04/03/2024
After sharing my life update with you all yesterday, sooo many of you shared with me that you also caretake your parents that have dementia. I wish I shared more of what that journey was like with you all real-time but it all was just so much to process, especially as an only child.
In 2020 I felt on top of the world with . I had a ton of partnerships, major brand deals being made behind the scenes and everything fell apart once the pandemic hit. Somehow, I was still blessed with having the most sales I’ve ever experienced in business by that summer, however my mothers illness really ramped up and I couldn’t keep up with my businesses growth and my moms “new normal” ( which kept changing rapidly).
My mom was officially diagnosed with vascular dementia in 2021 and went from being able to drive and manage her bills to questioning if I was her daughter and forgetting our birthdays within a year. Every few months my mom hit a “new normal” and lost an old ability. I think one of the worst parts about it all is that once my mother was let go from her job a few years prior due to unfitness to work as a special education teacher, she also lost healthcare. I unfortunately couldn’t give my mom the true care she deserved without having the discussion of giving up my mothers home that she worked her entire life to obtain. I had to cut off my moms cable/phone/internet just to have enough to pay for doctors visits and medication.
Watching my mothers decline broke my heart in so many ways that I needed to take long breaks from running because I lacked the creative drive and energy to really keep things going consistently. So much so that I actually had to apply for government assistance for the first time in my life just to keep food on my table and keep the lights on.
These last 4 years I’ve honestly been going through the ringer, but at the end of the day I am still standing to tell the story. I’m honestly happy to say that even though my heart is broken with my mothers loss, I’m so thankful she no longer has to suffer with that absolutely awful disease.
