A Rude Awakening

I woke up when my phone started ringing. I knew it was my sister Caroline since the ringtone was Neil Diamond's Sweet Caroline. Caroline thought I was a genius to be able to do something like that and had me put Croche's Bad, Bad, Leroy Brown on hers so she knew it was her husband calling. I had better add that Leroy was a nice guy, not a bad bad one.

"Whazzit?" I mumbled.

"Is that you, little brother? You sound like you swallowed a mouse."

"If you're calling at this hour I smell a rat."

"Cheese, you're suspicious."

"This had cheddar be good, sister."

"Gouda, if you can make lousy puns you must be waking up."

"Alright, alright! I'm awake."

"I'm worried about Mom, Harry. I just got done talking with her and she seemed… well… off."

"Maybe you should try calling her earlier in the evening?"

"That's not it, she was saying weird things and then she would sound perfectly normal. She kept getting my name wrong, calling me Pam or Carrie, like Great-grandma used to do."

"Hell! I do that with your kids. Start to worry when she calls you by my name."

"She did, Harry, I'm serious. I'm worried that she might be having memory issues."

"What, she's only seventy. She's not that old."

"You know I've been worried about her all alone in that big old house since Dad passed."

"And she'd kick your ass out the door and around the block if you said that to her."

"I'm not the one having memory issues."

I suppose that means you want me to go over and see her this weekend."

"Well, I do live two states away and you only have to drive for an hour to get there."

"You haven't been on the Interstate around here lately, have you. I hear they're going to install meters and charge for parking by the hour on the thing."

"Harry!"

"OK, OK! I'll go over on Saturday."

A Visit to Mom

Carrie! When did you get back. Why didn't you call me?" Mom greeted me.

"I haven't gone anywhere to get back from, Mom."

"What? I though you were in India or Iraq one of those places fixing up little kids and such."

"That's Carrie, Mom. Remember? She's the one volunteering with Doctors Without Borders. I'm Harry, the writer, I wouldn't be competent to put a bandage on a mosquito bite."

"Oh, silly me! Come in, Harry"

Maybe Caroline was right to be worried. My twin sister Carrie and I are a lot alike, but our own mother was pretty good at keeping us separate, even when we were trying to fool her.
 

I have to pause for a second here. As you might of gathered from the cheese puns, our family has a weird sense of humor. Mom and Dad named us twins Harry and Carrie, and we got no end of grief for it back in school.

I've heard just about every bad joke about Japanese suicide there is. It gets even worse - the blade the samurai used to kill themselves is called a tanto. You have to strain real hard to mix in the Lone Ranger's buddy when making fun of a kid.

Cheese jokes are a lot more palatable.

Alright, back to the story.
 

Naturally we talked in the kitchen, Mom can't rest until any guest has their stomach tended to. We sipped tea and munched cookies while I told her what I was up to and asked her what was going on with her. She seemed perfectly normal to me.

I noticed there was only one egg and almost no milk in the refrigerator, so I offered to go shopping for her.

No way! She'd go shopping and take me along for company. We got in the old Olds Land Yacht - it was new just before Dad passed - and off we went.

She filled the shopping cart and even threw in a box of Capt'n Crunch, my favorite as a kid. I didn't have the heart to tell her I didn't do sugared cereal any more - my thirty year old body didn't burn calories like my ten year old one did.

I bagged while she waited, putting the bags in the cart. When I finished she started off.

"Excuse me, ma'am. You need to pay." informed the checkout clerk.

"Oh, silly me!"

Mom ran her card and we left. We put the groceries in the trunk of the Land Yacht and we set sail for home. I closed my eyes and was almost asleep when a horn blared and Mom hit the brakes hard. The guy she almost T-boned gave her the finger and kept going.

"I'm sorry, Carrie. I didn't see the stop sign."

"It's OK, Mom. Want me to drive?"

"No, I'm fine."

She started up again and I realized I didn't recognize the surroundings.

"Where are we, Mom? I asked.

"Why, right on the way home."

"Are you sure, Mom?"

"Of course! I just turn…"

"Mom? Are we lost?"

"I don't know…"

"Let me look."

I got out my phone and punched her address into the GPS function. We were almost two miles in the wrong direction.

"Turn left at the next stop sign, Mom."

We got home, but now I was worried. There was certainly something wrong.

Things That Go Bump In The Night

Mom seemed normal for the rest of the day, but I was still worried. I decided to stay overnight just in case, even though I hadn't brought any clothes with me. Mom hadn't tossed any of Dad's clothes, so I could appropriate something for the day. He was a bit bigger than me, but not enough to be a problem.

I ensconced myself in my sisters' old room - much larger than the one I slept in as a kid - and spent some time traversing the Web looking for information on dementia. There was plenty there, but it wasn't at all encouraging. I didn't want my mother to be the one affected.

I was sleeping the sleep of the just when a loud thump awakened me. Blearily, I investigated and found that Mom had fallen on her way to the bathroom.

I rushed over to her and helped her up. She didn't seem to be hurt, but she stared at me and exclaimed "Carrie! You can't go around like that. You should at least wear a nightgown. Didn't I teach you better than that?"

"Mom, I'm Harry. Carrie is away overseas."

"Nonsense, young lady. You must get dressed."

"Are you heading for the toilet? Let me help you."

So I got her there and closed the door. I ran into her bedroom and found Dad's bathrobe and put it on.

She still thought I was my twin, Carrie. I have to admit that since I had been living my life as a woman named Sherry for the last several years I might not have been as successful at turning it off as I had hoped I would be. In fact, the only time Harry made an appearance was when I came home to visit Mom.

I got Mom back in bed, then found my own. Sleep was a long time in coming, memories of the past flooded my mind.

In The Beginning

The 'which twin is it?' game had always been one of our favorites, at least until it became obvious I had a bra stuffed with old socks and she had a bra stuffed with real girl.

When Mom and Dad started to be able to tell I wasn't Carrie we were both disappointed. At one of our gab sessions with Lucy, Carrie's best friend and accessory before and after the fact to our various plots, we started lamenting my bumpy boobs.

It was Lucy that came up with the answer. One of her relatives had lost a breast to cancer and had a replacement. She had gotten to see it one day when visiting (Lucy was a snoop, just like us) and she told us all about it.

We were barely teenagers at the time, but precocious. We instantly decided I needed fake boobs so we could keep playing the game. But just how does a kid manage to get himself fake breasts? Not so easy, but possible.

Now Mom and Dad were both big on logic and reasoning and, even at that tender age, Carrie and I were nascent researchers. The phrase look it up! had been drummed into our heads since the time we could read for comprehension. Along with that, learn to ask the next question became a mantra.

The family being rather well off, we had been gifted with our own computers and trusted to use them without filters. It didn't take us long to learn how to erase a cache and delete a history when we thought it necessary, and we were soon far more digitally adept than our parents.

So we searched for breast forms and boy did we get results. Seriously weird results, for sure, which we of course had to read through. And the pictures! I was glad I didn't look like some of those pictures of guys using breast forms!

We eventually found several places that would sell you breast forms if you sent them money. Quite a bit of money from our point of view, but if we pooled our resources from allowances, odd jobs and such we could just about do it.

You might think it odd that a sister would part with her hard earned money to help her brother buy fake breasts, but we were twins. I won't call it telepathy, but it came close. She knew I wanted them so we could continue to be each other. The logic was simple: She had breasts, I didn't. She couldn't remove hers so I had to add them to my body to shape it like hers.

Black and white logic, so obvious at that age.

So OK, what kind of fake breasts did we want and what size? Lots of choices there. When I asked her if her boobies were teardrop, triangular or round, the answer was painful. Her elbows are as hard as her breasts are soft. Actually, since we hadn't a clue we picked the cheapest ones they offered.

Next problem: how do we pay? Too young for a credit card. Can't ask Mom or Dad to write a check. Pam has a credit card, but she's at college. Caroline doesn't have either a credit card or a checkbook. Money order from the Post Office? Eureka!

Continuing problem: where do we have them sent. Mom and Dad are sure to want to know what we had gotten, so that was out. Maybe send them to Lucy's house - that might work. We could tell her folks it was a present for someone. Lucy was right there with us all the way. I didn't realize it then, but having Lucy be so comfortable with me as Sherry was a true treasure.

How we ever managed to pull it off remains a mystery to me. Some weeks later they arrived and we had to wait for a time when the folks were gone to try them out. Two Carries and a Lucy emerged triumphantly from the house and went for a walk.

After all that secrecy, we had neglected to realize that two Carries was one too many. The first time we met anyone who knew us it was obvious as hell what was going on. Word spread and Mom and Dad heard the story before the weekend was over.

Dad threatened to tattoo our names on our foreheads. Mom had on her famous pickle face. We thought we were in big trouble until Dad finally broke up and started laughing. They sweated the details out of us and gave us an A+ for creativity and a D- for failure to consider the consequences.

Then came the lecture about reasoning from false premises and cherry-picking your data. That lesson, painfully learned, has informed my life. Too bad Lady Elaine is incapable of learning it, but then if she had any brains she wouldn't get into enough trouble for me to write the next book.

(I suppose I should tell you that I write for a living, and Lady Elaine is my dumbass but sexy heroine. Together with her Faithful Maid Lucinda she gets into the most asinine situations.)

They reminded us we couldn't date until we were fifteen, whether we were male or female or who-knows-what. Then we were assigned to write a 1000 word essay on what could go wrong when a boy went out in public dressed as a girl. Some of the answers were pretty scary, so Carrie and I had to do some thinking.

But they didn't forbid us to do it. Our parents were pretty smart cookies. I was required to wear a bracelet with something blue on it when I was looking like Carrie and she had to wear some shade of red. Better than tattoos, I suppose.

School on Monday was pretty hairy, a couple of neanderthals tried to start a fracas, but Carrie and I were a pretty good tag team. They ended up red in the face and looking like jerks by the time we were done with them. Good thing there weren't more of them, we might have gotten the short end of the stick otherwise.

Most of Carrie's friends got used to Sherry after a while, but not all of them. Some of my friends decided I was too weird to hang out with, too. Group dynamics changed, but finally settled out. Oh yeah, Sherry never attended school, we knew that would be pretty stupid.

Thinking of all this made me realize how sad it was to see my logical, loving, clear-headed mother starting down the path to dementia. Maybe it was a blessing that Dad had dropped in his tracks and didn't have to go through the slow, agonizing torture of no longer being himself.

The Medical Maze

Back to the present. I called my sister and we agreed Mom needed to see the doctor. Easy to decide, but who will bell the cat?

Me…ow. Who else is right in the house with her? Who else has a job with no fixed hours. Who else gets stuck with trying to convince Mom to see the doctor without the use of a cattle prod and a lasso?

So I lied. It didn't work, Mom has a built-in lie detector that seems proof against incipient dementia. That detector worked when I was a kid, it worked when I was a rebellious teen, and it still works now I'm supposedly an adult.

"Carrie! You're dressed like your brother again. I told you I don't like that."

"I'm Harry, Mom, not Carrie."

"Nonsense! Do you think I can't tell my own children apart?"

"Mom. We'll be late for the doctor."

"I don't need any doctor. I'm fine!"

"Not for you, Mom, for me."

"Oh, for you. Why didn't you say so?"

Wow! I got away with it.

"Let's take my car, it's easier to park in the medical center lot."

"I suppose."

 
After I explained the problem to the receptionist, she gave Mom a clipboard and asked her to fill out the forms for her. Pretty sharp lady, it was the basic dementia test; you know - drawing a clock face, who is president, that stuff. I have to wonder how well the clock face bit will work in a few years when kids only know digital time.

We saw the doctor and he spent several minutes in conversation with Mom, asking questions that helped him understand her mental state. Finally he asked "Do you know why we're here, Elaine?"

"Of course. I'm worried that my daughter keeps dressing up in her brother's clothes."

Now that stopped both the doctor and me dead in our tracks.

"They used to do it all the time, you know. They're twins and they thought it was funny to try and fool us. I don't like it that she's a grown woman and is still doing it."

"Interesting. Perhaps I should talk with your… daughter… alone. Could you sit in the waiting room for a while?"

"Of course, doctor."

When Mom left I looked at the doctor and said "See why I'm concerned?"

"I wasn't expecting that. Your mother has been my patient for many years, but this comes as a shock. Of course it's been more than a year since I've seen her."

"She really doesn't want to see a doctor. I had to trick her into coming by saying the visit was for me."

"There are certainly indications of dementia present, but just how serious is hard to tell. I suppose I have to ask - you are the brother, aren't you?"

"Absolutely. I'm Harry and Carrie is off in the middle east somewhere with Doctors Without Borders. And yes, we did trade clothes and all that. So what can we do?"

"First I want to have her do some diagnostic tests to rule out things like vascular dementia, tumors, that sort of nastiness. We can take it from there when we have the results."

"But what do we do right now. I'm not sure she's safe on her own. She ran a red light and got lost driving the other day."

"Is there someone in the family available as a caretaker?"

"That would be me. Not that I'm looking for the job, but if she needs care then I'm the one who has the flexibility. I'm a writer so I have no set schedule other than the deadline to turn in my copy."

"Your mother is fortunate, then."

"But what do I do? How do I help? She's an independent cuss and won't take kindly to being told what to do."

"Just like most mothers. Just like most people, I suppose. We have pamphlets with the basics out in the waiting area, but I suggest you hit the library, there are several good books on coping with dementia.

"This may not be what you want to hear, but the bottom line in care for dementia patients is this - if it isn't harmful, then you have to go where she is. She can't come back to reality as you understand it.

"Some people get hung up on 'lying to the patient,' but for the patient, what they are thinking is what's real. Trying to change their mind is mostly futile. If they think that someone who has been dead for decades is mean because they don't come to visit, go along with it. Getting children confused with each other is fairly common."

"I'll try. It's hard to think of Mom losing it."

"One of the hardest parts of my job is seeing old friends go downhill and not being able to do anything about it. Find a copy of Making Rounds with Oscar, it's a good place to start."
 

"There you are! What took you so long, Harry?"

"The doctor had a lot to tell me."

"Nothing serious, I hope."

"Just some good advice. Ready to go home?"

"Yes! I hate this place."