to give her the level of care she truly needs.

I know that the facility we selected is perfect for her.

I know that once she settles in we can visit whenever we want and they are close enough for us to do just that.

I most importantly in this moment, I know that Dad will get to focus on taking care of himself now so I get to keep him longer.

I know all of this to the core of my being.

I can proclaim all of this with my whole chest.

My brain understands all of this.

and yet, even as I write this, a full 24 hours after the actual move, tears are still falling freely with no real explanation or trigger.

The thing about Alzheimer’s… or any dementia really…

It sucks.

Profound observation, I know.

You don’t just grieve once.

You grieve again and again and again and again….

Once when the mom you knew… the one you could call for advice, gossip, or just friendship is no longer available.

Again when she no longer recognizes that you are her daughter and now are just a vaguely familiar friend.

Again when the familiarity starts to disappear…

Again when you move her to a care facility because loving her is no longer enough to keep her safe at home.

Again and again and again.

And yes, someday there will be even more grief when she ultimately leaves this earth for the great beyond.

But that is someday… this is now.

I know my dad is dealing with his own levels of grief that far surpass my own… one I can’t even begin to fully understand

She is my mom, but for him, this is his PARTNER and has been since 1968.

That’s a whole lifetime woven together… leaving him in a house that probably too quiet now.

Hubs and I will do what we can to help fill pieces of the void, but we can’t replace her for him.

I know my aunts and uncles are dealing with their own levels of grief.

I can’t speak to their experiences.

I can only speak for where I stand.

And from here?

It sucks.

There isn’t a checklist that fixes it.

There isn’t a perfectly packed bag big enough to make this transition any easier on anyone.

All those years to sending our children out into the world, saddled with pieces of home, because they were leaving to build more of their lives.

This time, I packed pieces of home because Mom is rapidly losing the ability to remember hers.

Maybe that’s the reason it all feels so heavy.

And here I sit.

Nothing left to label.

Nothing left to pack or organize.

Nothing left to do….

There’s just the feeling part.

I really preferred the doing.

feeling the weight of the decision made… hoping it was the right one.

Trusting the people we’ve chosen to care for the woman we love.

Giving Dad permission to breathe.

Giving Mom time to settle into another new normal.

Putting one foot in front of the other…

Because sometimes that’s the only thing left on the checklist.