"You Are Bad, Bad, Bad!"

"You are bad, bad, bad!"  That's what mother was saying with her lips pursed while shaking her finger at me.  She was very upset with me, and even yet she can give a good scolding!  Sometimes with Alzheimer's disease it is difficult to distinguish the petulant child from the mother who is unhappy with her child's behavior.  This time it was both.

Mother had a sweatshirt lying on her bed that was not hers.  Checking the tag, I noticed that it belonged to her suite mate.  When I picked up the sweatshirt, Mother started in with "what are you doing - that's my shirt."  Nothing I said would dissuade her.  As I left the room with the sweatshirt to return it, I could hear her scolding me and protesting. She was childlike in her believing something was "hers", but she was also an angry mother whose child was not doing what she wanted her to do. 

It is a fine line to walk sometimes, that line between still being her child, and yet playing the "parent" role of making her floss her teeth, limiting her chocolate, and making her return things that are not hers.  I thought maybe it would be easier to do.  But there is something in that wagging finger and the accusation of "being bad" that still resonates in the back of my mind.  I felt guilty for upsetting her because her belief in her ownership of that shirt was real.  That is the problem with Alzheimer's; one's reality changes.  Sweatshirts or relationships, it all becomes as tangled and scrambled as her mind, and we are all a part of it.