With the 20/20 hindsight that comes with time, I know I was unfair to my mother when she began to show signs of dementia.
Adult children are commonly resentful and fearful when aging parents give way to infirmity. The first response is often, “If they would try harder, if they loved me enough to do what they should, if they weren’t lazy, then they could avoid decline.” We always want to believe that we can avoid our own decline and death through valiant effort, because we are afraid. To see a parent’s decline is most fear-inducing of all, because we are related to them by blood, by love and by need. We feel betrayed when they begin to leave us via the introspection of pain or the finality of approaching death.
I'm not sure whether I read this quote somewhere: "Don't believe everything you think," or if I came up with it myself during the years I was coping with my mother's Alzheimer's disease. When we feel resentment and anger toward an aging parent, we need to proceed with caution. Chances are the emotions of coping with a loved one's decline have more to do with the caregiver's sorrows over losing the support they need than it has to do with any failure of the patient to try harder.
It's hard. As always, in our dealings with everyone, it is important to be grounded in Scripture and to let love cover a host of real and perceived sins in the precious ones who are leaving us sooner than we thought and in more emotionally wrenching ways than we wish.
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Above all, love each other deeply, because love covers over a multitude of sins.
1 Peter 4:8
