My story

My mother came to live with me while I was assigned in Hawaii. At the time I was an active duty military officer in the U.S. Army. She was 81 at the time.

I am an only child and my father passed away when I was 12. It’s been my mother and I ever since and we are very close. The idea of her living me with was a little scary but I didn’t want her living on her own anymore. So I told her she would come to live with me!

The first two years were great! I’d come home to cooked meals and on the weekends we will see the island. I’d take her everywhere with me. The Hawaiian culture embraces seniors and everywhere we went she was the center of attention…which she loved!

But I began to notice things, her forgetting where things were. She would pick up the TV remote control when the phone rang. Her primary care physician gave her a remedial test in his office and declared that she “had a little” dementia. But as the months went by I knew it was more.

On the island of O’ahu they have the Hawaii Pacific Neuroscience Center. I took her there where they did a comprehensive testing from and MRI, EEG. She meet with a neuropsychologist, geriatrician and finally the neurologist who then told me she had Alzheimer’s.

This declaration was like a blot of lightening and a breath of fresh air. Because now I have an actually disease and we can go from there right? So I thought but with each day, month and year I have watch this disease transform my mother into someone I had to learn to love and get to know.

Subscribe below to get notified when I post new updates.