Funeral

 

Once, when one of my loved ones passed away, I couldn’t attend the funeral. So I tried to attend other funerals as much as I could. Sometimes I attended the funeral of a person to whom I was not closely related. I believed that a person who was dying had to be going to the place where my loved one lived. So I felt that I could connect with my loved one by attending that person’s funeral. However, when my mother, who had Alzheimer’s disease, needed 24-hour care, I found it difficult to attend funerals.

The common Japanese-style funeral gives one two opportunities to attend a ceremony. The first one is tsuya or the wake, which originally meant an all-night vigil over a body. It starts in the evening. Those who are closest to the deceased stay at might night. The second one is sougi or the actual funeral, which starts on the next day at noon. My mother used to go to an adult daycare center daily. But I needed to be at home when she left and when she came back. Tsuya was too late and sougi was too early to accommodate my schedule. Of course, using the short-stay service for adults was an option, but we would have had to make a reservation a few months in advance. And no one could predict when a funeral would be held a few months ahead of time. Thus, during that period, I could not attend some funerals.

However, my mother sometimes said mysterious words to me. Some of them might have been spiritual messages, for instance, “Do you understand why you appeared to this world?” It was possible to think of my mother as already being a half-resident of the other world. Taking care of her was a possible way to connect to a deceased loved one.

Now that my mother is in a nursing home and I am no longer responsible for her day-to-day care, I can finally attend funerals again. But, my friends, please don’t die! I hate funerals. I sincerely hope you will live long lives.

Picture by Matu

bankbook

 

One of the most serious problems of my mother who had Alzheimer’s disease was repeatedly losing bankbooks. We reissued her bankbooks again and again. After we reissued, the lost old bankbooks would be found, but these were already invalid. However, the new bankbooks would get lost again. We could not deposit money from the banks. To take care of my mother, we needed money.

At that time, my mother had a secretary and an accountant. One day they asked me to keep my mother’s bankbooks. I felt odd because I assumed children should not read parents’ bankbooks. I did not realize Alzheimer’s disease could cause a situation like this. I kept my mother’s bankbooks, but I did not read them. I just put them in my desk.

One day, when I came back home, my mother was angry and said, “Do you know where my bankbooks are?”

I answered honestly, “Your secretary and accountant asked me to keep your bankbooks.”

She got angrier and said, “Don’t touch my bankbooks! Give them back to me immediately!”

I did not have a choice, so I gave her back the bankbooks.

After a few days, the secretary and the accountant extremely scolded me. “She will lose the bankbooks soon. You do not know how complicated the required processes are to reissue the bankbooks!”

They were right. My mother repeatedly lost the bankbooks.

The solution I thought of was to fake the bankbooks. First, I pretended we lost my mother’s bankbooks to the banks so they would give us new ones. Second, I gave my mother old invalid bankbooks then kept the new ones. When my mother insisted she lost the bankbooks, I pretended to look for the bankbooks. Secretly, I would put the new bankbooks where my mother could find them. I let her find the new bankbooks by herself. After she found them and attended to something else, I would take back the new bankbooks and keep them.

To prevent my mother from realizing that her bankbooks were invalid or from using her bankbooks, I always needed to put enough money in her wallet.

It was so complicated and bothersome. Furthermore, I felt guilty as I tricked my mother and the banks. However, I could not find a better way to solve it.

Some older people tend to feel secure when they view their bankbooks, but I feel otherwise.

Picture by Graphs

 

 

Disgrace to the World

Minakata Kumagusu (1867–1941) was a Japanese author, biologist, naturalist, and ethnologist. He worked internationally. He would sometimes contribute an article to a foreign magazine. However, he was famous as a kind of freak.

Once, he argued with a governor on a government policy. Kumagusu picked up mushrooms in a mountain and put them into a bag. Then he visited the governor’s house and threw the bag to the governor’s head. Kumagusu was immediately caught by the governor’s supporters and was arrested by the police. After the police scolded him, he was released. When he met his granddaughter, he explained the incident like a heroic story: “I beat up most of his supporters, but there were too many supporters. So finally I was caught.”

I read this story on a newspaper that interviewed his granddaughter. I wondered, Why mushrooms? He was a genius. He might have a reason that I could not understand.

Afterward, he wrote bad things about the governor on foreign magazines. Kumagusu boasted about them on his book and wrote, “Disgrace to the world!”

I just thought of never fighting against any governors and geniuses.

Picture by Anastasia Lembrik

 

Shopping

 

My mother had a successful life. She turned her hobby into her job. But this also meant that she was hobbyless. When she was active, she had really busy days. I think her recreational activity was shopping. Every weekend, she and my father would get into their car and head out to shop. Both of them had grown up during WWII. During those days, there had been shortages of various supplies in Japan. Hence, for my parents, shopping could be the most attractive leisurely activity.

About seven years later, after my mother had been diagnosed with Alzheimer’s disease, she attended adult day care daily. But, this was not an option on Sundays. Hence, my father would take her shopping on Sundays. But he ultimately passed away. My wife was busy on Sundays because she was a stage lighting artist. That meant that I had to stay with my mother at our house because we could not leave her alone. If she had gone out, she could have gone missing.

During those days, we spent Sundays shopping. The nearest small supermarket was half an hour’s walk away. We would walk to the supermarket slowly. It was said that walking was good for those who had Alzheimer’s disease. After we arrived at the supermarket, I would give my mother a shopping basket and say, “You can buy anything you want.” Then I would leave her alone and go to the smoking area. All exits were visible from the smoking area. So there was no possibility of her leaving the supermarket and getting lost. After smoking, I would reenter the supermarket and find my mother. She usually had something in her basket. We would pay for that and go back home, where I would cook the food she had selected.

Sometimes this worked; sometimes it didn’t. Sometimes I didn’t know how to cook the food my mother had chosen. When that was the case, I would wait for my wife to come back from work and ask her, “Do you know how to cook this food?” When the answer was positive, she would cook the item for us on the next day. However, sometimes even my wife didn’t know how to cook the food. I had previously assumed that a supermarket would sell only food that was familiar to us. But my mother sometimes picked up food items that were unknown to us: “Hey mom, even you have never cooked this food. I know because I have never eaten it!”

Farmers and fishermen, I own you an apology. Sometimes we had to dump the food because we didn’t know how to cook it. But please forgive us: After shopping, my mother would appear to be very happy.

Picture by Sato

Cherry Tree, Cat, and Train

 

It took two or three years for a doctor to give my mother a diagnosis of Alzheimer’s disease. Those were the hardest days of my life. At my mother’s place of work, her coworkers had suspected that she had a medical problem. So I took her to many hospitals. But, at that time, no doctor was able to determine what she had. In the early stages of Alzheimer’s disease, identifying it is very difficult, even for doctors.

All doctors used the dementia rating scale that Dr. Hasegawa had established. It involved a doctor asking a patient some questions. Depending on the answers, the doctor would determine whether or not the patient had a disease. An example follows in the next paragraph.

The doctor said to the patient, “Please memorize these words: cherry tree, cat, and train. I will ask you to remember them later.” Then the doctor asked a few different questions. Subsequently, the doctor asked the patient, “Can you remember the three words I said?” If the patient’s condition was serious, it was difficult for him/her to respond.

My mother’s case was different. She was experiencing the earliest stage of Alzheimer’s disease. Hence, she answered perfectly. Furthermore, many doctors let her memorize the three words repeatedly. Thus, she had no difficulty remembering them.

Having anticipated this kind of case, Dr. Hasegawa created a test B, which employed the words, “apricot tree, dog, and bicycle.” However, no doctor used test B.

Dr. Hasegawa’s test words described a plant, an animal, and a vehicle. Hence, doctors could quite conceivably have used “willow tree, monkey, and car” or “baobab tree, tyrannosaurus rex, and Segway.” But none of the doctors we met had used either option.

I have no hard feelings regarding the doctors who failed to identify my mother’s disease. But I suspect that doctors are basically unimaginative people.

Picture by piangtawan

More Than Three Caregivers

 

It is said that if you take care of a patient with Alzheimer’s at your home, you need more than three caregivers. A patient with Alzheimer’s needs a 24-hour care every day. We should recognize that caregiving is a job. Being paid or unpaid does not matter. When only one or two workers are assigned in a workplace needing 24-hour work every day, they get sick. It should be eight hours per person, so that workplace needs more than three workers. A patient with Alzheimer’s should not be taken care of by less than three caregivers.

In our case, my father, my wife, and I had achieved a short-term three-caregiver system. Before I got married, the caregivers were just my father and me. After my father passed away, the caregivers were just my wife and me. Of course, we often used day service and short stay. However, we had difficult days.

A patient with Alzheimer’s needs three caregivers, but if the caregivers want to pursue their careers and their hobbies, there should be more caregivers.

Taking care of a patient with Alzheimer’s is not a complicated job. It is simple if it is for a short time. However, many caregivers get sick, commit suicide, and even commit murder in Japan. These situations happen because most of them do their jobs for a long time without any break. Any job could make people insane if that is the case.

In Japan, hundreds of caregivers commit suicide and murder. The government is trying to establish socialized caregiving systems. Of course, we need those systems, but we should treat caregivers as family members, relatives, and neighbors. That is a respectable lifesaving action.

Picture by hobi

Sandwich

 

When I was a university student, I almost did not attend my classes. I was crazy about acting on stage. I was an amateur actor.

One evening, I happened to meet a girl at a subway station whom I got acquainted on a theatrical event. She was tremendously beautiful. We had not met for months. We enjoyed chatting on the platform. When the train approached, she whispered, “I am hungry.” It was dinnertime. Now I believe she made a great chance to ask for a dinner. If I had taken the chance, I would have a different life. However, I was a stupid young man.

“Yes! I have a sandwich. I will give it to you,” I said.

Unbelievably, I took out a sandwich from my bag and gave it her. That was my leftover lunch. She burst out laughing, but I could not understand why. I thought, I gave her my precious sandwich, but why was she laughing?

She was a beautiful, perfect, sweet lady. After she laughed, she ate my sandwich, smiling.

If I had recognized her sign at that time, it would have never happened. In those days, I was not well-off. I was a nameless amateur actor. I did not even have ten dollars in my wallet. How could I ask her for dinner?

Today I am smarter and richer, but not young.

Picture by takagix