A journal of her thoughts during her mother's descent into death, Annie Ernaux is at her most vulnerable while documenting her interactions with her mother, and how she feels, all whilst combating an inner crisis born out of this. Annie's mother has been diagnosed with Alzheimer's and has to be moved to a geriatric ward, and things begin spiralling out of control. To become a mother to your own mother is not something one could prepare for even if they had time for it, but being thrust into that position with no warning is arguably worse. She envisions scenes from her childhood in her mother; repeating mannerisms and behaviour. For her, life has come a full circle, where she sees her past and her mother's present intertwine. Because of this, she feels a part of her is also waning along with her mother.

She has no choice but to care for her mother, for she loves her. But this love has its caveats. The current situation has awoken in Annie her childhood trauma, and she subconsciously remembers her to be the "bad mother" she thought of her when she was a teenager. She has not forgotten the fear that was put into her by her mother, which is now conflicting with the affection that she has for her. Her mother did not give her the love she needed, even though back then Annie was brimming with love in the other direction. Now put in a spot where her mother is desperate for her daughter's love, she is unable to provide her with the same, with roles reversed from a score or so years ago. While she is desperate to express her vulnerability and tell her she loves her, Annie is unable to do so because her memory reminds her of the fact that she never truly won her mother's love. She tries to make up for it the same way a busy parent would try to appease their child in a boarding school; with regular visits and cake.

The reason Annie is unable to digest what is going on is because she remembers her mother as a figure of strength - because her mother made it a point to show everyone that she was strong. People close to her remembered that very aspect of her. Her mother would constantly call her a weakling. But now, she finds that the strength has vanished. The woman of power was now reduced to a shell of a human being, a woman who has all but lost control of her faculties. Now she does not know what to feel. Before her is a woman who used to call her a weakling, but now a weakling herself. Even the wounded hatred she holds for her does not have ground to stand on, for the woman she hated is now in the past. Annie cannot stop observing how frail her mother has become, and constantly laments the same.

She makes it a point to clip her fingernails, wash her hair, and shave her, so that she can feel her mother and remind herself that her mother is still alive. This soothes the part of her that already considers her dead, that sees in her an empty vassal lost in the past, that has not kept up with reality. The geriatric ward doesn't help either, as she sees her mother blend into the amalgam of women like her. She makes an effort to identify unique characteristics in these women, to assure herself that she can still recognize her own mother. All this while, her world revolves around piss and shit. A world she cannot escape until her mother escapes the world.

Even the preparation for her mother's death does not help her cope when it does happen. She could not bear to see her mother for the last few months when she was alive, but now is desperate to remember everything about her.