I used to teach a lovely man who was in his eighties. He spoke French really well and enjoyed having conversation lessons but every now and then he would screw his face up with extreme frustration when a word or phrase eluded him and he would always call them ‘senior moments’. I always laughted at him and reassured him that even though I was half his age, I had more than my fair share of senior moments.
Now I am fairly sure that I am not suffering with anything too serious other than being a busy mum and trying to juggle to many things all at once, but quite often I can not remember the most ridiculous things. If you asked me what I had eaten for breakfast, I would probably come up with the actual answer eventually. If you asked me what I had been doing the day before, it is even harder to recall. Particularly during term time. In the summer holidays, when I was relaxed and the pace of life had slowed down, I found that my memory miraculously returned. However, if you met me in the supermarket I can pretty much guarantee that I wouldn’t have a clue what I had come to buy.
Most of the time, these ‘senior moments’ are fairly harmless. The children and my husband take the mickey quite a lot about the fact that mummy can never remember anything. They all have memories like elephants and the number of times they say things like; “Mummy do you remember when…?” Quite often now they tail off mid sentence as they remember that the answer will probably be no. It can be embarrassing though. At a wedding this weekend, everyone was discussing how long they had been married on our table and someone asked me our wedding date. Luckily my husband swept in with the answer. I would have got there eventually but it would have taken some thought. I have also quite regularly given the wrong date of birth for A. It happened a few weeks ago when we had a hospital visit. I went to sign in and gave the wrong date and the receptionist told me that I was wrong. I corrected myself and assured her that I was there when she was born but she looked fairly unimpressed.
A few months ago, I did do some research on the internet to see if maybe there was something wrong with me and it is reassuring to know that memory loss is not an inevitable part of growing older. Apparently ‘glitches’ in your brain can mean that your brain takes a bit longer to recall information, but it is still there lurking somewhere. So that must be the cause of my senior moments. I often remember things that had been bugging me during the day as I am drifting off to sleep at night and I tell myself to remember it for the morning, but by then it has disappeared; probably replaced by thoughts of the billion and one things I have to do that day.
Anyway, my senior moments are part of me and as my family find it quite amusing, it’s not all bad. Maybe one day when I have a few extra hours in my day, I can start doing crossword and playing memory games until then I may have to start tying knots in my hankies to remind me about things.. if I had any hankies that is. I must remember to buy some.
Oh dear! Glad it’s not just me! We just have too much other stuff on our minds. My latest thing is ordering the wrong things off the internet – the wrong quantities or the wrong sizes. My best was right identical Tshirts for my daughter when I only wanted one!
Sadly, I identify with this all too well!
I do this sort of thing ALL THE TIME! X