Every now and then I need to be an interpreter for my sweet sister, Lisa. When she’s overcome with laughter, the fine line between despair and delight can be hard to detect. Tears and torment might ride along with giggles and smiles. Mercurial and rapid, Lisa’s capacity for displaying the full range of human emotions in sixty seconds or less leaves average onlookers (those unschooled in all things Lisa) puzzled, at first. 😉
Yesterday was one of those days. Lisa is in a new program at her special needs workshop and she loves it. For the higher functioning intellectually disabled clients, more outings and activities occur and I love the nimbleness of her team. Everyone hopes more community-based work for Lisa and her friends will be available again soon, but it’s been tough. Most of the piece-work jobs have disappeared as local businesses have tightened up for their own salvation.
When the trip to a local dollar store (Dollar Store? Dollar Tree? Five Below? I’m not sure) was announced Lisa was full throttle excited. When mom/Sue was alive, she and Lisa frequented all the thrift shops and dollar stores as they purchased unnecessary trinkets and doo-dads, adding to the growing hoard in their home.
I recognize the behavior – now – as an early indicator of mom/Sue’s decline into dementia but at the time, her insistence that she needed to buy birthday gifts for small children went unchallenged. I didn’t drill down. Whose children? I didn’t realize Sue’s fragmented memory conjured images of tots and toddlers – grandchildren of friends from decades prior. I assumed she and Lisa were buying for present-day little ones who loved crayons, stuffed animals, board games, dolls, and art supplies galore. The discoveries came later with Sue’s descent. Every nook and cranny in their home was loaded with dollar store finds, mostly still in bags, with receipts. Sometimes with notes written in Sue’s hurried scrawl about the intended recipients, with wrapping paper adding into the bag. Even in her decline, Sue tried to be organized.
Lisa’s memories? None of the hoarding. Once the items arrived home, she was unaware of what happened next. Sue had plenty of hiding spaces inaccessible and out of view. For Lisa, the mention of a “dollar store” was evocative of fun times with mom. She loved picking and choosing colorful gifts, loading up a cart with purchases and then rejoicing on the way home, complete with fast food hauls from their favorite drive-thru haunts.
Oh – I should share this ‘nugget’ (wink) from McDonald’s. 😉 One of Lisa’s most gigglicious memories from their local drive-thru was about the crew – always knowing Sue and Lisa’s order when they pulled in, greeting them with “Hi, girls – the usual?” as if they were at a local bar. From what Lisa’s shared, these were memorable moments, not because of any angry incidents – nope. A drive thru? One of Sue’s happy places and she and Lisa made a habit of paying for the car behind them – long before ‘random acts of kindness’ were a thing. Lisa loved every bit of ‘happy Sue’ and saw their routine as a benevolent, silly extension of their shopping excursions.
When the recent outing to the dollar store was announced, Lisa’s staff knew nothing of the backstory. Lisa’s flooded memories of over-buying trinkets and topping off the outing with McDonald’s drive-thru shenanigans were joyous. Her laughter prompted full-body heaves and then she peed herself, just a little – and through her giggles, tried to convey that she needed to get to the bathroom. Stat! Well, you know how that went. Sweet, caring staff members construed the guffaws as something more…and the tears? I mean, who could blame them? Is Lisa in pain? And then Lisa’s choked out words about needing to rush to the bathroom. It looked serious…prelude to a seizure? But it was anything but.
As Lisa filled me in on all the details last night, I wondered about the kind staff members and whether or not I’d receive a follow-up call to explain the backstory. Remarkably, there are times when Lisa does a good job on her own and I think this was one of those instances. When I probed, asking, “Did you tell your staff you were excited about going to the dollar store – and it made you remember fun times with mom…that you were happy, not upset?” Lisa’s reply was a keeper. “Oh, yes. I told them I was fine. Just remembering mom when she was silly.”
Lisa…channeling some of the best parts of Sue? One of the gifts that keeps on giving.
Vicki 😊
Learn more about my book, “Surviving Sue” here or stop by to leave a review or comment. Thank you so much for reading the book, the blog posts and/or listening to the podcast. My greatest hope is that my mom’s story will help others.
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Victoria Ponders 
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