{"id":10339,"date":"2015-09-15T19:04:46","date_gmt":"2015-09-15T19:04:46","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.pbs.org\/independentlens\/?post_type=films&p=10339"},"modified":"2025-10-14T15:47:23","modified_gmt":"2025-10-14T22:47:23","slug":"mimi-and-dona","status":"publish","type":"films","link":"https:\/\/www.pbs.org\/independentlens\/documentaries\/mimi-and-dona\/","title":{"rendered":"Mimi and Dona"},"content":{"rendered":"

What happens when love runs out of time? For 92-year-old Mimi, who has spent much of her life caring for 64-year-old Dona, her daughter with an intellectual disability, it means facing the inevitable \u2014 the likelihood that she will not outlive her daughter and the need to find her a new home. Filmmaker Sophie Sartain, Mimi and Dona\u2019s granddaughter and niece, respectively, captures the quirky and deeply connected mother-daughter duo at their most poignant crossroads.<\/span><\/p>\n

Since Mimi Thornton\u2019s husband died in 1968, she has lived with her daughter Dona in their suburban home in Dallas. The cognitively challenged Dona has possibly undiagnosed autism, but over many years, Mimi and Dona carved out a happy life for themselves, one filled with errands, church, weekly visits to the beauty parlor, and nightly doses of <\/span>Wheel of Fortune<\/span><\/i>. Frozen in time, they have lived off their Social Security checks, inside the same home, for forty years. But Mimi and Dona’s symbiotic existence is about to come to a crashing halt. In part worried for her safety, as well as dealing with the reality of aging, Mimi\u2019s family has made the agonizing decision that she can no longer care for Dona, and Dona must leave home to live in a state-run facility in nearby Denton, Texas.<\/span> After 64 years, Mimi will have an empty nest and Dona will suddenly be away from home.<\/span><\/p>\n

In this powerfully personal documentary, Sartain chronicles the painful process of separating her aunt and grandmother. She also interviews her own mother (Dona\u2019s sister) and other family members, reaching back to explore the complicated legacy of Dona’s disability on three generations of her Texas family as well as its history of family members with mental and developmental disabilities. Ultimately, family bonds run deep and true, even when faced with the greatest challenge yet.<\/span><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

What happens when love runs out of time? For 92-year-old Mimi, who has spent much of her life caring for 64-year-old Dona, her daughter with an intellectual disability, it means facing the inevitable \u2014 the likelihood that she will not outlive her daughter and the need to find her a new home. Filmmaker Sophie Sartain, […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":13,"featured_media":10347,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","template":"","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"topic":[1254],"class_list":["post-10339","films","type-films","status-publish","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","topic-disease-and-mental-health"],"acf":[],"yoast_head":"\nMimi and Dona | Documentary about Caring for Aging Disabled Family | Independent Lens | PBS<\/title>\n<meta name=\"description\" content=\"In Mimi and Dona, an elderly woman who has cared for her intellectually-disabled daughter for 60 years must now find her a new home and caregiver.\" \/>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/www.pbs.org\/independentlens\/documentaries\/mimi-and-dona\/\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta 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