My deepest apologies to all who read my post yesterday.  Please
forgive me for upsetting the good people on this list. Thank you for
the book recommendations and the advice. I am amazed that Alzheimer's
pts can manipulate.

I was very, very upset when I posted last night.  I did not know that
Mommykins was a Troll-like name. I will not use the name again. Please
give me another chance. I may be the dark daughter.....but in my own
way I am fighting to preserve her dignity in that I want her to be
treated for the correct ailment. I am not completely convinced that
she has Alzheimer's. The doctor seems convinced that she does have it
and so does my sister, the medical professional.

I accept the criticism of my attitude. I see that while she does look
like the same person, her mind is dismantling itself. I will try to
incorporate this into my thinking. I wish we could have reconciled our
mother/daughter differences while she was her old self all of the
time. I guess it wasn't meant to be.

I am doing my best to rise to this occasion and because of the storms
of the past, I am not doing well. I do not wish to push this all off
on my sister. There are just two of us. Like I said, we helped our dad
to die at home. We want no less for her. My husband had to put his mom
in a nursing home. He encourages us to help her stay at home as long
as we can. Forever, maybe.

I am bewildered more than I can say. I still think she is depressed or
angry.....how do I ask for a test to determine what is what with her?

Last year, My mom was a clear-headed and  functioning person. We were
so proud of her. Let me back up. In 2000, she moved into the house
next door to me because her own neighborhood went to pot. After living
on the same street and neighborhood for nearly 75 of her then 82 years
she moved. In the year 2001, she traded in my dad's old Escort for a
new Toyota Ecco.  Changing houses, learning to drive a new car --
those are giant leaps for an octogenarian!  She did her own taxes and
came up a few cents off from my husband's Turbo program. SHE was
right.

Last year, around May, she was diagnosed with an aortic aneurysm. 8
cm! The doctor gave her 1 year to live. My sister was with her for
this visit. As I said, she is an RN and usually does the medical (I am
usually the chauffer.) stuff. After that diagnosis, we asked her to
please not drive any more. She was stoic!!! She was great!!! She
turned over her keys. My husband (with whom she gets along famously)
took her for one last driver's license so that she would have a form
of ID -- with the stipulation that she not drive. This was a woman
with one year left to live, remember....

Then, she sold her car. She stood at the window of her house and cried
as my husband drove it to off its new owner. Gradually, she began
slipping. She told me she was forgetting things. I told her I forget
things all the time....like, where did I park my car, where did I
leave my glasses.....I think she became depressed.....I lived next
door and began taking her to the store. Now, my husband and I had it
in mind to move as long ago as two years ago. Our neighborhood was
really going south.

We couldn't leave her in the City alone. She needed transportation to
the store. What if she needed someone at night?  My sister bought a
house for her next door to my sister and also next door to her
grandson.

I did not think my Mom had Alzheimer's until she thought, that morning
at 2:30, that it was sometime in the 1940s or 50s and she was at the
home she shared with her parents and siblings -- and waiting for my
father to come and pick her up. My sister, the RN, thought that all
along she was afflicted with Alzheimer's but I thought it was the
depression of first, having  the diagnosis that she had 1 year to
live; second, giving up her car (and her independence); third, selling
her house and becoming my sister's tenant (my sister wanted her
initially to buy the house, when she refused, my sister bought
it.....) and fourth - moving from the City to the country. Heck -- I
couldn't wait to get out of the City and I am depressed living in the
country where there is not that much to do...the antidepressant she
was given by the doctor -- Zoloft -- did not seem to help.

The doctor (and my sister) are convinced, I guess, that it is
Alzheimer's. Maybe they, as medical professionals, know something I do
not know....my mother missed only one question on the Alzheimer's
memory test that I gave her in July. When I talk to her on the phone,
she is out of breath and seems disoriented. Here, she works puzzles in
the newspaper. She coughs -- but is not chronically out of breath.
Last year, she shuffled when my sister visited her. When my sister was
gone, the shuffling disappeared.

Yesterday in the morning she pouted because I would not take her home.
I told her we could get through this together. We had to do it so my
sister could have a nice vacation. Later in the day, she offered
tohelp me do little chores around the house. She worked those puzzles.
She watched the news. All good signs. Signs of what, tho? Alzheimer's?
Depression? Acceptance of her circumstances? And what are those
circumstances? Can you see I am confused?  She was so different doing
all of those things than she was when I was talking to her on the
phone.

While I do not get along with my mother, I do my best to care for her
while she is here. She does have a mean streak, though. She has always
belittled me in front of people. I am not over a lifetime of that kind
of treatment. I am just a person, too. Sometimes I think of the
meanness and I still cry. I was closer to my dad. I think she was
jealous of this.  Yes, I am resentful some of the time, but I am a
decent person and perhaps a miscast caregiver, but I am better than a
nursing home while my sister is on vacation. I think my sister perhaps
was mistaken in thinking my mom could be alone in her house.   Maybe
she can with my sister popping in and out...my sister deals with the
elderly in her job and is better equipped than I to evaluate
this....but my sister is in another state now and I am 30 miles away
from where my mom would be if she were home. My sister did not ask me
to take her up here. I did it because I saw the need.

I didn't think Alzheimer's could be diagnosed until one was deceased.
Then I read another post on your support group whereby someone had a
scan?

Well I am sorry this is so long.

Thank you for your answers yesterday and again, I am sorry I offended
people.

I am not in denial. It will be Ok with me if she has the disease. Why
didn't the doctor offer to do some tests? Do they just see the gray
hair and wrinkled brow and  go on automatic?

Doctors don't have all the answers.  I want someone to look at my mom,
really look at her, have a conversation with her and say, "This is the
deal..."

I feel that the world has written her off because she is old. Even tho
we don't get along and she smokes up my house, she deserves better.

The dark daughter