‘It’s our mom so we’re going to figure it out’ — USU star Cash Gilliam, Mother tackle dementia

Friday, Sept. 10 was a memorable night for senior Utah State Football player Tobias “Cash” Gilliam. 

Gilliam, the Aggies starting striker (a hybrid safety and linebacker position) had just finished with six tackles in a 48-24 win over North Dakota. And he had the first full weekend to hang out with his mom in several months. 

His mother Donna Ellis is 58 and was diagnosed with early-onset dementia in 2019. 

She has a joyful persona and can brighten the days of those who meet her. Exchanging pleasantries with her on the field postgame, it was clear she loves her son and loves football. She showed off her custom made no. 5 sweater that matched her son’s jersey. She seemed gleeful, despite not fully grasping what was going on. 

Gilliam, who had spent the past three hours trying to take his opponents’ heads off, was now the most tender person in the stadium, speaking with his mother patiently and not leaving her side.

It’s been a humbling couple of years for Gilliam, and a lot to take in as a student-athlete. He’s had to watch mostly from afar as his mother, who lives in Ohio, continues to regress in health. He and his two half sisters, Ryane Adeniran and Nikkei Adeniran, don’t know what to do. 

A once independent woman who raised three children and was highly involved in her community — even establishing a pee-wee football team in Dayton, Ohio — Ellis is now losing touch with reality. Taking on a childlike persona, she’s unable to do day-to-day things such as cooking or driving and even struggles to use the restroom on her own. She has to be supervised 24/7. 

“It’s kind of hard, because she worked so hard to get me to this point,” Gilliam said. “And she can’t really genuinely … she can’t see it.”

“It’s a tough, tough thing to deal with,” said senior defensive tackle Jaylin Bannerman, who was Gilliam’s teammate at Kentucky, Arizona Western and now Utah State. “But that’s a wonderful lady. I love her like she’s my own mom. She’s a very good person.”

Sadly, there doesn’t seem to be any way to keep Ellis’s condition from worsening. 

“They don’t have any cure for it,” Gilliam said. “You really can’t do anything for it honestly, besides make their life comfortable.”

Gilliam and his sisters have spent the past year searching for an effective treatment center that could take care of Ellis but have been unsuccessful at finding an affordable one that meets her needs. So instead, the family has taken turns caring for their mother. 

When Ellis’s health began to rapidly deteriorate in early 2020, she came out to Logan to stay with Gilliam for a six month stretch. When she went back to Ohio, she lived with her sister and mother. 

Soon it became clear that wasn’t working out, and Gilliam decided to enter the transfer portal with intentions of returning home to take care of his mother. Thankfully, Nikkei “stepped up to the plate” and moved from Atlanta to Columbus instead, to be the primary caretaker, and Gilliam was able to stay in Logan.

This year, Ryane relocated from Boston to Cincinnati to help take care of Ellis whenever she’s in the country, which is about half of the time. She works for the International Churches of Christ, and the church sends her out to work in Europe for two month stretches throughout the year. Ryane just left for Moldova on Sept. 13.

There’s a chance Ellis will move out to Logan for a few weeks this fall, so she can see Gilliam play in his games and give Nikkei a break. 

But the reality is having Ellis bounce around from one family member to another isn’t a viable option. Each sibling is making tremendous sacrifices, yet Ellis’ memory and overall well-being continues to deteriorate. They’re desperate to find a more reliable solution. 

“It constantly seems like we’re taking 10 steps forward and then 15 steps back,” Ryane said following the North Dakota game. “But we’re just kind of doing what we can and trying to find joy and laughter in the midst of feeling stuck in this situation.”

“It’s really hard times,” Gilliam admitted. “But it’s our mom so we’re going to figure it out somehow.”

 ‘It’s crazy how fast it happened’

Ellis used to be a fiercely independent woman who worked hard to raise her three children. 

Described by Ryane as “overly confident” and “ambitious,” she knew how to take matters into her own hands. 

When Ellis was unhappy with the little league football team Gilliam played on growing up, she decided to establish her own team “despite not knowing much about football,” according to Ryane.

She made the team an official member of Pop Warner, hired coaches and enlisted high school-aged Ryane and Nikkei to run the cheer team. 

“I played on her team for like three or four years,” Gilliam said. “And she made it really cheap so inner city kids could come play.” 

In other things growing up, her passion could turn into pride, and there were some “hurtful” things that happened, according to Ryane. But for Gilliam, his mother was his inspiration. He’s acquired much of the same drive she had, and it’s helped him become a successful football player and person. 

“I wouldn’t be here without her,” he said. 

Because of Ellis’s self-determination, early signs of dementia weren’t immediately recognized. 

“Towards the end of my senior high school, I started noticing it but at that point, I didn’t know what it was,” Gilliam said. “I used to get frustrated like, ‘Mom, I just told you that.’ I didn’t really understand.” 

Gilliam moved to Lexington the summer of 2016 to play football at Kentucky. It wasn’t long after he moved away when Ellis’ situation got more serious. 

On May 15, 2017, Ellis’ sister passed away. When this happened, “things kicked up kind of rapidly,” according to Gilliam.

Despite clear signs something was wrong, Ellis was adamant she was just fine. Her self-sufficient nature was dueling the disease. 

Eventually, she got into the doctors and was diagnosed with early-onset dementia in 2019. In the months since, there have been several chilling instances that helped Gilliam realize how scary of a condition it is. 

In 2020, Ellis was splitting time living with her sister, Gilliam’s “Auntie Wheatie,” and with Nikkei. She preferred living with Wheatie, who didn’t fully grasp the situation and had a hard time telling her no.

In one instance, Ellis took the keys to her sister’s car and started driving around. Nobody knew where she was. One of Gilliam’s hometown friends spotted her sleeping in the car in a parking lot, and told Gilliam, who then gave his mother a call. 

Ellis knew she was in trouble and didn’t know how to get back to her sister’s house. Gilliam was in Utah and felt helpless. She continued driving the car around aimlessly. But, thankfully, an old family friend stepped in. 

“This is how God works,” Gilliam said. “She gets to this gas station. And one of my pee-wee coaches from when I was in little league was at the gas station. She was getting into it with the clerk talking about, ‘I’m looking for one of my kids, they got Alzheimer’s.’”

“My coach noticed her like ‘Hey, Miss Ellis. What’s up? You good?’ and she was like, ‘Yeah. I’m looking for my kid with Alzheimer’s.’ Now mind you he know me and my whole family and was like, ‘None of your kids had Alzheimer’s.’ So he called my best friend’s mom. They had to go get her and then they had to call the police at the gas station. They took her license away so she ain’t allowed to drive anymore legally.” 

This occurrence, and others like it, helped Gilliam and his sisters realize she urgently needed proper treatment. 

Finding Treatment 

When Nikkei moved to Columbus last year, the search began for an assisted living facility for Ellis to move into. 

They found a nice one that would be covered by insurance and was located next to Nikkei’s new home. What they didn’t realize was most care centers don’t have the resources to take care of somebody with dementia. 

“She got rejected because her scores were too low and her evaluation didn’t go over well,” Ryane said. “They said she needed a memory care unit.” 

The problem is memory care units “cost an arm and a leg,” according to Gilliam. Their current health insurance plan won’t cover memory care. And because Ellis has seven years until she’s 65, Medicaid won’t help. 

Ryane and Nikkei have done everything they can to find help and gain knowledge. They’ve found support on social media and in Ohio from others who have a loved one with dementia. 

“So we’ve had people get us in contact with like case managers, or social workers or neurologists in different states, or people who just have gone through it themselves,” Ryane said. “But also, at the same time, it can be like an analysis paralysis or information overload. It’s like, we have all this information, but it still doesn’t seem like we’re making any progress.”

Another concern is finding a place that not only meets Ellis’s needs, but makes her feel comfortable. Because most people with dementia are in their 70s, 80s and 90s, Gilliam knows his mother wouldn’t do well in a memory care center — if they managed to find one they could afford.  

“She wants to still be able to move around and like, maneuver and stuff like that,” he said. “At the end of the day, we want her to be happy too. We just don’t want to put her somewhere. You know what I’m saying? We want our mother to be happy.”

Gilliam’s dream is to get Ellis a comfortable, permanent home to live in and hire a caretaker to live with her. 

He believes his best shot at doing that is making money from the sport he loves to play. 

“God willing,” Gilliam said, “I have an opportunity to play at that next level. I know I’m gonna be able to take care of her. So that sacrifice alone, I feel like it’s gonna be worth it in the end. I didn’t go home this summer. I didn’t see my mom. I stayed in Logan to train. But she knows why I stay here.”

In the meantime, they’re trying to take care of Ellis with the limited resources they have. 

 Day to Day 

Ryane was quick to learn taking care of somebody with dementia is an emotionally and physically demanding task around the clock. 

She feeds Ellis three meals a day, takes her to get her nails done, takes her to church and has her listen to gospel music. 

When Nikkei is watching her, she’ll take her to the park, have her meditate and do any activity that will help Ellis keep her brain moving. 

Whoever is watching Ellis needs to be attentive to what she’s doing because if she’s left alone, trouble can arise. 

On Aug. 30, Ryane was eager to spend her Monday getting things done to prepare to go back to Europe. But Ellis, who was staying with her, had other plans. 

“Sometimes she goes through phases where she gets paranoid, or she just is really convinced that you know, reality isn’t really what reality is,” Ryane said. “I woke up to a kiss on the forehead from my mom, her bags were packed, and then I heard the door close behind her. And then I got up, got in my car and followed her for the next hour, hour and a half as she tried to go and find a bus to Georgia.” 

It was frustrating for Ryane because her whole day was derailed. It was also really sad because her mother was trying to leave. 

Ryane has found that everyday can be emotionally draining in its own way, but she tries to keep it to herself. 

“I think it’s challenging because it’s hard to personally grieve as your that close face- to- face to it,” she said. “So even if I’m feeling very emotional, I’m like, man, I don’t even feel like I have the space because she doesn’t realize what’s going on.”

The mother-child dynamic also makes it tricky. For Ryane, she’s now fully responsible for somebody who used to be in charge of her. 

And despite having childlike tendencies, Ellis is still an adult who has her pride and emotions, which means her children can’t just completely control her. 

“We figured out you kind of have to guide or, you know, give her options and let her choose, you know, guide her to the right option, instead of being so dominant,” Gilliam said. “So I feel like that helped us a lot learning that.” 

The unwanted circumstances have forced Ellis’ children to become more patient, which has helped them increase the love they feel towards their mother. 

“Everybody has individual interpersonal relationships, but we both have realized how this has brought us closer to our mom.” Ryane said. “And for me, as a woman of faith, that’s something I’ve prayed about for, like, the last seven years of like, man, I really want to be able to be closer to her … The act of taking care of somebody when you kind of have to, and naturally softens your heart and draws you closer to somebody.” 

 What You Should Know

Ellis’ children aren’t sitting around asking for handouts. They’re desperately trying to solve their situation. As mentioned, Gilliam’s goal is to make the NFL and use his earnings to help his mother. Ryane and Nikkei uprooted their lives to help their mom. 

Letting the public know their struggles is another step in a long journey in helping their mother, while also shedding light on how brutal the disease of dementia can be. 

“I would just say, you know, treat somebody [with dementia] like they were your mother, your father, your grandmother, your grandpa,” Gilliam said. “Don’t ever try to take advantage of somebody with dementia because at the end of the day, they still are human, and they still have feelings, and they are already going through a lot in their mind. They’re battling their mind every day.”