Chorus: Everything is nothing, everything is never enough, without You. Everything is nothing, a little bit more will never measure up, gotta need  Your love…                                                                                      from the CD Chasing the Wind by KJ Scriven

The song describes what a man and a woman discover. The man, who tries to prove his worth by climbing the corporate ladder, realized there was “a whole down in his soul”. The woman thought she “found the one”, the one who would give her the love she was longing for. However, she realized he could not “fit the shoes that were made for God alone”.

For the majority of today this chorus of Scriven’s song kept replaying in my head. I felt as though God was trying to tell me something. But what was God’s point? I think I may know the answer.

God challenges us to cast our care upon Him, for Him to take care of, for Him to handle. The sixth chapter of Matthew also commends us not to be concerned (better yet worried) about what tomorrow brings; it will have worries of its own. Instead, seek first the kingdom and his righteousness and all these things shall be added.

Lately after visiting my mother, and noticing how her brain is mixing memories with events that either happened, or they are events her mind has made up, and believing it is real and has occurred. As I walk to my car, I have had to say out loud to myself “You can’t fix this.” At the same time, I attempt to come up with some type of strategy to get my mother to see what really is reality.

• I have tried to give her a list for her to refer to. Problem is, she doesn’t look at it.
• I come up with a plan to talk to her about things to get her to understand what is going on; that did not work.
• I try to offer solutions to her ‘reality’, it only makes things worse.

So today when I visited her I just listened, told her I would look into it, and when I could, I interjected a sentence or two as to what she should do. The problem with that is give it a few seconds and she is right back to saying the same thing, her unreal reality.

I left again,  walking to my car, telling myself the same thing: you can’t fix this.

So, getting back to the song, could it be what God is telling me to stop chasing the wind (the title of the song), and instead cast on Him, get Him more involved, and not worry? could it be that I should stop chasing the wind of what I perceive to be  answers to this situation? Could it be that I am so involved in my mother’s issues it messes with my getting rest, keeps me unfocused regarding what I need to do for myself, eating things I shouldn’t, in an attempt to release the internal pressure I have placed on myself? Like my mother, I may have developed some ‘reality issues’ of my own that don’t exist.

What does exist is there is a God who is still with me, full of the reality of His going to bat for me if I only relinquish what I can’t change. Like all caregivers who want the mind of their loved one suffering from dementia to return (yet knowing the disease has taken over), we must remind ourselves not to become God and solve everything, because everything we strive to do is never enough, without the involvement of God who is the Omniscient One. So, I will continue to remind myself to love my mother and do my best to care for her, and look to the hills from which cometh my help, which is from the Lord who made heaven, earth, my mother, and me. I gotta need His Love…to get me through this.

As my mother has been transported from the hospital to a skilled nursing facility, dementia continues to rear its ugly head. The latest is living in her dreams. She calls me during the evening wanting me to come and get her. She comes up with what at first I thought was just crazy thoughts, and I couldn’t figure them out: she told me she was with the funeral director, or at a friend’s house, all the while she was at the nursing facility. She called me begging me to get her, and when I told her she was at the facility, she said she would just walk home since I wasn’t going to help her.

The next day I told her what happened. When I described what she told me, first I noticed she didn’t even remember doing that. But she did remember the dream she had, and it matched what I described she had told me when she called begging me to bring her home(which was about 1am in the morning). We laughed it off, but at least I realized what was going on. When I got home, I did some research about dementia and vivid dreams, and then it made sense.

Learning Points…

For years my mother has told me she has had vivid dreams since she was a child, and the dreams seemed so real it was hard to “come out of them”.  When we lived together years ago, I would hear her talking in her sleep. I wanted to wake her, but didn’t. Eventually the talking and (what appeared to be) crying sounds would stop. Here we are years later.  From the research, there is a correlation between the elderly who have dementia and vivid dreams. Many cannot tell the difference between dreams and reality, particularly as they are ‘sundowning’, described as when the sun goes down those with dementia have a change of behavior, and not a positive one. When there is daylight, my mother for the most part is okay. I visited with her recently, and left her as she was eating her lunch, with her telling me she would take a nap after eating. Once I got home, it didn’t take long that afternoon for het to call me begging me to come and get her; I knew she had awakened from a dream and was living it. This dream was about her being at her friend’s home and everyone had left, and I needed to come and get her. My trying to tell her she is living what she just dreamed didn’t help. My telling her she was at the nursing facility didn’t help either. She believed she was at her friend’s house; her dream was presently her reality. At least I only got one phone call, and at least for that evening, I did not receive any other calls.

If there are caregivers who are experiencing this (and you want to get sleep), and your loved one is not living with you, I can only tell you what is working for me. I turn off my cell phone after 8pm. I allow any messages to go to voice mail after 8pm. I have talked to the staff at the nursing facility about what is going on. I typed a list about where my mother is, why she is there, and meals will be provided for her, and I gave that to her to read. This was done so she can refer to this when she gets confused. Once she starts her rehab  exercises, hopefully this will tire her out and she will sleep better.

Only time will tell, or perhaps I should say only the night will reveal what will happen…