I sure do miss my Min.  Min was my grandmother; she lived with us for the past several years after her mind got bad.  She had Alzheimer's disease, and she got so bad she no longer recognized us, and she was like a little child:  we had to feed her, bathe her, take her to the toilet and even diaper her like she was a baby, as well as dress/undress her and make sure she didn't roll out of her bed.  It was hard because I can remember how she was before she got sick.

We knew something was wrong when Min started forgetting people's names or where things were supposed to go (more than once we'd find the butter in the dryer or we'd find the keys in the refrigerator).  In addition, she couldn't remember the days of the week or the months of the year; the only things she'd remember were things from way back, when she was a little girl.  She'd talk about her family or her parents who were already gone as though they were still alive; she'd also wait for Elmer (that was grandpa; he died five years ago, shortly before Min was diagnosed with the Alzheimer's).

Mom and dad got concerned, so they took Min to the doctor's.  He had her undergo all sorts of tests, to see what was causing the memory lapses.  Ultimately, the results came back.  The news was not good:  Min had the beginning signs of Alzheimer's disease.  In time she would get worse to the point where she didn't know a soul or where she would need total care.  She would be in a whelechair, unable to do even the simplest things for herself.

It was terrifying to see Min lose one skill after another.  She became childlike, and it got to be embarrassing when we'd go somewhere and Min would cry or throw a fit because she didn't want to do something, and she'd start to have accidents:  nasty, smelly accidents that drew attention from others.

Her Alzheimer's got to be so bad in the past year it was like we were living with a different person altogether:  a complete stranger.  Mom and dad ended up having to put her into a nursing facility because the care she required got to be too great, and the demands of caring for her all the time threatened to split us apart.  To save our sanity (and our backs), we made the unhappy choice to put her into the home, where she would receive more skilled medical care that we weren't capable of giving her 24 hours a day.

When Min went into the nursing home, it was a blessing in disquise.  We could continue our lives where we'd left off before Min came to live with us.  We would visit her twice a week (Wednesdays and Saturedays); it was hard seeing her sitting in her 'chair or laying in her hospital bed looking like a broken little bird.  We tried to get her to interact with us, but to no avail most of the time:  it was like she was in her own little world.

Soon, Min last the ability to eat.  She ended up having a tube put into her stomach.  She lost a lot of weight, and she acted like she wanted to give up.  Shortly afterwards, she died.  That was one month ago.  The funeral was two weeks ago.  Lots of people came to pay their last respects.  I felt guilty for dad because nobody else in his family (his four brothers or his two sisters) offered to help him out when we needed the most:  all the care we provided for Min was on us.  We didn't go anywhere because all of our waking moments were spent caring for my grandmother (dad's mother).

I am glad that Min is no longer suffering, but the bad memories remain, and I think that Alzheimer's disease is one of the cruelest diseases ever to hit mankind.  It's even worse than cancer or diabetes in my eyes.  A person is fine at first; then they start losing their mind, a little at a time, until they are held prisoner in a body (and mind) that no longer work right.  We can understand why Alzheimer's disease is often referred to as "The Long Goodbye" beause it is exactly that.

I have my days where I think I'm doing good; then I think of all the pain/suffering that my grandmother went through with her Alzheimer's disease, and it's all I can do to keep from breaking down yet again.  Sometimes I wish I had gone in Min's place because she definitely deserved to live a much better life than she did when Alzheimer's changed her life (and ours)!