The final days with my mother were interesting. “Interesting” has become an interesting word to me. It’s almost always said as a polite way of saying “bad” or “not for me.” The day-to-day visits with my mother were rarely the same. Some fine. Some difficult. Always, in a good sense, interesting.

In the early days of my mother having to face some dementia associated with aging, there appeared to be a normal loss of certain daily facts and recent memories. Mom had a palpable fear of losing herself. Probably magnified because her father had. Though he always stayed sweet, there came a time when my grandfather barely recognized anyone.

Toward the end of my father’s life, my mother began to noticeably slip. He said to me, “If your mother tells a story more than once, just let her tell it again.” I thought that was a very considerate part of their marriage. One day while visiting them, Mom started to repeat a story she had told just minutes before. My father said impatiently, “Judy, you already told that story!” I still crack up thinking about it. Apparently, it was okay for him to bring it up.

As Mom’s memory diminished more and more, she became very intentional about memorizing certain subjects. She remembered that I would visit her once a week, on Mondays. The family wasn’t able to trust her with some important things, like her finances. When meeting with her bank manager, my brother Dan and I were relieved that Mom was able to casually recall the vital stats without our prompting. Not wanting to legally render her “incompetent,” it was important she come off as having it together, since we were transferring Power of Attorney from my mother to Dan.

She knew us and that we were her children, as well as naming her sisters and remaining close friends. But she was no longer invited to her reading group, where her memory issues detrimentally surfaced. She was not able to take part in the discussions about the chapters they all decided to read before their weekly get-togethers. As much as I understood the reasoning for her being removed from the group, I was devastated for her. She had been with them for decades. It was one of the few activities she still looked forward to.

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The last six months of her life brought on a different level of dementia. Sometimes she would write letters to her father, who had been dead for twenty-seven years. I admit that was hard to take. Others who didn’t spend time with my mother regularly found her general behavior challenging to witness. I, on the other hand, saw her as being much happier in her diluted reality. It seems in Mom’s foggy imagination my father was away on assignment. At other times, she invented dating fictional men. That, in particular, made me laugh. I experienced it with a sense of relief. She had been seriously depressed during the years after my father died. Though I missed the formidable woman that had been with me my entire life, I had to accept that that person was gone and was not going to return. In this new state, at least she presented herself as happy. I know she went to a dark place on Saturdays and Sundays, rarely hosting visitors, not even her sisters who often took weekend trips together. And I worked weekends. Toward the very end, one of my favorite memories was her telling me that she was dating two men. One, named “Matt,” she decided not to see anymore. She told me he was too controlling.

I am writing this as if the reader knew the relationship I had with my mother. For the most part, we had always been very close. Somewhat of a stereotype, I was the youngest of four children, gay, and had a terrific adult friendship with Mom as well as respecting the parent/child rules set prior to my going off to college. I believe it is important to be a parent, not a friend, to your child through the adolescent years. We transitioned somewhat seamlessly into our lifelong relationship until she died at ninety-one years old.

When my father became terminally ill about eleven years before Mom died, I began my weekly visits to their home. When Dad passed, I continued traveling to see my mother, believing that after a month or so, I could stop. But that didn’t end. Mom began to look forward to the visits so much, I couldn’t take away her anticipation. That tradition would continue for the next eight years. Beginning during the days when Dad was still alive, we would go out to a local restaurant for lunch. Once he became bedridden, we would alternate eating at home with Dad, or, at my father’s insistence, Mom and I would go out for lunch, and spend time with Dad at home when we returned.

As the weeks turned into years, I admit it became an obligation. But an obligation out of love. And though there were days it was emotionally exhausting, I will never regret the time I spent with them, accepting I had to forfeit my weekend of freedom.

I was also lucky, since I not only loved my parents, I genuinely liked them. And, my mother had a big mouth, as do I. We were never short on conversation. Sometimes it was small talk, other times we dissected family, politics, history, stories of her past, or whatever was on our minds that day. One thing I cannot tolerate (besides looking at photos of someone’s grandchildren for more than five minutes) is spending a meal mainly talking about the food. When I count the friends that have continued to put up with me, one thing that they all have in common is conversation. The gift of gab, without it being primarily focused on the quality of the chicken salad.

It sometimes drove me crazy when my mother and her two sisters, who all lived within five minutes of each other, would share a meal and the main subject was on what was being served. My oldest brother, Steve, reminded me that they spoke to each other every single day, so sometimes that was what was left for them to discuss. As obvious as that may seem, I hadn’t looked at it that way. It completely changed my perspective on their years of conversations. And I would like to state in defense of this topic that prolonged comfortable silence is sometimes as significant as talk.

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Twice I caught Mom deep in childlike behavior. Though she did not remember, I hated that she saw my reactions. Once, somewhat undressed, she was dancing in her bedroom with long, silk scarves. Thank the Lord, she was wearing a bra. Had I witnessed that “Dance of the Seven Veils” while she was not wearing any clothing, I might never have recovered. The second time was when she spoke in a child’s voice while “playing” in her room. Both times, when she saw me staring at her, she pulled out of it and came back to being my mother.

One incredibly sweet moment for me was entering her house while she was still upstairs in her bedroom. Marcia, one of her caretakers who had become like a sister to her, told me to just go on up. Mom was lying down, fully dressed, quietly resting. She had an open book on her night stand. One she had taken out of the local library titled “The Seventh Scroll.” It was not something I believe she would have chosen to read when all of her former faculties were intact. She asked me to read aloud from it. So, I did. Watching her watch me at the foot of her bed was tear producing. She was listening, but her eyes were fixed on me: so full of love. It is a wonderful and heartbreaking memory.

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I am not a religious man, though I think of myself as spiritual. I sometimes wonder if citizens who were not subjected to the religious mores that saturate our society, we would behave differently. Or perhaps I should say, “HOW” instead of “if” we would behave differently. Even my spirituality is steeped in fear of the unknown. As a Jew, it’s difficult for me to accept structured religion after knowing what happened to one third of the world’s Jewish population during the Holocaust. Without intending to be preachy, I believe that there are two reasons for war and violence throughout the history of humankind. Property and religion. With secondary reasons being pride and women (i.e. Helen of Troy).

I’ve veered off topic.

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For we who are lucky to have good relationships with one or both of our parents, there is no way to predict or understand what it will feel like when they die. Even when you have complicated or have unhealthy relationships with a father or mother, it permanently affects how you live your life as an adult. There is probably nothing comparable, other than, arguably, the hours spent while at school.

That is also why I believe psychiatry is a good career. Or at least an interesting one.