You have been grieving her for 4 years. The funeral is only now.

Two things are true at once and nobody has told you they are allowed to be. She died on Tuesday. You have also been saying goodbye since the afternoon in 2022 when she asked who you were and meant it.

So you are not writing from fresh grief. You are writing from something older and flatter, which is why the templates you have read tonight feel like they were written for a different family.

The split room

Look at who will be sitting there. Her sister, who knew her at 20. Your children, who mostly remember the last chapter. The carers, who were kind and who never met her before the illness. A neighbour who stopped visiting in year 3 and has felt bad about it since.

Half that room needs the first version of her returned to them for 4 minutes. The other half has never met her. Both of those are one job: put her back, at full size, doing things. The structure in a eulogy for your mother holds; what changes is where the illness sits.

The illness gets 1 paragraph. She gets the other 5.

Where the illness goes

• not at the startOpen on her, in a scene, before any of it. The first 30 seconds set which woman this speech is about, and the room will follow whichever one you name first.
• once, in the middle, plainly“She had Alzheimer’s for the last 5 years.” Not “a long illness bravely borne”, not “her final journey”. Name it, say one true thing about what it took, and move on to the next section.
• never at the endIf the speech ends in the nursing home, that is the image the room carries out. End 40 years earlier, on something she said, in her own voice.
• one line for the people who cared for herName the home or the carers once, briefly, without a list of names. It matters more to your family than to the room, and 1 sentence is enough.

Getting the first version back

The problem is practical: the last 4 years are loud in your memory and the 40 before them have gone quiet. These questions are the fastest way back in.

• 01What did her house smell like when you were 9?sensory detail bypasses the recent years completely. Polish, gravy, cigarettes, cut grass, chlorine
• 02What was she doing the last time you remember her being completely herself?the specific room, the specific week. This is usually the paragraph the speech is built around
• 03What did she say too often?quote it. One sentence in her voice does more than any adjective, and the room will laugh in recognition
• 04What was she like at a party, or in an argument?the illness took the sharpness first. Give it back to her for 4 minutes
• 05What did she do that annoyed you, and that you now do yourself?this is the honest kind of tribute, and it is nearly always the funniest line in the speech

Ask her sister or her oldest friend 1 of these questions this evening. They hold the years you cannot reach, and they will answer within the hour because being asked is a kindness to them too.

Relief is normal, and it has a place

You may feel relief, and it may be the loudest thing you feel. That does not mean you loved her less. It means you watched something long and it is over.

At the lectern, relief gets 1 careful sentence or none. At the reception, in a corner, with her sister, you can say the whole of it. Know which room you are in.

In the last 2 years she was not really here, and I am not going to pretend that was anything other than hard, or that today is only sad. What I have is 45 years of her, and 4 minutes, so I am going to spend them on the 45.

the one careful sentence — say it, then go straight into a scene

The last thing she said to me that was entirely hers was in the car park at Sainsbury’s, and it was an instruction about parking, and she was right.

dry, specific, and it hands the room the person rather than the patient

If you were the one who cared for her

Then you know the parts nobody else saw, and you are tired in a way the room cannot see. Two rules.

First, the speech is not the place to account for the caring. One line, if any, and no ledger of who visited. The people who did not visit already know, and Saturday will not correct them.

Second, you are allowed to hand the reading to someone else. Write it and let your brother read it. That is not a failure, and the words are still yours.

Then end on her, before all of it. A phrase of hers, quoted and left alone. Nothing after it.

• How do you write a eulogy for someone who had dementia?

  Build the speech around the person before the illness and give the illness 1 plain paragraph in the middle. Open in a scene from years earlier, because the first 30 seconds decide which version of her the room pictures. Name the illness once, without euphemism, say one true thing about what it took, then move on. Never end in the nursing home — finish on something she said in her own voice, decades earlier.

• Should a eulogy mention Alzheimer’s?

  Yes, once, by name. Everyone in the room knows, and “a long illness bravely borne” sounds like you are managing them. One sentence is enough: she had Alzheimer’s for the last 5 years, and here is one true thing about that. Then return to her life, which is what the room came for.

• Is it normal to feel relief when someone with dementia dies?

  It is the most common feeling at this kind of funeral and it says nothing about how much you loved her. At the lectern it gets 1 careful sentence or none: that the last years were hard, that today is not only sad, and that you would rather spend your 4 minutes on the 45 years before. Save the rest for a corner of the reception with someone who was also there.

• How do you remember someone before they were ill?

  Ask sensory and specific questions rather than trying to summarise a life. What did her house smell like when you were 9. What was she doing the last time she was completely herself. What did she say too often, in her exact words. What was she like in an argument. What did she do that annoyed you and that you now do yourself. Then ask her sister or oldest friend one of those questions tonight — they hold the decades you cannot reach.