Elder Care Expert Advice

Fun? Nope…still not. Funny? Yes…but sometimes not even that.

By the time I realized Mom’s recipes, lovingly prepared for us for decades, should be written down because her memory was slowly fading it was too late. For years, at Christmas, my Mom had made each family member’s favorite cookies or candy just for them. A few of the recipes I had called and asked for over the years. But, the sorghum cookie recipe was not one of those.

My niece, Becky, adored Grandma’s sorghum cookies. They were the taste highlight of her holiday. But the recipe was memorized by Mom many years before and either never written down or lost if it was. Becky lamented, “I can’t believe I’ll never taste those cookies again” as tears rolled down her cheeks. She grieved the cookies and her dimming Grandmother, I think.

I then made it my purpose to recreate them. At work, I asked everyone to search their cookbooks for molasses or sorghum cookie recipes. I got dozens. I read each recipe and finally chose the two that I thought showed the most promise, based on my own recollection of what went into them. It had to have ginger as an ingredient and only a little cinnamon.

Two weeks before Christmas, I baked them. I rolled them into BIG walnut-sized balls because one of the things about the cookies was that they were as big as your head! I baked them. I cooled them. I tasted them. “Close but no cigar,” I thought. When Becky arrived, I told her the story of my quest. She tasted them, smiled and thanked me for being so thoughtful. The look on her face told me they were not the same.

The next year, I altered a few things. I rolled them EVEN BIGGER to try to replicate the soft center and outer chewiness. I serve them to Becky again. “These are good,” she said. “But not Grandma’s, right?” I asked. “No,” she said, “not Grandma’s.”

My mom died in January, 2000. She was a saint and had gone to officially be one with God, whom she had walked with every day of her life.

I remember it must have been late July or early August. It was hot and it was early in the morning when the sun is just starting to turn everything gray before dawn. I was asleep dozing actually. Suddenly, there was a very loud crash, as though something had fallen off the wall. I sat bolt upright in bed, and in a clear and loud voice, my Mother said to me, “It’s margarine, Honey, not butter!”

I sat there stunned. I got up and walked the entire house, looking for what had fallen. Nothing was out of place. When I crawled, puzzled, back into bed, Michael aroused. “Are you okay?” he asked. I said, “Yes, but did you just hear my Mom say, “It’s margarine, honey, not butter?” He fully opened his eyes and shook his head. “You must have been dreaming,” he said. “I guess I was,” I replied, knowing full well that wasn’t the case.

“What does that mean?” I thought. “Margarine not butter.” You see, it was late July or early August and I wasn’t thinking about Christmas cookies.

In December, I dutifully got out all the recipes that I fix for my family every year. I pulled out the sorghum cookie recipe and sighed. Should I try again this year, for Becky? As I gazed at the recipe, my eyes fell on the first ingredient: butter. My mother NEVER baked with butter! She ALWAYS baked with Parkay margarine! I understood!

I went to the store. I bought Parkay margarine. I let it soften on the counter until it was limp. I put the Parkay into the KitchenAid mixer along with the sorghum. Unlike butter, the margarine and sorghum didn’t combine. They formed into little brown beads. I added the dry ingredients. I rolled them out into balls as big as your head. I baked them, cooled them and picked one up.

I knew.

When Becky arrived, I offered her a cookie. She smiled at me and dutifully took a bite. Her eyes filled with tears and she stuffed the whole thing into her mouth, chewing with her eyes closed as tears ran down.

“Oh,” she finally said. “I never thought I’d taste that again they’re Grandma’s cookies!”

Take comfort: she never leaves you and she is there in the gray colors of the morning, if you take time to listen.

Thanks, Mom!

Kim Woodward is owner of Senior Helpers of Avon, an in-home care and companionship company. Contact her at kwoodward@seniorhelpers.com or (317) 718-1806.

Nope…still not fun. But, funny? Yes!

So, I’ve shared with you that my mom had Alzheimer’s and that she was a former school teacher. One day, at the nursing home where she and my dad lived, she had an idea.

Outside their window was a school. She noticed it and decided she needed a job there.

The nursing home had her cuffed with a sensing device that sounded an alarm if she went out through any door. She quickly figured out that, to silence it, you could wrap your hand around it and it wouldn’t go off.

I had talked to the staff about mom’s condition. I said, “About the only thing I can’t stand the thought of is her wandering out in the cold and freezing to death.” They assured me that they would do their utmost to prevent that.

One November afternoon, I got a call at work. The nurse that took care of mom and dad’s wing told me that she had wandered away and they were looking for her. I said I’d leave right away and come to search for her, but the trip from my downtown office to the nursing home would take 30 minutes or more. Shaking, I left work, got in my car and started driving. About 10 minutes into the trip, I got another call that she had been found, safe and sound.

When I arrived, I found out the following:

Mom had silenced her cuff and headed out the back door toward the school. In a wheelchair, she had scooted across the parking lot, across a baseball diamond, across the school driveway and to the front door. She went inside, found the office and announced, “Hi! I’m Edith Linn and I’ve been a teacher for many years. I’m not working right now and I need a job…here…several days a week.” The school secretary smiled and said, “Well, I think we can use you. Let me just make a call.” She called the adjacent nursing home and said, “I think we have one of your folks over here.”

When I arrived, the nursing staff directed me to the school. I went inside to find the director of the nursing home, my mom, the secretary and the school principal waiting for me. Mom was entertaining everyone with stories of her 44 year teaching career. They were all laughing and enjoying her stories. I said to her, “Mom, we need to get back home. School’s over for today. Let’s go.”

The secretary asked, “She’s such a sweetie! Could I go over and get her a couple of days a week and have her sit with me? It seems that she really misses being in school.”

“Are you serious?” I asked. “You don’t have to do that.”

“I know,” she replied. “But I think she would really enjoy it. We could have her staple things or stuff envelopes for us.”

“Okay,” I said. “I think she’d enjoy it, too.”

So, she got the job! From that point forward, she would get up every day, get dressed, put on her makeup, fix her hair, and get ready for work. It gave her a purpose.

God bless the people who understand that, like children, it takes a whole village!

Kim is the owner of Senior Helpers of Avon, an in-home care and companionship company specializing in matching quality caregivers with clients. Go to www.seniorhelpers.com or email her at kwoodward@seniorhelpers.com for more information.

No, it isn’t fun, but some of the things that elderly parents or other loved ones with Alzheimer’s do are funny! My mother is a perfect example of those that, if allowed, can live and die with Alzheimer’s and still keep their dignity.

My sister and I are a lot alike (except that she is MUCH older than I am). We look alike. We sound alike. We like the same sports. We like the same foods. Even my dog, who hates everyone except me, likes her. One area, though, where we were very different was how to cope with our mother’s memory loss.

She spent much time correcting when Mom said or did something outlandish or incorrect. “No, Mom,” she’d say. “You know you live here at the nursing home with Dad and can’t go home.” “No, Mom,” she’d say. “You remember that we talked about your bank account yesterday.” “Mom, that’s not a knife it’s a fork.” It frustrated both of them.

I coped with Mom’s dementia by simply meeting her where she was. I’d walk in and say, “Hi Mom! Where are we today?” “Oh,” she’d say, her eyes lighting up, “we have to watch the turkeys that are in the front forty and make sure they don’t fly over the fence.” “Great!” I’d reply, “I love to watch those turkeys!”

It is terribly tempting to correct, remind, extol, exhort, appeal, correct, and even pander to your loved one with memory loss. You hope for a break through, a return to lucidity, and to have your fully functioning parent back for a few minutes or hours. But, I found that it only served to ruin the time you spent together. I believe I had 3 years longer with Mom than my sister did because I actually enjoyed her company, her stories, her fantasies, her hallucinations and her disorientation and my sister, well, she grieved it.

I’d encourage you to try letting go and allowing them to keep their dignity. Let them be where they are, doing whatever they’re doing, and join in. You might actually learn some facts from the past and you both will be able to simply enjoy each others’ company.

Kim Woodward is owner of Senior Helpers, an in-home care and companionship service that provides elderly clients with the ability to live independently in their own homes and much needed respite for primary caregivers.