The Code To Freedom

My sister has a way with words. She has the ability to express what all of us are feeling when she describes how she feels after a visit with our beloved mom. Members of our family often send emails to one another after our visits; sharing whether it was a good day or bad day. One day, after a particularly difficult visit, Martha emailed us about the code to freedom that we possessed.

You see, my mom has Alzheimer’s. Martha, like all of us, carries guilt out the door with her after every visit. For those who love, live with, or care for someone suffering with this cruel disease, you’ve likely experienced that same guilt, pain and frustration we have.

That pain can come in varying levels. Like the illness, some days are worse than others. It was a gradual progression those first few years. My father, saint that he was, covered for her. We had no idea how bad she was until he passed away and we realized what he must have been dealing with. After his death, the progression of the illness accelerated. It seemed as if she was simply ‘gone’ mentally within a few short months of his death. I felt that was God’s anesthesia. His way of allowing her to overcome the pain and grief that was just too much for her to bear. I mean how do you…can you cope with losing your love of 63 years?

So, we go to visit our mom in her new home. We walk through the heavy security doors that separate the “memory impaired” from the rest of the world and into her room, and more often than not, find her sitting quietly. She is surrounded by her beautiful things and beautiful photographs of people she can no longer remember. She is still our sweet, poised, ever classy, always refined mother, (even now) as she exists in this new world of what would appear to the lay person to be the mentally insane. People around her on any given day may be crying, moaning or having some sort of outburst. We close the door to her room to shut out that world and spend our time there looking into her beautiful blue eyes, which stare past us blankly, as we talk away, brush her hair, and rub lotion on her hands and feet and do what we can to make her—and us feel better. Sometimes she smiles; but mostly she just stares while we continue to talk, about kids, the grandkids, anything and nothing. Doing what we can do to aleve the guilt we feel. Because we know that after we’ve done our “due diligence” we walk toward the door and punch in the code that opens the door to our freedom, and leaves her behind in her prison.

I remember the first time she asked who I was…and I told her I was her daughter, Susie. Her baby. She looked at me suspiciously and said “you’re not my daughter! “I don’t know who you are.” A grown woman…I felt like a disappointed child. An orphan.

We realized, after a valiant effort at home care, that she needed 24 hour care. In our hearts we know she is cared for by wonderful people in this Alzheimer’s home. And although she has visits from one of her 7 children almost daily, we all struggle with the pain and guilt of leaving her there. Because we can walk away …we just go to the end of the hall and punch in the 4 digit code to freedom as Martha describes it, and leave her behind. “1234 locks her in...to keep her safe...1234...the freedom code back to our lives. We walk down those steps and out the door often with a lump in our throats, tears in our eyes and a prayer lifted to heaven.”

I’m just waiting for my dad to come to get her. He’ll take her by the hand and lead her down that hall, punch in that 4 digit code and the angels will hold those doors open while they walk together out of there for the last time…from there through gates for which she’ll never need a code…because she’ll be free at last. Thank God almighty she’ll be free at last!