Looking For My Mother

The first year that I began visiting her she still knew who I was. She spoke to me by name and knew the names of my husband and children.

The second year she still knew my name but often called me by my sister's name.

The third year she recognized me as someone she knew and was excited when I showed up for a visit.

Now I am another face in the crowd. Just someone to talk to but not anyone she knows from her former life.

I have watched my Mother progress in her journey with Alzheimer's. I have watched as more recent events have faded in her memory and she could only remember things from her childhood. I have seen other people who are in a much more advanced stage of the disease and I know where it's going to take my Mom unless God intervenes first. 

I know these things but something inside of me still fights to find my Mom somewhere in that body. My head knows it's not possible but my heart won't quit hoping.

During my last visit, in my struggle to find my Mother, I ran through the same set of questions that I often ask. I asked her about some of her favorite places to fish during her lifetime. I asked about picking cotton when she was a young girl. I tried to talk about people or places that she once loved. 

Our conversation was full of nonsense. Her answers were garbled with a few words that made sense, but most things were foreign even to me. She occasionally pulled out a name or a place that surprised me. But for the most part there was no evidence of my Mom. There was no evidence of her remembering her life at any stage. And yet I continued to search. I continued to have hope that there was something in there, something that resembled who I knew she had been.

Then I began to sing to her. And that reminded me that I had my phone with me and in my music list were some songs she would know. So I started to play songs and sing. At first she wasn't paying much attention, but soon I caught her humming the melodies. Before long she was trying to sing a few words that came out more like just sounds. The next thing I knew, she was singing right along with Merle, "Mama tried, mama tried!"

And for just a couple of minutes, I found my Mom. All of my searching was answered by a 47 year old song.