My Future Nightmare

30-Day Writing Challenge #12

Prompt: What are you the most scared of losing, and what would you truly lose if you lost it?

The above picture is completely blasphemous in my eyes. You do not burn books. But it is a pretty accurate representation of what I’m so afraid to lose.

Dementia runs rampant in my gene pool.

This awful illness that I’ve been struggling with has given me a glimpse into what it’s like not to be able to remember things. I forget the words that I’m trying to say. I forget things that just happened. I forget what day it is and doctor’s appointments, and whether or not I took my medication (my husband keeps track of those things for me). I have to write down anything important because I won’t remember it later. It’s the worst part of all of this. I can handle the exhaustion, the headaches, the stomach issues, the muscle cramps, the dizziness, the shortness of breath…. whatever else I’m forgetting right now… but I can’t deal with the fact that I can’t remember.

It’s terrifying. And it’s even more terrifying when you know there’s a high likelihood that it's just a tiny glimpse of your future.

The book burning is blasphemy, but to me it represents erasing a story. And that is what dementia does. One memory at a time, it erases your story. It steals the names of people that you love. It steals your feeling of safety in the world because you’re not sure what is going on or sometimes even where you are and who surrounds you. I watched it happen to my grandparents. I don’t want it to happen to me.

I am so scared of it that I made my husband promise me that if I ever forget who he is, he will feed me strawberries. I’m deathly allergic to them but I figure if I forget my husband I will probably forget that too and eat them willfully. It’s not exactly murder. It’s mercy. And nothing upon nothing is more terrifying to me than slowly losing myself one memory at a time.

Imagine being afraid of your spouse because you do not recognize them and they’re trying to touch you. Imagine looking at your children and not knowing their names. Imagine waking up in a room you do not recognize.

The latter has happened to me once in my life already. I don’t really want to…

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