“If someone you love is old and suffering, and you look after them for years and years, how do you not go crazy?
“Most people put them in a home. Visit once a month.”
That was not an option for Cathie Borrie, a trained nurse, law school graduate and author, who chose to look after her Alzheimer-afflicted mother for six years.
Borrie taped their often absurd conversations in order to document her mother’s slow descent into dementia, for her new book The Long Hello.
Losing a loved one by teaspoonfuls is difficult enough, but laying bare, with brutal honesty, the frustration, guilt and anger associated with that is a herculean task.
Luckily, Borrie has emotional muscle to spare.
Setting the stage with flashbacks to her childhood, readers piece together the events that shaped Borrie’s life: a drunken father, a brother who dies tragically at age 13, a selfish stepfather, and a draconian boarding school.
When her mother’s illness escalates, Borrie becomes the sole caregiver, sacrificing her own life and happiness.
Acknowledging her mom’s declining cognitive function, Borrie adjusts her own speech and thoughts to match the increasing absurdity and disconnectedness of her mother’s.
At one point she says: “Our conversations are like excerpts from Alice in Wonderland, aren’t they, Mum?”
Like a dance, Borrie adapts to her mother’s steps, careful not to move too fast.
Despite the heart-wrenching sadness of Alzheimer’s, Borrie is able to celebrate the small blessings; the moments of clarity, grace, humour and recognition her mother displays.
As the disease progresses though, Borrie becomes overwhelmed by hopelessness, frustration, guilt and loneliness.
In sharing the inescapably painful process of witnessing her mother slowly disappear before her eyes, Borrie gives strength to others.
The message to caregivers is this: be at peace with what’s happening to your loved one, instead of trying to correct their words, direct their attention, or coax them back into your world.
Follow, don’t lead. Look for pearls amid the dross. And don’t try to understand it, change it, or fight it. Just accept what is.
By the end of the book I had tears streaming down my face; sad for my mother who has dementia, sad for me, the part-time caregiver.
It’s all too heartbreakingly real. Yet Borrie’s examination of the minutiae of grief, love, suffering and beauty is profound.
Shelley Civkin is the communications officer at the Richmond Public Library. For reading suggestions visit YourLibrary.ca/goodbooks.
