To Tell The Truth

For those true blue baby boomers you may remember an American television panel game show created by Bob Stewart and produced by Goodson-Todman Productions that aired from 1956 to 1968 called To Tell The Truth.  There were four celebrity panelists who questioned the three challengers all claiming to be the real person in question.  The celebrities got to ask each of the challengers questions and only the true challenger had to tell the truth.  The other two challengers could lie.  I, being a bonafide baby boomer grew up with this show and loved trying to tell who was lying and who was telling the truth.  Today, in my house, I play this very same game only the contestants and the rules have changed to protect the guilty.  You see, the only person who really knows what's going on is my mom and she has dementia.

Interestingly enough, she gets the truth right more than one might expect from someone suffering from loss of memory, but when she gets it wrong it's completely off the charts.  For instance, yesterday mom asked me what day it was.  I told her it was May 21st.
"My birthday is the 13th."
"I know, but that was in March."
"You weren't even here."
"What are you talking about.  Your birthday was two months ago.  All the kids were here.  We even had an ice cream cake."
Her bottom lip was beginning to quiver.  "No.  You're lying."
Since, I was getting ready to go out to dinner I didn't want to belabor this conversation because she was going to bed and I didn't want her to get more upset.  As she lay in bed I told her that we would celebrate tomorrow.  She just moaned and turned her face.

I figured she would forget the next day, but I was wrong.  When we were watching television in the afternoon she brought it up again.  Why would she remember this conversation in its entirety?  I asked her if she wanted me to do her nails and she said no because I forgot her birthday.  Again, I didn't want to agitate her by insisting the opposite so I changed the subject and put a movie on that I thought we could all enjoy.  Unfortunately, hallucinations and loss of memory are typical dementia symptoms, and you just never know when they are going to manifest.

Now I wonder why she couldn't remember that we did celebrate her birthday, yet only a few days ago an incident occurred which my mom had no trouble recalling.  The replacement aide must have handled my mom too roughly and bruised both her forearms.  My mother not only remembered which aide made the marks, but she could tell you all about how it happened.  What was odd was the aide in question is so mild mannered and sweet to my mom, and the aide that my mom can't stand, who we all suspected to be the culprit, was, in fact, not the target in question.

To Tell You the Truth I honestly don't know what or whom to believe.  I want to believe my mom because after all she is my mom.  Yet, her memory tends to mix things up on a regular basis. Three aides, three different stories, all different from my mom's.  Will the real offender please stand up!