i saw my mother today just staring at my son he was building a tower of blocks she was just there immobile a fixed gaze not on him but past him like through him this vacant stare it was maybe 30 seconds but it felt like an hour the air changed it got dense and quiet even the kid noticed he stopped making block noises just looked at her then at me a silent question maybe apprehension her face was smooth no lines no expression just this flat expanse i instinctively moved between them it wasn't a conscious thought more a kinetic reaction a protective reflex like an animal i said something mundane like you need anything mama water she didn't respond for another beat her eyes slowly refocused on me like rebooting she blinked twice then said oh i was just thinking about the garden this non sequitur a deflection a clear indicator of cognitive dissociation or maybe a minor fugue state it happens more now these micro-episodes where she just disconnects it's the second time this week i've observed this level of disengagement the first was when she was trying to recall my father's birthday she couldn't articulate the date just kept saying the flowers the flowers always the flowers the inability to retrieve specific semantic memories is becoming more pronounced i’ve read about it it’s the early markers the subtle shifts the prodromal phase of something larger more insidious and i’m just here watching it unfold like a slow-motion catastrophe i’m 30 still paying off student loans working 60 hours a week to keep us afloat my son he’s 3 this whirlwind of energy and demands my mother she’s an immigrant an elder now relying on me entirely i’m the sole provider the caregiver the son the father the everything i have no bandwidth for this no emotional reserves left to process what this means for us for him for me the weight of expectation is crushing i’m constantly failing someone or myself or both simultaneously what i felt watching her look at him like that it wasn't fear not exactly more like a cold clinical dread a recognition of inevitability a sense of impending loss combined with an overwhelming exhaustion and an acute awareness of my own inadequacy i just stood there with my son’s small hand in mine feeling the tremors of a future i can’t outrun a future where i’ll be stretched even thinner until i just break down into component parts and cease to function i just don’t know what to do what’s the protocol for this level of systemic collapse