Grandparents

I can't sleep. I think it's because I finally realized that my grandma is mentally gone. She doesn't know who I anymore. I have been putting off going to see her since May because of it and I feel really guilty about it. May was her 86th birthday and we had a family dinner for her. We were sitting around talking and she was looking at one of the picture albums from the wedding and she turned to me and said, "how come I wasn't invited?" I was speechless. "What? Grandma that's you in that picture and that's you being walked down the aisle by Jeremy." She shook her head and said, "nope that's not me. That's someone that looks like me." She didn't remember any of it. I had to excuse myself to the bathroom to go cry. Honestly not because I was sad she didn't remember the wedding but because she had no clue that I was her granddaughter. Like I would really leave my own grandmother out of one of the most important days of my life! My grandparents were always a big part of my life. When I was in kindergarten I lost my maternal grandfather to a heart attack. My paternal grandparents lived in Bethany all my life and my maternal grandma lived in Oklahoma City so they were always around. I saw my maternal grandma every weekend. After my other grandpa passed away I always thought my grandmas should move in together so they could be like the Golden Girls! When I lost my paternal grandma I knew I needed to spend more time with my last grandparent. I would go over and we would talk about school. Occasionally, she would ask me the same questions she had previously asked in another conversation but I gave her the benefit of the doubt because the woman was in her 80's! She would accidentally call me by my mothers name, again fine because we do look alike but she would always correct herself. Then I started noticing some other Dementia related signs and it got to be too hard for me to go see her. It's a no win situation. I want to go and spend time with her. But the her I want to spend time with wont be there. It will be someone who doesn't know me. I will choke back tears the whole time and stay for a measly 15 minutes and then sit and cry in the car for 30 minutes. 5 minutes after I leave she won't remember that she even had a visitor. If you can't tell I'm having a pity party for myself! I'm going to need to get over it because I'm being selfish. So...I'm putting on the big girl panties but stuffing them full of tissues and going to make myself stay for longer than 15 minutes and have a nice conversation with my grandma. Whether or not she knows who I am is beside the point. She deserves this because she's always been there for me no matter my condition so I'm going to return the favor! Eeek...pray for me.