Things You Shouldn’t Say to Your Mother with Dementia

Literally Stories/November 2023

“I’ve just told you that.”

When things became worse, I brought my mother to our abandoned-since-Dad-died beach house for the summer. A sabbatical and a newly west coasted daughter freed me to lug Mom like a bag of silent, bewildered groceries into the passenger’s seat of my car. We sped along the highway from the city to the coast, chasing the rickety car of Mom’s memory, lumbering just ahead. I savored the hopeful sensation of control and the encroaching smell of sulfury sea air.

The house, high on a hill overlooking the sea, was left to my father by my grandparents, and was really just a shack, by modern standards. Mcmansions threatened from all sides.

The first night I awoke to find my mother flying on the green sky lawn, face down, her nightgown hitched up the back. 

I turned her mud-smeared body on its side, used both my hands to direct her gaze towards mine.

“Home?” she said.

“This is your home.” 

“Home?”

“You always loved it here.”

“Home?”

“I’ve just told you,” I said, jaw clenched.