May 6, 2008: mum's weight loss

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May 6, 2008: mum's weight loss

Marianne Talbot's mother, who has Alzheimer's disease, has lost her life-long love for food and is losing weight fast

Life is fraught. Mum’s deterioration is moving so fast I can hardly keep up. For months, years even, she stays reasonably stable (although others notice her deterioration). But at the moment she is sinking faster and faster.

For the first time too, she is physically deteriorating. She used to be extremely – er – robust. But she has lost a huge amount of weight. Her clothes are hanging off her. As I helped her out of the bath yesterday I noticed the tops of her arms are beginning to look skeletal.

Skeletal? Mum?

Mum has always had a huge appetite. She adored her food. I have fond memories (and a photograph she loathed) of her looking hungrily at the largest knickerbocker glory you ever saw. She polished it off in minutes. Wanting to treat herself, she used to drive herself to the nearest Little Chef, and order three portions of their garlic mushrooms. Appetite has never been a problem for mum.

About six months ago, though, she started to find it difficult to eat. I began cutting up her food. That worked for a while. But she continued to find the knife and fork difficult. I substituted a spoon and fork. Then I removed the fork.

Last night she was trying to eat with the spoon the wrong way up.

All my healthy eating rules have gone out of the window. I now cook whatever I think might tempt mum to eat. Last week I fried some potatoes for her. I have never fried potatoes in my life!

Not only that I served them with a mushroom omelette fried in butter and covered the lot with tomato sauce. I felt strangely proud when she ate the lot.

But ‘the lot’ was about half the amount she would have eaten before.

Her teeth are part of the problem. Last time she lost her dentures I decided it wasn’t worth replacing them. She’d had the pair she lost only about three weeks. They cost £450.

So mum has one tooth in front at the top. But she still has enough at the back to be able to chew. But apples – which mum used to eat continuously – have become virtually impossible.

I wonder whether her teeth are hurting her? I have made a dental appointment, but am dreading it. Mum is not going to take kindly to someone poking around in her mouth.

But last night was something new: I am not sure but I suspect mum wasn’t even sure that her food was for eating. I had to help her spoon by spoon.

To think mum might need feeding is the most daunting thing I have yet faced.

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