Mum forgot my birthday :(

I know the feeling. My parents were divorced very acrimoniously some 50 years ago and my late father's live-in mistress, later to become his second wife, wouldn't allow my name or that of my mother to be even mentioned and certainly she forbade my father to have any contact with me. But despite all this, Dad still remembered to send me a card on my birthday in June and again at Christmas every year, enclosing a small sum of money. I always wrote a thank-you letter back to him but had to be very careful in how I worded the letter, saying 'thank you for the present, it was just what I wanted' without specifically mentioning what he'd sent me. Mum, who remembered this woman very clearly, said it would cause complications for my Dad othwerwise.

Dad sent me a substantial sum when I got married in 1973 and up until the late 1980's he religiously sent money and a card on my birthdays/at Christmas, and as when i was a child, I was always very careful in how i worded my 'thankyou' letters to him. I was pleased that despite the controlling nature of his second wife, he still remembered and cared enough for me to send me something for my birthday; it showed he'd not forgotten about me.

From roughly 1988 onwards he then began to be a bit late in sending birthday cards and my Mum, still in occasional contact with him on matters connected with me, had to remind him on more than one occasion about my birthday. Eventually in the late 1990's, long after his second wife had walked out on him, Dad simply forgot altogether to send cards but I never forgot him. In 2002 I was contacted by a friend of my Dad's, who I'd not seen for almost 50 years, who told me that Dad had had to go into residential care because he kept wandering and getting lost in his opwn home town. I visited dad in hospital in 2004 and although he was pleasant and seemed to remember my face I'm not sure if he really remembered me or was simply being polite. I like to think it was because he remembered me, because as a small child I worshipped the ground my Dad walked on and it broke my heart when Mum said we had to emigrate to the south coast.

By 2004, Dad had been formally diagnosed with dementia and the consultant's report, which I have upstairs, quotes 'senile dementia to a marked degree'. From what I remember of Dad, this dementia had obviously been brewing for well over ten years.

The hospital visit in 2004 was the very last time I ever saw my lovely Dad, as he died the next year; 2005 was the last time I visited my home town, for his funeral. Despite Dad's dementia, I like to think that somewhere back in the recesses of his mind, he did remember me. His will, written in 1987 before he started to become 'forgetful' did specifically mention me by name so certainly by then he still knew I existed.