It has happened. Ganny now lives in memory care. She fell a few months ago (no major injuries thank goodness), and when we took her to the doctor, we were informed that she could no longer live alone. Her dementia is too advanced. So while she is in pretty darn good shape physically - gets in and out of my SUV on her own, puts her clothes on quickly by herself, etc. - her memory impairment prevents her from taking care of herself in many ways. For example, we suspect there was a fall before this one due to minor bruises on her head, but she didn't remember falling and couldn't explain how the bruises got there.
The move from an independent retirement center to an assisted living facility had to be immediate since my husband and I both work and are unable to "watch" her during the day. Fortunately we had called a few facilities for information in the past, and had one in mind. We went straight there that afternoon after the doctor's visit, and tried to explain to Gan why this was her new home, and why she couldn't go back to her other apartment. Of course we tried to sugar coat it by saying it was cheaper and closer to us, neither of which are true. "I don't like this one. I think I'll just stay at the apartment I'm at," she said. I was not prepared for this conversation. This was one of the hardest things I've ever had to do: tell my elderly grandmother she couldn't choose where she wanted to live, that I had to leave her in this new place that she couldn't leave on her own. While I say she's pretty far gone mentally, she has enough of her wits about her to know that she doesn't want to be confined somewhere. I used the whole "just stay tonight and we'll talk about it again tomorrow" thing and prayed.
Once I managed to pry her arthritic hand off of my arm, the race was on to get her belongings moved. This was quite an undertaking. My saint of a husband handled the majority of the furnishings, while I tried to get what I knew she would need every day, like her makeup, clothes, and bedding. She wouldn't have much room at the assisted living facility for her things, so we had to prioritize. Her closet was pretty full of mostly moth-bitten, thrift-store-looking garments, (except they never made it to the thrift store, they've just been in her closet for forty years), so I pulled the most familiar things that I knew she wore often, and sent the rest to Goodwill. Mind you I didn't have all the time in the world to do this. My husband and I were still working during the day and trying to manage this in the evenings. I would've liked to have taken more time, let her choose what we kept and what we didn't, but given the circumstances I did what I had to do.
So, move ahead a few months to winter, about three weeks ago. She let me know she needed her winter clothes - her boots and sweaters. All this time I hadn't had the heart to tell her we had to get rid of most of her things, so I'd been telling her that her things were in storage.
"I'll get them out of storage for you Gan and bring them next time I'm here."
(I go to see her at least once a week.) Since any winter clothes were nowhere to be found, we had to get her some more, but again, I didn't want to tell her that a lot of her clothes were gone, so I went to Kohl's by myself to get her a few. I planned to buy them, take the tags off, and take them to her like they were the ones I'd gotten out of fictitious storage.
I found myself perusing the sweaters of the petites department, picking them up, holding them up, and putting them back down, saying to myself, I think she would believe this is something she owned. I laughed out loud to the surprise of a nearby stranger. You know, there are things that you think you'll never say like, "Yes, I like working late hours," or "Go ahead and borrow my last fifty dollars," then there are things so bizarre you can't even think them up to say you'll never say them. This phrase is one of the latter. I can't wait to see what other currently unfathomable statements await me in my elderly-caregiving future.
By the way, she did believe they were her sweaters and she wears them often.
