Today I spent the evening with my dad. Everything was fine, though he was a little sleepy.. we spent some time watching tv and just relaxing. He then started to do my least favorite thing: call me by the wrong name. Now intellectually I know it's absolutely not his fault; his thinking has been compromised by his illness and he can't help it. It happens every now and again, but today I just couldn't deal with it. I didn't leave or so anything extreme.. just got really irritated and refused to respond to the other name. We talked about it and how frustrated I felt that he confused me with his brother (a man, and oh - maybe 45 years my senior). He said he understood but then kept doing it! Ack! Something about going up there and spending this time, and all the time and effort I put into making his life a little more comfortable, and then him not recognizing me really pissed me off.

After a few silent minutes of watching SVU passive aggressively, I just kind of let it go. I've learned that no matter how difficult situations can be, what people generally take away from them is the overall emotional tone of the interaction. At that moment I had a choice.. either I would leave and we would both be left feeling bad (though he may not consciously know why) or I could just suck it up and listen to my brain instead of my heart - he really can't help it. So I just let it go, and we had a great rest of the night. I told him I loved him and that he's the best, and he said it back. Honestly why should I care that he thinks I'm someone else from time to time. I try to make sure I never leave him with either or both of us having hard feelings, but when I do have a hard time I also try to remember that everyone fights with her parents from time to time just because my father is ill, it doesn't make us immune to the normal things that families go through.