My mother forgot my seventeenth birthday. My junior prom had been the evening before, and I slept over at a friend’s house. When I walked through the front door with my overnight bag that Sunday morning, I fully expected a “Happy Birthday” greeting from my family, yet I received none. Exhausted from the late-night shenanigans…
A counselor once told me that my mother would be more “accessible” to me after she died than when she was in the advanced stages of Alzheimer’s disease. I didn’t fully understand what she meant at the time. She thought I was going to be able to communicate with my dead mother? Yet, shortly after my mom died,…
How does loss and grief become a blessing? I’ve said before that writing is how I heal. And never is the weight of grief more lifted than when I’m writing letters to my mom. As it turns out, being an Alzheimer’s daughter gave me a voice. Dear Mom, I don’t know if you can read my…
In a 2008 television interview with my parents about my mother’s early-onset Alzheimer’s diagnosis, I told the reporter, “it’s like we’re losing her in slow motion.” Lately, it seems like I have been surrounded by loss. Several friends have recently lost parents after long battles with cancer, and, of course, most recently, friends from church…
