SERIOUS WARNING! Keep reading at your own risk!
Anyways, what people might not know is that my Mom was in a fatal car accident when I was a sophomore in high school. She was the sole survivor in the accident; both the driver of the car she was in and the driver that hit them head on at 45 miles per hour died on impact. I took care of my Mom at home while I was in high school after that for some time since she was sent home with brain damage, internal bleeding, as well as other injuries until she could walk again (which, came years later). Well, the brain damage part of it resulted in the loss of my Mom's short term memory (she usually forgets things after a few seconds, sometimes minutes if you're lucky), which leads me to this fun story (btw, she's doing better now-a-days).
While visiting my Mom requested that she be able to watch the finale Dancing with the Stars (DWTS) episode. However, there was an hour long show on Monday 5/24 and then the 2 hour finale was on 5/25. She didn't know this is how it was going to be done, she thought there was a finale show on 5/24 and that was it. So, when they kept saying (during the 5/24 show) that the finale would be on tomorrow (again, 5/25), my Mom got really upset. We told her we could watch the finale show the next day and that seemed to calm her down. Although, what we had not anticipated is them showing the show from 5/24 immediately before the finale show on 5/25 - this is where things got really fun....
As I said before, during the 5/24 DWTS show they kept mentioning the finale show being on "tomorrow". Well, replaying the same show on the day of the finale was VERY confusing to my Mom, again - since she has no short term memory. Every time they would say "Watch the finale show tomorrow to see who wins" or something like that my Mom would throw her arms up in complete frustration and say "Tomorrow! I thought it was on tonight!!". To which, my Dad, Binderclips, and I would remind her that they were replaying a show from yesterday and that the finale was on right after it - TONIGHT. We did this for the entire show and it was really fun when the couples danced then got scored by the judges. Since my Mom had no recollection of the show she would wait in anticipation for the scores while my Dad would say (right before a judge gave his/her score) "it's going to be a 9, I just know it". When it was a 9 my Mom would be flabbergasted at how he knew what they were going to say every single time. It was great. Needless to say, we all laughed A LOT that night.
Anyways, living with my Mom and her lack of short term memory has taught me a lot. Namely, to be patient and even if I had to tell my Mom every day 2-3 times that "yes, we are going to the Nelson Atkins Art Museum on Friday", it did NOT kill me to have to repeat it. It's also taught me to be super paranoid about my own memory, for example this morning I woke up frantically trying to remember what I had for dinner last night....when I remembered I felt better and reassured myself that my memory was still functioning normally. Please tell me other people do this?? :)
Any who, have a great day everyone. Make Up Words Wednesdays will be back next week, but still feel free to throw a new word in the mix on this hump day!
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Well that sounds like fun! Maybe MY mom has been in an accident I don't know about...she tells me the same stories over and over and over. Good preparation for having a kid, though (if you guys ever decide to go that route)!
ReplyDeleteI, too, forget what I had for dinner last night, but it's more annoying than alarming. NOW, however, you have instilled a sense of paranoia about my memory loss that will be sure to add to my hypochondria. Thanks! :)
Hahaha! Maybe! Glad I could contribute to your paranoia....errr, I mean hypochondria or hypochondaranoia (it's a hypochondria that includes increased levels of paranoia). ;)
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