Here is a short excerpt from the book. It is during the time that Alzheimer's was overtaking my mother and I could do nothing to stop it.
"Mom is lying face down on the table in front of her wheelchair and she is neither dancing nor singing. The gathering, meant as a cheerful little insert into the lives of the people there, has gone sour. It is a scene of carnage now, in my mind. My heart is continuing its slow, painful crumble.
I am quite literally overcome, paralyzed even, with the knowing and the feeling.
I have tried so long to force the doctors and the staff and everyone caring for her that she is sinking. They will not listen. Even friends and family do not seem to get the impact. I cannot move. I cry outside the room; for her and for me.
Later that month, I called in hospice. It was a
monumental act of will to pick up the phone and share with people whose
business is seeing folks, comfortably, out and over the rainbow. To tell them
my mom was on her way and I needed help as much as she did.
Staff and friends alike responded oddly, in my
opinion. They were almost angry that I had called in the troops. This was a
kind of battle and I had no one else to help fight it. But they frowned and
said how they wished I had not done that; not called in hospice. She was going
and all were in denial now. I seemed to be the only one aware of the truth."
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