She has been stripped of everything that was important to her. No more weekly visits to the hairdresser. The cheeks that always sparkled with a bit of rouge are now pale, the small red veins the only colour in her face. Her lips are dry and colourless, a cold sore on the bottom lip looks in{amed.Where once her neck was adorned with a twinset of pearls there are now only wrinkles and liver spots with lots, sinewy muscles contract as she tries to speak. Her hands are bare where once a wedding ring sparkled its fabulous diamond, her zngernails once lusciously coloured now cut short. Sometimes she scratches herself…
The flimsy dress has been washed too often, faded colours speak of this. The slippers hang loosely from her bony feet, she no longer walks. The incontinence wear bundles up around her once voluptuous hips. “She is no longer our mother” the children proclaim. The photographs against the wall tell a different story a graduate in music, a young bride, a proud mother of three, a grandmother. She is still all of these, in spite of her cognitive impairment, which is not what stripped away her dignity and personhood. It is us who did that…
Why does this happen? How do we allow this to happen? When do we stop seeing the Mother and only see a patient? Is it because we simply do not care? Is it really too much trouble? There but for the grace of God go you and I…