"Holding Hands" by Karen Sleeth
– “I don’t want you to get lost.”
I held Momma’s hand the day I took her to the nursing home.
Karen Sleeth lives in Durham, North Carolina. She is a member of the North Carolina Writers Network and the Renegade Writers Group. Her work has appeared or is forthcoming in The Main Street Rag, Potato Soup Journal, 2022 Best of Potato Soup Journal, Café Lit Magazine, and others. Currently she is attending Lindenwood University in St. Charles, Missouri. She will complete an MFA in Creative Writing in May of 2023.
Author’s Talk
Karen Sleeth
When someone you love dies you grieve the loss but eventually the pain is replaced by pleasant memories of who that person was to you. You remember their love, the funny things they said and did, and the experiences you shared, often with a smile. With dementia the nature of that person and memories becomes eroded by the effects of the disease on them. You are trapped in a seemingly unending grief.
My mother will be 90 years old soon and has lived with the diagnosis of dementia for over fifteen years. She is essentially a large infant now, unable to feed herself, walk, and has no recognition of anyone, even herself. I realized recently that the woman I grew up with does not make an appearance in my memories anymore. Instead, when I remember, it is the stages of dementia that she has gone through, occasionally funny things but mostly painful including being easily frightened, wandering away, looking for home, being angry and defensive, and striking out.
As I wait for her body to wear out like her mind has, I am determined to resurrect my memories of the life she lived as a happy, vital, loving, generous and kind woman. I will remember her using the harshest word I ever heard her say, when she called the non-starting lawn mower a “rip!” I will remember her driving the motorcycle with my sister on the back down the C&O canal tow path, while Dad and I rode beside them on our bike. I will think of her planting “daffy-dill” bulbs in the yard and delighting when they bloomed. And I will remember her holding me when I cried because my kitten died, I messed up the solo I sang at church, I had to drop out of college because of the cost, or my marriage was over.
My story begins that journey of grieving my mother, not dementia.
