Years ago I read about a man who was sole caregiver for his wife for a number of years. One day some family members stopped by, and found something unexpected. His wife had fallen and broken a hip, and his solution to that problem was that he put her on a blanket and pulled her from room to room.

At the time, I thought, "What in the world was he thinking?". Well, after years and years of caregiving I thought of him again last week, and it scared me that this time I could understand a lot better how he got to that point.

As the years go by, situations arise, and we adapt. We cope. And more things happen, and we manage, we lower our expectations of life, and our world shrinks and then shrinks again. And then one day we look down and we're pulling someone around on a blanket!

Recently in a moment of quiet, I looked around at the wreck of our home. It's messy and not very clean. Certainly nothing like it used to be. And then I looked at myself. Again, messy and not very clean. A shadow of my former self. And I thought about how we get from normal life to this.

Most of us don't have someone to help us--to help clean, to talk things over with, to help make complicated medical decisions, to give us a break, or to even ask how we're doing. And all the time that we're trying to deal with things alone, year after year, we're aging right along with the person we're caring for. After a while it might occur to a caregiver that the other person has somebody to take care of them, but no one is taking care of us. (How often do you hear someone wonder if the caregiver is getting enough socialization or mental stimulation? Yet that's a common theme for our spouses.)

I don't have any idea what the answer is. But a conviction is growing in me that a disease that can completely destroy--if not kill--two people deserves a little more attention. No, a LOT more attention. And understanding. And help.