Did I Try Hard Enough to Understand My Mother?

By Anthea Rowan for the New York Times

Ms. Rowan is the author of “A Silent Tsunami: Swimming Against the Tide of My Mother’s Dementia.”

My mother often asked me, “Am I on a ship?”

“No, Mum, you’re not,” I’d assure her. “You’re high on dry land.”

More and more, though, her dementia created the illusion that she was on a ship, unmoored, her illness cleaving a distance between us. I knew in time that she would fall off the edge of the horizon.

It is only later, long after she’s gone, that I understand she may have been describing a real drift she perceived but could not articulate.

Research shows that people with dementia often harness metaphor to communicate experiences in their desperate bids to remain engaged. They might substitute an unexpected word for the conventional, or invent words and phrases. There’s a surprising magic in the patois of the condition.