Leaving someone with advanced Alzheimer’s in professional care full time is not abandonment. Fiction rarely shows how long it can go on with virtually no memories left and no ability to care for oneself for even a couple hours. (The fictional danger is often shows as the person forgetting where they live and walking off - the real danger is that they will shit themselves, not tell anyone, and get painful skin issues.)
That’s before you get into the emotional side. How many times a year do you think you could meet your mother and have her not know you from a stranger? No, seeing her every day doesn’t help either - it actually makes it worse for both of you.
Alzheimer’s can be such a slow death you’ve already grieved through “acceptance” while your loved one is still, medically speaking, ‘alive.’
The last part about grieving through loss while the person is still alive is very apt. When my mom passed after brain cancer took her memories, she survived for so long with no idea who or where she was that her body dying was a relief and the grieving had mostly occurred a year before.
Well, I’ll never finish grieving that loss I guess. I realize all the time that there’s more to grieve. But the shock was certainly not there. The sense of loss wasn’t. That was difficult in itself; to tell people she passed away and not be as sad as people expected. I felt like something must be wrong with me at the time. In retrospect, she had just died much sooner than her body did.
It’s an especially strange human experience I think.
That’s before you get into the emotional side. How many times a year do you think you could meet your mother and have her not know you from a stranger? No, seeing her every day doesn’t help either - it actually makes it worse for both of you.
Alzheimer’s can be such a slow death you’ve already grieved through “acceptance” while your loved one is still, medically speaking, ‘alive.’