Hope, Dementia, and Kimberly Williams-Paisley
In my recent article in Money magazine, I discussed the difficult conversation that is necessary when a new dementia patient needs to hand someone else the financial reigns. In a situation that seemed to me – at first – hopeless, there was hope for a better way.
“When Dementia Threatens a Family’s Finances” highlights strategies and resources to help families through this crucial season of decision making. One recommendation I made was to “pick your battles, and relent some control.” The story of Steve Starnes’ grandmother, whose family had created a limited shopping budget she could control, was heart lifting as she brought home a new necklace that drew her focus away from the other losses she was experiencing.
Of course, not all stories end so rosily. The decline of a person’s independence and abilities is a raw, heart-wrenching situation. Maybe giving the patient a limited budget will completely offend him and he will begin to feel like you’re the enemy. But isn’t it worth your personal investment of time and emotion to decrease the potential for conflict? There is a now-viral video on YouTube of Naomi Feil, founder of Validation Therapy, conducting a session with a non-verbal dementia patient. Through Feil’s therapy in this 6-minute video, the patient begins to sing and talk again.
If there is that kind of hope during the end stages of dementia, we can only surmise that connecting with a patient in the beginning stages – when financial decisions become risky – is within our reach.
More hope can be found in Kimberly Williams-Paisley’s recent essay “Facing My Mother’s Dementia” in Redbook. She is an actress I have always admired, but I have new respect for her courage as she acknowledges the pain:
“Our visits were agonizing for me. I couldn’t look at her without seeing a fading picture of who she used to be. I resented this mostly manic, dangerous, crazy woman who had taken over my mother’s body. I hated her insidious disease. I couldn’t help but speak of Mom in the past tense. She just wasn’t there anymore, not in the way I wanted her to be.”
But then, hope enters. After talking with others who had lost parents to dementia, she has a “renewed heart:”
“I flew to see her the next day. She was sitting, head bowed, in the living room of the residence… I shook her gently.
“‘It’s me,’ I said. ‘It’s Kim.’ I brought my head down underneath hers, trying to get her attention. It took a few moments. But when she saw me, her eyes opened wide. Her mouth lifted into a wide, happy grin, as though I was one of the greatest surprises of her life. We sat like that for a while, smiling at each other and humming a bit to the music. I rubbed skin cream on her dry hands. I focused on this new person in front of me, in many ways a stranger. She radiated a peace that comes from having little self-awareness.
“She is, in many ways, a ‘new’ mom. But now it’s easier to welcome memories of her as she used to be.
“‘Want to go for a walk?’ I asked. She sucked in her breath in wonder. Her eyes opened wide and bright.
“‘Yes!’ she said.
“With almost all language gone, she and I discovered a new way to say, ‘I get you. You understand me. We love each other.'”
Like most difficult life experiences, there is hope. In the case of dementia, it needs to be unearthed and massaged.
If you or a loved one are going through a difficult situation that is affecting your finances, let’s talk. You don’t need to go through it alone, and there are ways to find peace.
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