How It All Started

Hi! I'm Yaz, an Alzheimer's caregiver to my mom, a housewife, runner, sister and Tia (aunt).  It's not always in that order but I love all those titles. I officially became my mom's primary caregiver in January of 2017, she had been diagnosed in 2016 but I have to take you back to 2009 to when it all really began. That was the year my dad passed away from cancer after a year of battling with it.  My parents had been married for 35 years and had actually known each other since they were kids growing up in Chile.  Shortly after I'd been born we left Chile and eventually came to the U.S. as refugees.  My brothers were both born in the states and my parents accomplished the American dream of a better life.  They were able to buy a house and make it a home which is still in the family.  We eventually moved to a bigger house in a nicer neighborhood where shortly after my brother and I left to get our own places. We had family dinners fairly regularly and still lived pretty close to our parents. My parents really instilled togetherness and wanted us to remain close since we had no other family near us. Fortunately, my brothers and I are really close so it has not been hard to do but yes we do drive each other nuts sometimes, after all we're still siblings.

When my dad passed, mom was a wreck.  She had always had anxiety from what I could remember but now it was through the roof, add in depression and it truly became a recipe for disaster. My youngest brother was still living at home at the time so that helped a little. We had promised dad that he would never have to worry about his sweetheart, we'd always look after her, it's a promise we have prided ourselves on. We took turns making sure she was ok: taking her shopping, making her dinner (or taking her out to dinner), driving her to church and calling her several times a day. Even with crazy job schedules and fiances (at the time) we kept mama busy. My middle brother got married first at the end of 2009 while I got married the following spring. The celebrations helped a little with the grieving even if for just a little bit. We hadn't noticed too much change in mom with the exception of the heightened anxiety.

I have to say, mom was always a little quirky and we attributed that to her not growing up here in the states. But slowly we started seeing more paranoia, bigger burst of anger and repetitive stories. In January of 2012, she started babysitting my nephew and it seemed to give her purpose.  She was actually doing really well with him and had established a schedule for herself. It was wonderful to see. Then in 2015 came my second nephew and suddenly she had a new baby to look after but this time it was different. The little things became big things.  She would complain to me that they left the baby with her for an excessive amount of time but tell my brother to let the baby stay longer. She had been a great cook with all kinds of yummy foods for us but she now was saying she couldn't remember how to make beans.  I had asked her to help me make pan amasado (Chilean homemade bread) yet she told me she didn't know the recipe.  Mind you she'd been making this bread since she was a young girl when she would help her mom in the kitchen. My brothers and I began to compare notes and were trying to find explanations for her behavior and we couldn't come up with anything.  We hadn't even considered dementia especially since mom was still young (in our eyes) for it at 66 years old. The bread incident for me was a tell tale sign something was not right but my brothers weren't there just yet.

In May of 2015 my kid brother got married in Northern California. My mom had been so happy leading up to the wedding because we all adored his bride. When we getting ready for the rehearsal dinner at the house we rented, she was beyond upset and didn't want to take a shower.  When I asked her what happened, it turned out she had burned herself because she couldn't figure out the shower. I offered to help and that seemed to make the situation better. The next day, as we were getting ready for the wedding, she told me she was having problems with her makeup and needed me to do it for her. That was it for me that was the moment I knew something besides depression, anxiety and confusion was wrong with my mom.  She had always done her own makeup.  She loved getting ready for the day and especially for important events.  This was not the woman I knew. I told my brothers we needed to look into it further after the wedding.

After we were back home from the wedding, it seemed that everything happened at once. She started calling us franticly that someone had gotten into the house and taken the dog.  When we questioned her for more details she would say oh never mind here she is.  Then she would tell us that people were watching her through out the house. We realized she was referring to all the picture frames she had on the walls in the house. She would nod at a picture frame and say look but don't let them catch you, they're watching us. Not even magazines or books were safe because if there was a person on the cover, they too would "watch" her. The final straw was when she went on her daily run/walk. She was all done and walked into the house.  The problem was that it wasn't her house, for context her neighborhood is pretty cookie cutter and several houses look alike.  This house was only 2 over from hers and did look similar.  Fortunately the neighbors were phenomenal, and didn't yell at her as she was yelling at them to get out of her house.  They suggested that maybe they call the police to sort this out and mom agreed.  Our neighbor across the street heard about the commotion from her daughter who had been over that house on a play date.  She told her mom that Carmen (my mom) was in trouble and needed help.  The police showed up as our neighbor was heading over there as well.  She explained to them that my mom must be confused because she actually lived a few houses over.  They walked mom over to the house and used her keys to open the door. Mom seemed to have calmed down but was now embarrassed.  After she got mom all settled in, our neighbor quickly called my brother and told him what had happened.

Mom didn't tell us anything, but was extremely upset with all the neighbors for calling the police like she was some criminal when we told her we knew what happened.  She would no longer watch my nephew because it obviously wasn't safe for either of them anymore.  We were able to get her an appointment for a neurologist within a few weeks.  The doctor asked her several questions/quizzes and did the "clock" test. Afterwards she said the word that forever would change our lives, Dementia. What was so heartbreaking was that my mom asked her if there was anything she could do to get better.  The look in my mom's eyes when the doctor told her no and that it would progress still makes me teary-eyed. She looked so defeated. I told her not to worry and we would deal with this as a family.  That seemed to help ease her a little bit as I drove us back to her house.

This is how it all began, we were on a new journey that none of us had ever faced. We would be making decisions that would affect all of us and unbeknownst to me, aside from mom, it would impact me & my husband the most.......