My mum has got a lot nicer as she has got older. Growing up, she had an unpredictable temper. I tried not to give her reasons to be mad at me, but she was not rational in her rage, lashing out when she had a particularly bad day (she struggled with a gambling addiction), or when bills were (over)due.
Now 87 years old, she is smiling whenever I visit her. Mum has been diagnosed with dementia and has moved into an aged care facility. When I see her, I always tell her who I am. So far, she has always responded, “I know.”
Sometimes we sit in her room, other times in the dining room, where she leans in confidentially. “You should eat,” she says. “The food here is free!”
I have gradually stopped bracing myself for her criticisms of my weight and life choices, which used to characterise my visits home. Sometimes it is hard, looking at my mum, a cute old Asian lady in an oversized tracksuit, to see the tyrant who loomed over my life for so long, the reason I still tense my abdomen when I hear a door slam.
It’s not that Mum has simply forgotten all her old beefs. Getting older is making her brain kinder.
When a person is happy, the nucleus accumbens, the reward centre in the brain, lights up. Studies have found that in most humans, this region activates when we see someone in need getting help. But older people are kinder than the rest of us.
In a neuroimaging study, scientists found that 75% of people aged 55 and older have greater nucleus accumbens activity when they see money going to a charity, rather than to themselves, compared with less than 25% of younger people. As people age, the release of oxytocin also increases, and has been positively associated with life satisfaction, empathy and gratitude.
Being nicer might also be a result of living in the present. Mum has forgotten where she lives, that she ever gambled. She remembers who I am, which I am grateful for, and when my child comes with me, my mum looks at her and repeats, over and over, ‘How old are you? Good girl!’
It’s hard not to care for Mum the way I care for my child. Parenting is the main mode of caring I know – tying laces, washing faces, wiping bottoms, correcting words. But I can’t just transfer this method to my mother, who is an adult with agency and, even with dementia, her own self.
When she forgets words, or entire life events, I don’t correct her. I try to enter her reality, and avoid conversations which may cause her distress. I don’t ask, ‘Who has come to visit you this week?’ I don’t even ask, ‘What did you have for dinner last night?’ I say, ‘Was the food good today?’ And she might have a full sensation in her belly, and she can agree.
It can be hard to know what activities to do with Mum. Dementia resources advise me to try to be present and enter into her reality. They advise me to go for walks to encourage her mobility, but not to try to have conversations at the same time. They say to allow her the time it takes to put on her watch, even if my fingers itch to take it from her and do the latch. We can paint each other’s fingernails, something my child enjoys, especially if she gets to pick the colour.
I accept a cuppa and a biscuit from my mum, even though I don’t drink caffeine and I’m gluten intolerant. I can ditch them both later when she is not looking. Meanwhile, I can see her resume something of the posture of her old self, taking care of me.
If we run out of things to do, we sit in silence. I hold my mum’s hand and try to let my memories fall away. If she can forget, then maybe so can I.
Jackie Bailey is the author of The Eulogy, winner of the 2023 NSW premier’s literary multicultural award. When she is not writing, she spends her time helping families navigate death and dying. She is an ordained interfaith minister with a masters of theology and is working on a nonfiction book about spirituality in a post-religious world
