Category Archives: The power of creativity

Although my mother and I love each other very much, our relationship was never an easy one. However, her illness has gifted us a closer and much more loving bond, we are constantly looking into each others eyes, I massage her legs, stroke her hands and face, she raises her face to me to beContinue reading “La mamma´s cake”

This is a story about approaching Alzheimer’s through a wellness orientation. And, in my mother’s case, it is about an artist regaining the confidence to sign her paintings and exhibit her work. It is about people regaining their sense of identity, instead of progressively losing it. My mother´s determined spirit, exuberance, and an insistence onContinue reading “Better when I paint”

Too many moments, too many good moments, to see that we now barely have a lost stare, disordered words and the gift of an odd smile that may come from a happy thought some small moment of lucidity has allowed her to salvage.  Chisgaravís. That’s how it all began.  A word invented to replace theContinue reading “¨Chisgaravís¨”

For me, the moment when I feed my mother is especially endearing. In the same way I did with my children when they were young, I have to be creative to make sure she swallows and to understand whether or not she enjoys the food she is eating. This is part of the great deteriorationContinue reading “Virtual Conversations”

As long as I remember, my mother and I danced to the music of Tito Puente, Celia Cruz and Poncho Sanchez and the salsa rhythm helped us connect throughout her journey. As her Alzheimer’s progressed, these Latin salsa icons helped even motivate my mother do things she didn’t want to do, like shower.

¨Mum’s talking nonsense¨, said Marisol to her sister Juani, ¨she says she has been at a wedding!!¨ ¨Well, don’t worry, she is 92 years old and such lapses are normal..¨ But no; Soledad, the mother of the two sisters was not talking nonsense, even though she is living in a care home where most ofContinue reading “A wedding at the care home?”