You’re Not Alone: Finding the Sweet Spot

To love a person is to learn the song in their heart
and sing it to them when they have forgotten.

– Arne Garborg

This is my fifth installment in the You’re Not Alone series. I have one goal: to help more caregivers by sharing our experiences in dealing with my mother’s Alzheimer’s. Early on, I wrote it’s not just about taking care of a loved one, but a complete lifestyle change.  

But none of you are alone – we’re all together in the fight.

I learned early on, thanks to members of our caregiver support group, that everyone was dealing with the same frustrations, sadness and anger. New members to the group benefited from feedback from caregivers who had been dealing with the challenges longer. Many of the group members, along with the facilitator, had great ideas to level out the peaks and valleys in care. The more time with the group, the more ideas were shared.

Early on, we learned the importance of finding the “sweet spot” for Mom.  The Google definition of “sweet spot” is the point or area on a bat, club or racket at which it makes most effective contact with the ball.

Well, in my mother’s care, especially as Alzheimer’s robbed us more and more of her personality, finding things she loved became more and more important – those sweet spots. Here are some examples:

• My mother never stopped loving ice cream. She also loved a ride in my convertible. So, the perfect evening activity was a trip to the local ice cream shop, complete with the top down. If my mother was laughing and smiling, we all were!
• Looking at old albums and talking about the photographs was another sweet spot. I wrote about this in a previous post. However, one point to reiterate – make sure you take notes. We never did, and today I have hundreds of old photographs with no idea who’s in each picture.
• Both my folks loved music, especially classical. Music was always playing in their home, but one of the highlights, as I look back, was taking them to see The Nutcracker, performed by the Sarasota Orchestra. But the visual I’ve hung onto all these years was looking over and seeing Mom’s eyes as big as saucers and Dad holding her hand as they enjoyed the performance. For a brief evening, there was no Alzheimer’s, and time stood still enough to be cherished.
• Mom loved going out to dinner, and it didn’t matter what the cuisine! The little adventure was all about being together. However, we did learn a valuable lesson in a cuisine that became off-limits – tapas. A tapas restaurant had opened in the area, and we thought Mom would enjoy it, and she did. However, because of memory issues and Tapas being all about small plates, Mom would have a taste of something, but as the plate made it around the table, she’d forget she had it already. Because the plate was empty, we’d order another one…it became one of the most expensive dinners we ever had with her…but that didn’t take away the fun of it.
• Mom loved watching television, but we also learned early on that we had to be careful. Mom became whatever she watched. For example, I received a call from Dad one night, saying they had watched The Sound of Music, and Mom couldn’t stop crying, saying, “I can’t believe what they did to the Von Trapp family!” Dad was beside himself…but Sheila had the answer. It was the 50th anniversary of the movie. “Dad, just tell her the Von Trapp kids were all on Oprah this week and they’re terrific.” That was all it took – the crisis was over, and Mom was at happy again.
• Visitors became less and less frequent, as many of my parents’ closest friends abandoned them. Mom loved visitors, and if she couldn’t remember how she knew the person, she’d fake it and make something up. My one regret is that I didn’t get more involved and, at the very least, talk to a few of their friends and encourage them to stop by. The challenge was that nobody knew what to say or how to act, but I still feel we could have helped the process along a bit.

Here’s my point. Make a list of things your loved one always enjoyed doing before Alzheimer’s. Everything should be on that list, from favorite foods and movies to people and television shows. Anything they used to love doing is still there. Keeping these things in their lives is also a chance for a little emotional respite as a caregiver.

Those infrequent lucid moments became what we all called the sun coming out from behind the clouds. And with each one, another memory was made for each of us. Nothing topped Mom’s smile when she was happy.

It’s not how much you do, but how much love you put in the doing.

– Mother Teresa