'Everyone adores mammy' - Irish woman sharing mother's dementia journey on TikTok

A woman from Galway has opened up about what life is like caring for her elderly mother with dementia.

Susan Burke from Gort, Co Galway, left her job to become a full-time carer for her 96-year-old mother Isabella who was diagnosed with dementia in 2025.

Susan has created a TikTok account with nearly 30,000 followers where she shares videos of her and her mother, advice and experiences as a carer. The TikTok account has gained a lot of attention from people in awe of their story.

Susan said that "everyone adores mammy. They just all love my mother. They could see the decline in her last year and then this, with this new tablet, it seems to have helped her and she's coming back."

Susan's mother has recently started new medication which has helped greatly, Susan said.

One of the first moments Susan realised her mum was developing symptoms of dementia was when they were watching television together, a very normal and regular moment for them both.

READ NEXT: 'Adored and loved by their sons' - Funeral arrangements for couple killed in weekend crash - Ireland Live

"We were just as usual, nice and relaxed," Susan explained, "we'd been chatting fine and then she just turned to me and said, 'where's Susan?'

"And I said, 'I am Susan mum.' I knew then that something was wrong but I didn't want to accept that my mum had dementia.

"So I kind of tried to downplay it but I just knew by the look, it was a fearful look. She was afraid. She was lost. She didn't know who I was, where she was and it was just a very, very scary moment for both of us."

Susan said that in that moment the only thing she could do was reassure her mother and tell her that she was safe. But Susan said that this wasn't a one-off moment for them both, and said that during this time period it "would have been a daily, hourly, regular occurrence."

"It was so sad to see this woman that I loved who was just so lost and didn't recognise her daughter anymore," Susan said.

"We were, and we still are, the best of pals. I never married, which she loves telling everybody this when we go to see them.

"She would say 'just as well, Susan never got married'. So I've been with her, I'd say, for the best part of all my life. I lived out of home for a while, but we did everything together.

"We went on weekends away, we loved going out for dinner, going shopping together. We were always equal. I'd say probably up until 2024, we were equals."

Susan described one way she has created a safe environment for her mother in their home with the help of her years as a childcare worker.

"I made a little Montessori room in the house and I have paints there and little building blocks, jigsaw puzzles. It's all catered just to try and stimulate her memory.

"I do quizzes with her, I come up with little quizzes that she can do. She loves colouring. Mum always loved to paint and she used to do the most amazing paint numbers, like the really detailed paint by numbers.

"But now it's children's colouring books that she's doing, or colouring books for seniors, for older adults. She would do these every day, every single day. It's kitted out to keep her stimulated, she's pretty alert in that sense now."

Susan also said that on the days when her mother's memory loss was particularly difficult to manage, she would wear a name badge and have a message on a board which would say something like, 'Susan is coming over - you are safe'.

"Because of all the repetitive questions. Who are you? Where are you? Where is Susan? Sometimes by having it on the board, I might write 'Susan and Bella are here today. We are the only people in the house. We are safe.'

"After repeating it maybe 10 times in the day, with the board there, I could just direct her eyes to the board and she could read it, and that would calm her. Likewise with the badge, because I was constantly saying, 'I'm Susan, I'm Susan,' I thought a visual aid would help her.

"I'd point to it, give her a smile, and then she'd smile back, and she was happy with that."

Susan described one aspect of dementia that's particulary frightening for both mother and daughter; when Isabella started to experience 'sundowning.'

Sundowning happens when dementia patients experience heightened symptoms of confusion, agitation, distress, and confusion in the later afternoon or evening.

"When it started to happen I had no clue what was going on because we'd be sitting maybe at the kitchen table, colouring a picture, and then all of a sudden she didn't know where she was, who I was, where she was living, what was happening next.

"I just didn't know what to say or do until I started looking up and researching what sundowning is. 

"I have to sit on the couch holding her hand to comfort for her. Tell her she's safe, she's not alone, Susan is with her, and then she feels okay.

"Sundowning was just one of the scariest times because you're looking at this terrified person."

Susan and her mother both moved to Galway from Dublin, so this change would confuse Isabella.

"We moved down at the end of 2017. Mum kept saying to me in those periods of sundowning, where's the house we bought? And I would say, 'you're in the house we bought, mum.'

"This is the house we bought in Gort but whatever way her brain was working, she thought we bought a second house in Gort that was identical to the house we were living in, it was like two realities that she had."

Susan said that often the best thing for her to do was to go along with her mother's version of reality and just remind her that she is safe and play games with her.

Isabella has started new medication which has improved her life significantly in recent weeks. Susan said that her mother would have had difficulty sleeping through before the change.

"She'd go to bed and then she'd wake up, I might have only put her into bed and she'd wake up at one o'clock and think it was time to get up.

"She'd want breakfast and she'd say 'why can't we have breakfast? And I want breakfast.' And so this would happen three, four, five times a week.

"Since she's gone on the new medication, she is sleeping through the night, which makes such a difference. I have a camera like a baby monitor in her bedroom, so I would have that on and that would alert me if she gets up during the night, because you always have that fear that she could fall. So as I said, you're on hyper alert all the time."

Susan is now sharing her experiences with the world on social media.

"Last year I would have been too emotional because I probably spent most of last year crying nearly every day, just upset, whereas now I just feel stronger that I can just share on our advice TiktTok page," she explained.

Caring for her mother is constant, exhausting and has taken over Susan's entire life, but her mother has been a huge part of her whole life.

She described her mother as a "little diva who makes people laugh. She's funny and kind and she loves her family with her whole heart and that is still there, that is still there with her."