JOAN’S BLOG – FRIDAY, SEPTEMBER 4, 2009 – A BITTERSWEET MOVE

First, I want to thank all of my readers for their patience during my big move to the Independent Living Villa. It has been impossible for me to keep up the website with current news stories, blogs, and message board posts in the middle of this chaos. Everyone has been supportive and kind, which is greatly appreciated, considering I have been dripping in sweat, in constant knee and shoulder pain, and completely exhausted.

The move has been bittersweet. There is no doubt that it is the best idea I have had in my lifetime. It is a small, quiet, friendly neighborhood of only 8 buildings with 4 villas in each building. There are activities every day, and outings every week from which Sid can choose. The pool and clubhouse are right outside my front door, and he does not have to do one single bit of home maintenance right down to changing a light bulb.

For me, it is a life saving stress reliever. I know that if there is an emergency with Sid, help is next door at the ALF; I do not have to cook dinner; I do not have to clean my house; and my financial burden of home ownership, maintenance, taxes, and upkeep has been lifted from my sagging shoulders.

Ah, but isn’t there always another side to the story? The bitter side. This move has either highlighted Sid’s deficiencies that were not apparent before, or it has hastened his decline. So much so, that even he told me that he was thrilled that we moved, because he could tell he was slipping.

My initial thought, and my fervent hope is that his almost total confusion, bewilderment, inability to keep a thought in his head for more than 30 seconds, inability  to follow a direction, start a task, or remember what he is supposed to be doing in the middle of a task, is due to the move. He has no routine. Every day is different, full of work he is physically unable to do, and since ¾ of the boxes are still full, he has no idea where anything is.

I have never seen him like this. He asks what he can do to help, then sits in his chair in the den. When I ask him to help me empty a box or put something away, he does not remember that he said he would help. He then agrees to help, but by the time he has walked from the den to the kitchen, he forgets what I told him to do.

His executive functioning, motor planning, processing, and reasoning, have been affected since the beginning of the disease, but they seem to have nosedived during this transition. Yesterday, we went to the old house to retrieve some laundry and food. On the way to the house, I told him to take the cooler from the old garage, fill it with the produce, and put it into the trunk. Three times. When we arrived at the old house, he asked me what we were going to do. I repeated the instructions about the produce, but simplified it. I emptied the refrigerator into a rolling cart, gave him the cart, and told him to fill the cooler and put it into the trunk. I did not watch him do it.

I then spread a fitted sheet on the floor, filled it with the laundry, and pulled up the ends of the sheet, so it would be easy to drag. I told him to put it into the back seat of the car. Since it was so heavy, I ASSUMED (always a mistake), that he would drag it across the floor. He complained that it was heavy and could not carry it. It was a major project for him to drag it across the floor, and move some boxes in the garage out of the way, so he could put it into the car.

When we got home, and opened the trunk, there was the cooler. The food was on the floor of the trunk NEXT to the cooler. When I asked him why he did not put it into the cooler, he looked confused, and said he did not know.

I do not care where the food, laundry, and cooler were. What I do care about it that this incident was a clear, hard, cold slap in my face of reality. It saddened me to the core to know that even if this is a temporary set back due to the move, it is what will be very soon. I have been through the personality change and the rages that have stressed and angered me to the breaking point. But this is different. This is my Sid, fading away. This is my Sid, the man I fell in love with at first sight, and with whom I have spent almost 4 decades as a partner, lover, friend, support system, cheerleader. He has been the other half of my soul for my entire adult life, and he is disappearing before my eyes. And at this point, he is aware of it. For that, I hurt for him, even more than for myself.  What a brutal, malicious, ruthless disease.

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The Alzheimer Spouse LLC
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