My search for grace and meaning after a former care partnering life with a wife who suffered from Parkinson's disease and dementia giving her a confused and disorienting world.
Cheryl was going through a bit of confusion as I put dinner on the table. She kept getting up to look for her deceased sister Janice. (She called her Janice instead of “Jan.”) Eventually she was satisfied that Jan was not here to eat with us. She became interested in food and ate what I had cooked. (Chicken, noodles, green beans and broccoli)
I had put some music on the radio to play quietly while we were eating. Jimmy Buffet and “Margaritaville” came on when we were finished with the meal. I asked her if she wanted to dance. She said yes. We did.
For a few minutes we were young at a dance with Jimmy Buffet. Our dancing these days is more of a swaying-in-place but it is fun anyway.
In a previous post I wrote about finding a little card entitled “The Art of Marriage” in Cheryl’s purse. As I unwrapped and unfolded the little package in her purse I was very aware of the fact that it was none of my business what she kept in her purse nor why she kept those things in there. Nevertheless, faced with various requests for help, like, I can’t find my black comb or I have lost my glasses, I try my best to keep up with how objects and things are pared up, associated together in her newly confused mind.
I am guilty of looking around through her stuff to help her keep track of her stuff. I have no other interest in her stuff. That is my defense when I am caught. So far so good. I have not been caught yet. She thinks I am really good at finding things. If you know who would think to look in the freezer for a comb or used Kleenex for example, then you know someone who is care giver to some person with some variety of dementia.
Punding is a term used by the Norwegians or Swedes to describe the activity of mindlessly sorting or aligning objects, often random objects, in a fashion known only to the person doing this. I believe the term means “blockhead” Swedish.
In Cheryl’s case this behavior manifests as organization of articles and documents in preparation for a meeting or some other activity. She ran the early computer tech program at Nativity School when our children went there. Having no educational background caused her to be constantly looking to others who did, attending meetings and reading articles. She was excellent I am sure simply because she was aware of her weaknesses. She also helped her mother send cards and notes to family and friends to thank or take note of various occasions such as birthdays, holidays, anniversaries, graduations or merely an invitation to dinner. To this last Cheryl has kept many thank you notes from her mom for Sunday dinners over the years.
She gets these out and sorts, re-reads, thinks about her mom and shows them to me as though she received it in the mail today. Often she will say, I got this card from Mom. Or I got this Christmas card from (whomever).
She collects these in various clumps and collections. Some are in manila envelops. Some are in small gift bags. Some are collected in stacks with a rubber band around them. Some are in stacks held together by spring clips. Sometimes they may make some sense to me, sometimes they make no sense. No chronology. The collections can be totally random.
As she looks at the cards she reminisces about the old times. I used to point out that she was looking at a five year old Christmas card. I find that unimportant to do now. The activity is totally harmless. Late in the evening she is amenable to “I can help you with that tomorrow. Let’s go to bed and rest so we are more alert to work on that.” And we trundle off to bed tired from another day.
Today it occurred to me as I cleaned the Kleenex lint from the washer and dryer for the nth time, it was doing no good for me to lodge a complaint with Cheryl about putting tissues in her pocket. It also occurred to me that although I beat myself up about missing the tissues in her pocket, I will probably often miss one once in awhile.
Dementia is not a specific disease but is rather a general term for the impaired ability to remember, think, or make decisions that interferes with doing everyday activities. Alzheimer’s disease is the most common type of dementia. Though dementia mostly affects older adults, it is not a part of normal aging. (from the CDC)
Drat and alas. Drat, she cannot remember to do it. She cannot remember my complaint either but will detect the disappointment in my voice and probably interpret it as anger. And alas, I will occasionally forget to look in all the pockets.
I will forgo the complaint process. It is not useful anyway. I merely causes us to pick at each other. (Forgo was the answer to the Wordle a couple days ago.)
We had a wonderful dinner with friends last evening. This gathering had been put off three times for various reasons but yesterday we got together. Gary showed off his wine aerator when he was pouring the wine. He told me he cannot tell the difference. His palate is older than mine and I had gin and tonic. Perhaps he was sold a bill of goods by an aerator salesman.
Everyone contributes when we have these dinners. My job was bread. Yesterday after several false starts I got two loaves of italian (my version of italian) together. They were remarkably good so I should perhaps I will note in my notebook of cooking disasters what went wrong and what I did to recover.
Leftover from the french toast leftover loaf.
Today Cheryl is very tired. She refuses to admit it. I suppose I am tired also. We did not stay out late but we did sit up and watched a PBS show to unwind a bit when we got home.
We had french toast made from the second (leftover) loaf of bread from last night. It was good again. I am very thankful that I do not have celiac disease. One reason to not be grumpy today.
Cheryl spent some time cleaning the kitchen after she had her french toast with blueberries breakfast. All the time I was worried about her. I think I am anxious for her because the last few times she has fallen, it has happened in the kitchen. This time however she moved a lot of things around and wiped counters; swiffered the floor; threw the kitchen tablecloth into the washer along with the clean one she got out to replace it with (both will be clean in soon); and then became tired and uninterested. She took her ten o’clock meds and went to lay down for a bit. When she awakened, she announced, “Today is my birthday!”.
On top of the paper is my handy white note board telling today’s events.
It is not and stupid me pointed out that it is May the fourth. I thought about – may the fourth be with you – but left that unsaid. She responded with, I wish people would stop changing the dates or some other angry anxious comment. I backed off quickly. I apologized to her and pointed out that her birthday was next week on the tenth of May but tonight we should go somewhere and celebrate her birthday.
She became calm and sat down to watch the gabfest on the View. I brought her a coke and set about putting the kitchen back together. I discovered that she had thrown the tablecloth from the table in with the folded one from the drawer into the washer and I did not catch that before tossing a bunch more towels in on top. (Damnation. I became immediately grumpy.)
I sat down to write this little story and laugh at myself. I do not want to be grumpy today.
She actually slept pretty well and later today we will probably get out and take a walk in the park. And celebrate her birthday. There is nothing to be grumpy about. We had dinner with friends last evening. It was good company and good conversation.
With that thought she got up at 1:30-ish in the early morning. It has come to me that when her dreams become real, I have to just go with the flow. I tell myself that our experience has shown that this episode will last about two hours, so be patient and helpful during that time. Some might to this as a prayer but I think of it as description of what I need to do to help her get through this nuanced dream she is experiencing right now. (And Carpe The Damn Early Morning Diem. 🙂 ) I suggested that she should have something to eat and she would be more alert, her mind would work better while she was writing the article. She agreed with that and asked what we had.
I suggested cereal with a banana cut up on top and some o.j. She took her vitamins. Later after she decided a piece of coffee cake from yesterday morning would be good also, we discussed how she could get started. She looked at the two-day old paper on the kitchen table for I bit. Maybe she was thinking about what to write? She did not tell me.
I suggested we watch TV for a bit while her thoughts gelled. We watched a couple TV shows that were previously recorded. After a few minutes as was our previous experience she became tired again and we returned to bed at 3 am.
The alarm went off at 7 am and I fetched her morning meds and we returned to bed for a little longer as we usually do. Twenty to thirty minutes is usually enough for her to get moving. I fell asleep a little more soundly than ordinary.
I woke up and realized I could not hear her. I got up and put some clothes on. I searched the condo and could not find her anywhere inside. The front door was unlocked. This morning when she got up, she left the house.
Did the rapture happen? It scared me. It is my greatest fear, not the rapture, the fact that she had wandered off looking for something she could only see in her mind. Fortunately she was just outside the front door to our building and it was not raining.
Later as she was laying down to rest she told me, she was looking for anyone awake. She was scared that no one was here. She had decided to go look in the next building for anyone. She asked me if that woman who runs things here was around – whoever that may be. I left, “What are you thinking about?”, unsaid and suggested we go out and get some sun. Take a walk. Maybe we could have lunch.
The previous post was self serving but I would like to have my old life back. I would like to have my young body back too. That is not going to happen anymore so wishful and wistful thoughts are not going to be helpful to looking ahead. Let me face forward and move on.
As hard as it is I want to try a new tactic. Much of my anxiety about Cheryl is fear for her failure and subsequent embarrassment. I project that on her. She is not concerned. She is talking about apple pie again. Today we bought more apples and she chopped them up to make an apple pie for Easter dinner.
Last night or perhaps the night before her confused head decided that she should call her sister Deb and chat her up about making an apple pie for the Easter gathering. As time moves on she seems more and more confused about what and when and who. I have explained that we are going to our daughter’s house for Easter dinner. Somehow that gets converted into Nancy and Jan and Deb.
Nevertheless I asked my daughter-in-law Mavis to come and help Cheryl finish the pie. She readily agreed.
The one who I could tease a little. The person who when I would toss a teasing barb at her would toss it right back and then some. Fifty plus years of marriage let you do that to each other. We had some great times. We had a lot of fun times. We always wish that the kids will have as great a time and Cheryl and I had along the way. We were never rich financially but there was always enough to make it work out. We were and are rich spiritually, socially, romantically and personally. I suppose that is what makes her mental state so disturbing and frustrating to me in this part of our life.
I can go back and forth, staying present and grieving what is lost to us. As I think of these things and reminisce I think of the song, “As Time Goes By.” There is a British TV show of the same name with Judi Dench and Geoffrey Palmer. It was one of our favorites. We rarely sit for long enough to watch any TV show. Any plot line makes little sense to her so she loses interest and gets up to go organize her office. It is her form of something called punding which is a useless and senseless activity that many in her situation do.
Cheryl was the one who was super organized. She kept the check book. She paid the bills. She was hawkish about getting and keeping and filing receipts for groceries and gas and any other expenses. She preferred to pay cash for stuff. If you did not have the cash in your hand, you did not buy it. When the kids were small we went to the grocery once a month and filled the larder. When it was gone you had to wait for it to come around again. There were some exceptions of course for milk and eggs and bread but generally you had to wait. The kids learned to be frugal. They were allowed to pick their own special things for school lunch and they learned how to make it last. Even when the children moved out to have their own lives we still shopped mostly once a month.
Cheryl knew how to use a screwdriver and still does but somethings that were second nature to her are now befuddling. How to open and what to do with an email. She once put all the family information into an Access database to print addresses for birthday cards, Christmas cards and anniversary cards. She knew how to drive that simple data system. She was used to putting together other databases and accounting systems for the clients she and others had in their small computer services company. It is hard now for her to wake up Microsoft Word to write a letter these days.
She was the one who did most of the household chores. I do that now and I do not mind doing it but she would if she could stand up long enough to do the laundry, make the bed, cook dinner, bake a cake or pie or simply vacuum the carpet.
Both her motor control and mental agility are greatly diminished and she is aware of those diminished abilities and it frustrates her.
She is the one who loved to hike. My favorite memory of this is a ten mile hike we once took in March many years ago. We hiked around a lake in a Kentucky State park. It was an eight mile loop and a two mile hike to the trailhead and back. We surprised some badge earning boy scouts about five miles from no where as we sat for a bit to enjoy the view and soak up the unusually warm March sunshine that day. It is a wonderful memory. We slept well that night.
She wants her old self back too. Who wouldn’t? Her sister passed way in the pandemic. Her sister also had Parkinson’s disease. Jan had other things going on that kept her from surviving the Covid wave in 2020. She still sees and talks to Jan. Tonight she sent her a text message. Tonight she does not understand that Jan will not answer but I might be the one who is wrong about that. Jan might answer. She often does – answer Cheryl when Cheryl talks to her.
Cheryl saw Jan at the table when we sat down for dinner tonight. I have no doubt that Jan was real to her. We discussed it. She decided to send her sister a message.
It is a powerful thing to see how strongly she was certain Jan would answer. It was moving to me. She went into her office to partake in a zoom meeting with some friends. She gave me her phone to hold in case Jan would call back or return her text above. These things sometimes break my heart. I try to keep them inside.
There is still time for new memories. I am sure of that. None of us knows when we are leaving this Earth. The best thing we can do is look for the good things, look for the humor in today’s situation. It is, however, difficult on some days.
An update after I published this about an hour ago. She came back from her Zoom meeting and remarked that she had not been out this late for a while. She wondered aloud how she would get home. I smiled and said that is the magic of Zoom, you are home. I gave her a tour of the condo.
When engineers look for a solution to some dilemma, they often spend a lot of time observing the problem.
Many thoughts can arise. Many questions seek answering. But ultimately the dilemma is slowly broken down to component problems and individual solutions to small problems are sought out. An engineering education teaches this process. An engineering education does not teach solutions for Parkinson’s disease and related issues. Those are discovered along the way.
“There’s someone hanging upside down in the trees in back”, she told me. There is a scrub tree growing in the weedy lot behind our condo. It has a crotch near the ground and branches into to smaller trunks as it grows toward the light. The bark is a light color almost khaki in color. To Cheryl it looks like a kid standing on their head. Perception is off a bit and her creative brain describes a different interpretation.
In that moment she pushed me into interpreting things and objects differently. Are painters able to do this spontaneously? Are story tellers able to imagine a different reality? Are engineers stuck with what they see and touch with little imaginative creation? It intrigues me, the imagination and story telling part. I have often thought that if I could get into her head I could help but maybe I would merely be steering her toward my reality and away from hers.
There are many changes that I notice in her behavior. She can easily ramp up an anxiety about indigestion. It is not apparent to me what specific foods cause distress. Milk products and foods high in milk and sugar seem to give her a hard time. Tomato sauces and beef with a high fat content also distress her stomach. The engineer says figure that out and do not eat those. (Easy Peasey) The average time to relief is an hour to an hour and a half.
I have not discovered any silver lining in these stomach episodes. It is challenging to distract her from focusing on how her stomach feels although occasionally I can get her to sip lemon ginger tea which settles my stomach and does not add caffeine. After a severe episode she is typically awake much of the night. This happened last night.
After it became obvious to me that there was no way for her to calm down and sleep some more, we got up. I got her a bowl of cereal and some orange juice. She sat and worked the puzzles for a bit. I sat with her and worked on the crossword. I ate a banana and drank some lemon ginger tea. I asked her if she wanted to watch TV for a bit to see if she would get tired. She agreed and I played a couple of episodes of Steven Colbert. I can no longer sit up and watch his show so I record it for later. We watched a couple shows. Fortunately he was funny and Cheryl laughed here and there.
Today she is not in tip top shape of course and she fell over backwards in the kitchen. She is understandably fuzzy headed even though she slept until about 9 am. Maybe one day she will keep her hands empty when getting up from or down into a chair. But my wishes and encouragement which she interprets as anger go mostly unheeded.
On the drive to exercise class she asked if I slept well. I asked her if she remembers being up for a large part of the very early morning hours. She said no. The fact that she does not have a memory of being awake is not uncommon. I asked her if she specifically remembered watching Steven Colbert’s late show. She remembers that slightly. She apologized. She apologized for something that she has no control over and that frustrates me to no end.
There is no reason for her to apologize. It is not her causing undue commotion. Parkinson did it.
Watch out for kids hanging in the trees. Carpe Diem.
Last night was one of those sleepless nights for Cheryl. I think I am learning when she will have a sleepless night or sleep fitfully overnight or sleep for a bit and then be awake for a couple hours. And the next day she has no memory being awake or thinks she slept soundly.
She went to bed a little early at nine but she had complained of being tired at eight while we were playing Uno. I got her bedtime meds and we played another round of cards. (I am losing this marathon game.) She insisted she was tired, so, I helped her find pajamas and opened the bed. I kissed her goodnight and read my book for a bit. Nine o’clock is too early for me to go to bed.
I went to bed at about eleven and slept for about an hour. At twenty minutes or so after midnight, she was up. I thought initially for a trip to the bathroom but she was up with conversational gibberish about work and school and children. I left her to put on clothes and I put on a sweat suit to go read some more and wait to see if she needed my help. (Her motion is good and she seems steady with no hint of Parkinson in the middle of the night.)
When she came out of the bedroom dressed for work, I got her some cereal and orange juice. She also ate a piece of coffee cake. She wanted to look for the morning paper and pointed out to her that the paper would not appear for several hours. She seemed to accept that and sat back down to re-read the Sunday paper. After breakfast we played a couple more rounds of Uno. In conversation before and during our card playing I was able to convince her that we had no appointments today. After a while she decided that she was very tired again and we went back to bed at about 2:30 am.
In previous episodes like this I admit to being Mr. Cranky-pants. Rosie showed me a different way to respond to her at night. We both fell asleep quickly and the LOUD AND ANNOYING alarm clock woke me at seven for her morning meds.
I would like to report that she is okay today and I am rested but I am not. I am a little tired but coffee helps. She is still a little confused but not any more so than normal lately.
She has a rash that appeared a couple days ago. This afternoon I made an appointment with our primary care physician to look at it. Hopefully it is nothing other than hives. I wish I knew what new thing is irritating her skin. She does not complain about it. (Update: Shingles. She has shingles. In some people it does not hurt. Damn. Another reason to not get old.)
In writing this little piece I googled “a different way” in the hunt of an image to use as a header picture. This hip-hop song popped up DJ Snake. I am not a consistent listener of hip-hop music but much of it is very good and has a happy beat. This video is very creative.
A Different Way – DJ Snake, Lauv
Could you believe I could be different? I’ll be the difference, I’ll lift you high And I understand your hesitation Our reputation, it’s no surprise So let me redefine you And you can see the tide move Just like tears in the eyes do And when you’re feeling alone Oh, baby, I’ll be right here Between the sea and silence So breathe easy my dear You can find sunshine in the rain
I will come running when you call my name
Even a broken heart can beat again
Forget about the one who caused you pain
I swear I’ll love you in a different way
I know that love is so unforgiving
You’ve been a victim too many times
And I’ll be the thread, hold you together
I’ll be forever, will you be mine?
So let me redefine you
And you can see the tide move
Just like tears in the eyes do
And when you’re feeling alone
Oh, baby, I’ll be right here
Between the sea and silence
So breathe easy my dear
You can find sunshine in the rain
I will come running when you call my name
Even a broken heart can beat again
Forget about the one who caused you pain
I swear I’ll love you in a different way
Hey, hey, hey
I swear I’ll love you in a different way
Hey, hey, hey
I swear I’ll love you in a different way
Source: LyricFind
Songwriters: Edward Christopher Sheeran / Ilsey A Juber / Jonny Mcdaid / Lindy Robbins / Steve Mac / William Grigahcine
It produces a reaction in me close to anger. I do not understand why. Anger is not quite right. Disappointment and some sadness with a little depression mixed in is a better description of the emotional mix. The only constant in life is change. However, that does not mean we have to like it.
In Matthew’s Gospel 21 (28-32) there is a story (parable) and I thought of it as I reacted to Cheryl’s idea. The parable in Matthew is about a owner of a vineyard who had two sons. He asked (told) his first son to work in the family business. He replied that yes he would go but he did not. When Dad talked to the second son the kid replied, nope, not today. I am hanging with the boys. He later relented and went to work for his father. It had not been more than a couple of weeks since it was read at mass.
That second son’s reaction was much like mine when Cheryl told me a confused story about Dan and Lynette. She though that Dan was a the Hospice of Cincinnati facility visiting with Lynette who was dying. He was not but I did not talk to him as I should have. My first reaction was similar to the second son. Nope. Ain’t doin’ it. I have no good memories of that hospice facility that is where my father died.
I gave in and took her to see Dan and Lynette. I put whatever little dinner preparation I had started back into the refrigerator for later. I made the five minute drive to the Hospice facility.
Cheryl was having a good day. We ran some errands and took a walk in the park. We had lunch at one of our favorite lunch diners. Our activities were all spontaneous. It was one of those sixty-five degree early March days. It would have been perfect if there no breeze at all but it was an okay breeze of five knots or less. It was very sunny. When we returned I told her about Dan’s call on Saturday. She did not return with the hostility that I expected as I had not told her right away. (This kind of news makes her upset for days.) She did react by calling Dan back to talk and find out what was going on.
When we got to Lynette’s room and I realized that Dan was not there I called him. In our conversation Dan explained that Cheryl kept asking where he was and did not seem to understand he was not there at Hospice. I asked him if he wanted to come. He does not see well and does not drive at night. He said yes he would like to do that and maybe we could get something to eat.
We drove across town, picked him up and came back to visit Lynette. She was unresponsive when he was there as she had been when we were there forty-five minutes earlier. Dan is a pretty quiet guy but he was a little beside himself. After a short visit watching Lynette’s irregular breathing we went to get something to eat. Dan insisted on paying for dinner.
We talked a lot while we were eating pizza at one of our local pizzerias. Comfort for a friend is something for which one must always find time. I have no explanation about my initial reaction other than it was about me. I had planned dinner and had comfortably settled into my chair to read before I had to get up to make dinner. I had no intention of comforting someone who was grieving that evening. Cheryl had been very upbeat and happy all afternoon. I was feeling pretty good myself.
Kindness to others earns grace. If only life was easy. This occurred on Monday. Late Tuesday since I had heard no more from Dan, I sent him a text and asked how things were and if I could help.
This is Wednesday and Lynette is deceased. Dan called late last evening to tell me that Lynette had passed on today. It is a sad moment for us both. Cheryl was asleep. I did not wake her with bad news last evening. This morning as I was going through my litany of what was happening today, I told her about Dan’s call. She was confused for a bit. She will ask me about it later.
One of life’s little twists just happened. Fate/karma/luck/the angel Gabriel – whatever brought me back into their lives on the last day of Lynette’s. Time for a little meditation and maybe prayer and reflection.
Cater was the answer to Wordle today. I am a little sad today. Lynette was good people. The only person I knew who knew how to tat lace. She had lots of crafty talent. She was an executive chef and a good cook. Dan is retired away from the “front of the house” in restaurant parlance. The restaurant business is where they met. Lynette was a very special person and I think I am better for knowing her in life.
May Lynette rest in peace without pain and dementia. Carpe Diem.
Adjunct_Wizard 