She looked in the mirror and talked about her reflection which she thought was someone else to me.

She went into the bathroom and came back.

I have to go but I am waiting for that other woman to get done.

What other woman? — me. I’ll look. She came with me into the bathroom and pointed to her reflection.

We have a large mirror over the double vanity much like this picture stolen from Pinterest. She does not always recognize herself.

Who do you think that is I asked her as we looked in the mirror together. I don’t know she said. Who are you I asked. I am not sure she replied. I told her she was Cheryl and the woman over there was Cheryl too. She said I don’t understand how that could be. She did not ask about my reflection or who I was.

Mr Cranky pants is unsure of how to respond to these episodes. These happen most of the time in the very early morning hours. I am pretty sure I have become part of her dreamy perception of the world but I am not looking out at the world through her eyes. And her vision of things is constructed in her visual cortex which is muddled up with bad chemistry.

The light is low. The overhead lights are on a dimmer. In the rest of our home several small LED night lights provide a glow to navigate by if necessary. At the time of this conversation I thought about raising the light level but I did not.

During the previous year of COVID isolation and many Zoomeetings with family and friends Cheryl indicated often that she thought the people on the screen were in the room with her or us. Her view of herself in the mirror seems an extension of that vision of her reality. Usually on Zoom though, she knew which rectangle was a picture of her reflected by the laptop camera. The mirror perception was new.

This is all very new and I hope that her new medication schedule will reduce and ameliorate episodes like this.

One can only hope.

Carpe Diem!