Mom can seem completely normal then out of nowhere will come a question or a behavior that reminds me of her memory loss. Like today, I called her from work to see how she was, and we were talking when she said "where are you? Who else is in the house?" I thought maybe she was confused thinking the cleaning lady was there (she actually was there yesterday). I reminded her that the cleaning woman came yesterday and that helped to orient her. Most of the time I will see a glimmer of my mom, as I knew her before ALZ, and it feels nice. Other times she is dependent and helpless. She does not take care of herself hygenically anymore, her clothes and hair are unkempt. Before, she would not leave the house without lipstick. She is slowly slipping away. She also thought that her sister had called and wanted to "meet us halfway" between here and where she lives (she lives in Michigan). I checked the caller ID and there was no record of her sister calling. And if someone calls for me, forget it, she can not remember what they called for, or if she does take a message and write it down, it is garbled. Who would have thought that those games of verbal charade would lead to this. But that was probably the first sign of trouble. That is hard.