Laughter truly is the best medicine, even for Alzheimer's
One constant companion that brought joy during Mom’s Alzheimer’s journey was humor. Even when things were hard, we could always count on laughter to bring us together.
My mom had always been known to easily “get her tickle box turned over” as she called it. I cannot tell you the number of times we laughed until we cried at the silliest things. Thankfully that sense of joy continued after her dementia diagnosis.
When watching movies or television started to become difficult – when your memory is affected, it’s hard to keep the thread of a plot – a comedy could still provide fun for us. Watching Melissa McCarthy trying to climb out a car window, Queen Latifah cause trouble for Steve Martin, or Lucy and Ethel panic-cramming down chocolates off a conveyor belt is hilarious whether you can remember the previous scene or not.
One favorite memory came when Mom was staying with me for a few days. We walked around downtown, waiting to pick up my daughter from school, and wandered into Deco. We ended up in the greeting card section, giggling over the hilarious cards, continually saying, “You HAVE to see this one,” to each other. Laughter would erupt again. A gentleman in a business suit walked over to us with a smile, handed me a card, and told us we were having so much fun that he knew we would appreciate this card he had found. I love that our joy spilled over to a random stranger.
During her dementia Mom went through a long phase where she loved buying me funny things. Magnets, aprons, anything that had a funny message that caught her fancy. One year I saw her get truly tickled at a winery we loved to visit in Virginia. She and my mother-in-law huddled together, and my mother-in-law helped her make a purchase.
It cracked me up that Christmas when I opened a small gift Mom proudly handed me. It was a pottery refrigerator magnet that read, “I used to jog but I kept spilling my wine.” It was even more hilarious to me because I had recently had a brief love affair (okay, love-hate relationship) with running that abruptly ended after I trained for and completed a half-marathon. Never again.
I loved the joy Mom found in such funny gifts. Giggling with her and Alicia will go down as some of my favorite life memories.
Fast forward to this past December when Christmas came only weeks after Mom’s passing. When shopping with my daughter she had handed me something face down, instructing me not to look but just add it in to our purchases. On Christmas morning I opened the small gift from her: a button reading “Call Me Old Fashioned” with a graphic of one of my most-loved beverages.
That little button made me smile so much. It was a reminder of my mom and the funny trinkets she loved to give me. That moment told me that my sweet daughter and my amazing Mom had bonded, something I most earnestly wanted. I had known the time for their relationship would be much shorter than what I had been privileged to have with my grandmothers. But the quality of their time together far outweighed the quantity. Mom’s imprint surely found its way onto her granddaughter all the same.
Helpful Resources:
Andrea Osborne is Capitol Broadcasting Company’s director of content. She has daughter in high school and recently lost her mother who had been diagnosed with Alzheimer’s. She will be sharing her family’s journey here on WRAL’s family section.
