By: Betsey
We often feel like we are wading through each stage of Alzheimer’s blind with no clue as to what we are doing! Just as we feel that we are getting a handle on something, my mom’s condition will change rapidly and we scramble to come up with a solution to each new change and challenge it presents.
Perhaps we should have utilized more resources and there is a magical guide we could have read, but we have just been figuring out each stage on our own by trial and error. Each situation is unique, but part of why we write is to help others by sharing what we have learned along the way.
One thing that helped us very early on was to organize and clean out my mom’s closet.
My mom loved to shop! She is very fashionable and had many, many clothes. It took us a while in the beginning to realize it was overwhelming for her to pick out clothes each day. With posterior cortical atrophy, it was difficult for my mom to see things that were in front of her. Crowded spaces were difficult and overwhelming for her to process. Therefore, looking in her packed closet and getting dressed in the beginning stages became very difficult. She struggled putting together clothes that matched or the appropriate clothes for the season. I don’t know why it took us so long to realize something so simple – clear out the closet!
We moved all of her clothes to a different closet and even bought a pop up portable closet for more space to store additional clothes in another room. We only put the clothes back in that were of the correct season and size and eliminated clothes with a lot of buttons or that were uncomfortable, etc…. While we did donate some clothes, just a tip – don’t get rid of all clothes of varied sizes. Our mom’s weight has fluxuated up and down during this journey. At first, she gained some weight because she wasn’t cooking for herself as much. There was more eating out, more people dropping by with food, etc… Since that time, my mom has had varied times of weight gain and loss so I am glad we didn’t get rid of everything.
So, in the beginning we essentially cleared out my mom’s closet to a few shirts and a few easy to wear pants that she would go for most often. This made a huge difference. Also, as we knew big events were approaching – wedding showers, parties, Christmas etc… we would plan her outfits in advance and lay them out for her. This helped my dad as well.
Cleaning out the closet is something we could all probably stand to do! But, for us this early on clean out made a big difference!