MY HEART BLEEDS EVERY DAY

Patricia Lewis lost her mom to Alzheimer’s recently. She tells YOU of the agony and heartache of watching her loved one fade away

- CYRIL BLACKBURN

SHE’S well known for her bubbly personality and mile-wide smile but there’s nothing cheerful about her today.

It’s been five weeks since singer and TV personality Patricia Lewis’ mother died and the star has been struggling to cope with the void her passing has left behind.

Linda Lewis, Patricia’s rock and best friend, died at 78 of Alzheimer’s disease and the grief is intensified by the toll the illness took on her mother. By the end, she was unable to speak.

“She couldn’t greet me like she usually did with, ‘Hello, my precious darling’. She tried, but she couldn’t manage more than an incoherent mumble,” Patricia says.

“That broke me because she’d already lost so much. She was already an invalid and then there were only fragments left of her most treasured memories.”

Linda was diagnosed with Alzheimer’s seven years ago but her condition only began to deteriorate drastically in the past year – and Patricia was forced to confront reality.

“For years I’d been in denial about how serious it truly was. Yes, my mom was weak and forgetful. At times she didn’t recognise my husband or my child. But I always convinced myself it wasn’t that bad, that there was still time.”

The denial was made easier because of the physical distance between her and her mom. Patricia lives in Ballito on KwaZulu-Natal’s Dolphin Coast, some 600km from her parents’ home in Mondeor, Johannesburg. Her dad, Patrick (83), and sisters, Vanessa Basson and Juliette Lewis, cared for Linda until the very end.