A Win for Mom; A Win for Me
Five years ago, when Mom was diagnosed with Alzheimer’s dementia, I asked her Kaiser-appointed geriatric memory specialist, “How did this happen? Dementia doesn’t run in her family.” The doctor informed us her bloodwork showed no disposition to the disease, and then, looking me directly in the eyes, he said, “Poor diet and lack of exercise.” I was thankful the doctor was a Black man, because he treated us like family and his words carried a care and concern that the medicinal profession rarely attributes to us “three-fifths-a-human” negroes. “I always tell us,” he said, caressing the back of his hand, “It’s not just about what you eat, but how much you eat. You know we love to pile our plates and go back for seconds and thirds. You can’t be doing all that.” Where my mom adulated “Amen” at the gluttonous thought of the seconds and thirds food and sugar addiction that got us in this predicament, I took notes on my iPhone.
Mom’s vitals, May 2021
Mom’s diagnostics, the day of her crisis that changed our lives, were less than favorable. Her blood pressure was very high, as was her weight and BMI, all of which paled in comparison to her emergency ambulatory blood sugar reading of 713 mg/dL. That is a diabetic coma number. A week later we received the Alzheimer’s diagnosis and I realized I was in for much more than I bargained. Battling dementia is one thing…getting a mid-70s Black woman to do the eating and exercising she’s avoided the past 40 years is something quite different.
It was immediately apparent exercising was not gonna happen. “My bed is my favorite place,” has been one of mom’s favorite sayings since my childhood. She goes from her favorite place to the chair next to her bed; to the bathroom when she has the urge and feels like getting up; and to the foyer beyond the hallway when she’s answering the doorbell for DoorDash or hears me watching television in the living room. She walks no more than a combined 50-100 feet a day, if that. “Maybe next time,” she says, chuckling, when I ask her to join me for a walk. “You should have asked me earlier.” After five years of almost daily urging I’ve all but stopped suggesting she walk around, only groaning an acknowledgement when, on the rare occasion she leaves the house and has to do some real moving around, she comments, “My legs are so weak…can you remind me to walk around in the backyard?” And when I do I’m met with a sassy, “When did I say that?!” Suffice it to say, in the battle of keeping Mom healthy I have two defenses at my disposal: Mom’s medication and her food.
Her medicine is easy: It puts the pills into its mouth or else it goes to Shady Pines. Each month I arrange and sort six of her seven medications into daily AM and PM doses, per prescription instructions. Over time I have come to know the names, shapes, colors, and dosage of each pill so well the task has become something I can largely do without thinking; I just put on my nightly episode of Murder, She Wrote and go. Except for her cholesterol pill, the bane of my existence, which must be split into two every month. I hate that trick. And then, Mom has the nerve to sometimes be funny with her medication. During meals I’ll put the appropriate dose in one of her hands and a bottle of water in the other, only to later find the pills tucked under a napkin on her plate or table, or I’ll hear them bouncing off the laundry room tile as I’m prepping her bedding for washing. My little eight-year-old.
Food is the real hardship here. Feeding a diabetic woman who wants all her chicken fried, thinks salads are a waste of money, and asks, “You got something sweet,” throughout the day is not easy. My mom has traveled the world, has stepped foot on literally every continent, and yet her palette exists in a Venn diagram of Soul, American, and Indian cuisines. She really loves lamb, though. She doesn’t do cold breakfast and prefers bacon and eggs or a breakfast sandwich over the Greek yogurt and fruit I typically eat to start my day. Meals on Wheels takes care of lunch during the week, but it’s often hit or miss for what she feels like eating. My own health and fitness goals require a protein + veggie dinner, and I try to adopt the same practice for mom. The trouble is depression and DoorDash. When the weight of caregiving, or life, feels heavy, I retreat to food apps for a quick and easy fix to our what’s-for-dinner problem. Likewise, my mom will do the same when she’s home alone and doesn’t want to get up and go to the fridge, which is always. Aside from the hit to repairing our finances, my fourth, unspoken, goal for the fall, the food on order is oftentimes not the healthiest, but I do my best to order meals that don’t do too much damage to our waistlines. We’re not gonna talk about snacking. Mind your business.
Mom’s vitals, October 2026
It has been a long road of trial and error, but encouragement and ___ came a few weeks ago during my mom’s medical physical. It was the first time in two years I was able to get her seated on an examination chair after her primary care physician of 30+ years retired. Caregiver TikTok put me on to having a phlebotomist come to the house to draw blood and take samples, which was HUGE in terms of mom’s willingness to deal with needles – there’s nothing like doing anything important whilst comfy in your pajamas – and also made the doctor appointment super-productive as mom’s new physician already had the data to facilitate our conversation. It was rather funny when the doctor, confirming medications, got a blank stare from mom and from me, a spouted list of complicated prescription names and uses that I know like the back of my hand. I always love the look of surprise on the doctors’ and nurses’ faces at how well I know my mom’s stuff. “You clearly have a son who's all over it,” her doctor said! Mom’s vitals have improved significantly these last five years. Her weight went from 188lbs. to 162lbs.; her BMI is down; her blood pressure is down, and guess what…her cholesterol is so much better that the doctor took her off that pill from Hades I had to half every month. Fucking HUZZAH!
But wait, Bob, there’s more!! The crème de la crème:
Mom’s A1C Trend
MOM’S A1C has decreased from 11.7% to 7.6%! It cannot be understated how big a win this is! For context: Diabetes gets diagnosed at a repeated A1C of 6.5% or higher. The beginning of this trial for us started with mom’s A1c at 11.7%, followed by a reading up to 12.9% in the first year of our caregiving journey. But now, five years later, and, respectfully, with no effort on mom’s part to follow her doctor’s orders to move her body and exercise, we now stand at a beautiful 7.6%!!
“I need you to take a moment to acknowledge that you did that,” said both Bestie and Therapist. “You make sure she eats right; you make sure she takes her medicine; you keep her spaces clean and comfortable; you encourage her to walk around; you keep an eye on how much sugar she’s eating. You need to pat yourself on the back!” And you know what…I’m going to accept that. I beat myself up far more than I give myself credit. This is not only a win for mom’s health, but also a win to certify that despite how exhausting, and all the other adjectives, caregiving is, whatever I’m doing is working, and working against all odds. I can’t say this news brings me any relief, but knowing I have likely extended mom’s life with such dutiful care does feel good.
Keep going, Will. Your hard work is paying off!
