It’s only a few days to the fourth Thursday in November, and here in the States that usually means the rush into Thanksgiving and then tumbling into Christmas or Hanukkah. That’s enough as it is, but when your family includes dementia it means really looking at what your loved one can handle right in this moment in terms of holidays.
But this is 2020- and if ever that was a “But wait, there’s more” moment in all of our lives it has been this year. We have had fires across the globe, more hurricanes than we can name, murder hornets, meth alligators, Friday the 13th on a full moon, ghost cruise ships in colonies offshore, school is at home, work is at home, and we have been unable to celebrate any holidays normally since March- or earlier.
The biggies are coming now- Thanksgiving and the winter holidays. And Covid is coming back across the globe. For those coping with dementia it really changes whatever hopes we might have had to move back to some kind of normal just a few months ago, and it is going to highlight just how isolating 2020 has become for dementia families.
So let’s look at some ways to make this work while acknowledging the changes we are facing.
First, if you are a family who lost a loved one with dementia in a facility this year:
- Remember them out loud at your table, on your Zoom call, or however your family will be together. There is a missing place at your table, and it belongs to a person you did your best to care for and provide a Safe place for their care as dementia made it impossible to care for them at home.
- You did not cause their death
- You had no way to know a global pandemic was going to sweep in and take the lives of so many of our seniors
- You had no way to protect them
- Their caregivers did all they could to care for them (I am hearing from so many caregivers who tried so hard for so long- they could not win against the virus. They are heartbroken too).
- Think about reaching out (not physically) to those still working there, or to other families you knew when your loved one lived there. Many of you are facing the same holiday this year.
Second, if you are a family with a loved one in a facility currently:
- Do what you can to be in touch safely and within local and state safety guidelines.
- If getting in is impossible, drop off something they would enjoy, and maybe some music they would recognize. Drop off something for the staff, too.
- Remind yourself (and others who might be wondering) that you made the decision to place them because they needed more care than could be provided at home while keeping them safe.
- If they could not be kept safe at home before Covid, it is not going to be safer now at home.
- Allow yourself to have a holiday meal you can enjoy. Denying yourself some comfort and reminders of happier holidays will not help your loved one. It may very well cause resentment that you are denying the rest of the family the ability to be together in whatever way you can be.
If you have your loved one at home this year:
- I know I do not need to say this- but be careful. Follow all the guidelines. Do not allow anyone to bring Covid home.
- Limit how much activity your loved one is exposed to. Dementia does not enjoy lots of noise, furniture that has been rearranged to make way for extra people, meals not on schedule, routines being broken.
- Dementia does not understand Skype, Zoom, Amazon, Alexa, Siri, Google. It clouds vision and understanding new things. You were not expecting to tell your lamp to turn on through your phone a few years ago. They are not either. If that group chat is too much, let them not be part of it.
- Make sure the meal is something they can negotiate with their eating skills and swallowing. Think about smaller servings, foods that can be eaten with fingers if it is a bad day, and have a room and place they can go rest of it all becomes too much.
- This is 2020- who says we can’t have pizza on Thanksgiving?
Dementia can take a lot from us, and 2020 has as well. You can still find that moment to reflect on what there is to be thankful for, and to enjoy a moment or two. It may be only a moment- but take it when you can.
This may be the perfect time to begin a journal of special moments with your loved one, and to ask everyone in the family for a special memory of them to record.
Wishing you as peaceful a Thanksgiving as dementia will allow for you and yours.
