In my work in long-term care facilities and with hospice, some of my favorite patients were those with whom I was able to write these words in their charts. (These are actually life goals for me when I reach a certain age.) Memory care units can be some of the happiest places on earth when interacting with a pleasantly confused person. They’re generally amiable and don’t often get upset when they are disoriented to place and time. It’s almost as though they just made up their minds to make the best of things when they started going fuzzy.
Of course, it’s not at all that simple, and a great many dementia patients become understandably angry and frustrated on the regular. I did a Dementia Virtual Tour similar to this one (https://www.secondwind.org/virtual-dementia-tourreg.html) once and it was unnerving and upsetting. I strongly recommend it for anyone who works or lives with someone with dementia or Alzheimer’s. I’m pretty chill as a rule, but that was a definite eye-opener. It’s not surprising that many dementia patients often act out with frustration.
I suppose one isn’t supposed to have favorite patients, but when they always are so happy to see you, tell you how pretty you are, and carry on the loveliest conversations with sentences that are almost all unconnected to one another, I couldn’t help but enjoy those visits more than some others. I had one patient who was always working in her “garden” and she would “show” me the various plants and flowers she was tending to on that particular day. She would sometimes complain about “those men” who were supposed to be moving dirt, mulch, rocks, and such for her. They had a habit of sneaking off before their work was done and she wasn’t going to let them think she hadn’t noticed when they came back.
Another patient could frequently be found in her room at her vanity, brushing her hair, and putting on makeup. She was always glad to welcome me and to let me know where she was headed that day. Sometimes it was for a television interview, sometimes she was getting ready for a class at college, and sometimes she was headed to work for her job at the bank. We had some great conversations about her “adventures.”
I often think about whether I would rather have a sound mind with a failing body as I reach the end of life, or a failing mind with a sound body. Of course I don’t necessarily get to choose, but I think being pleasantly confused and intermittently oriented sounds like a nice way to end things.