This boat that we just built is just fine ~
And don't try to tell us it's not.
The sides and the back are divine ~
It's the bottom I guess we forgot.
My mother's Alzheimer's story began approximately 7-8 years ago with a compulsive emptying and repacking of her handbag. It was noticeable because she did it several times a day but it certainly didn't seem like a "symptom" of anything. Just a nervous tic/funny habit my siblings and I wrote off to her being in her seventies.
Tonight, these 7-8 years since then, I think it took her a minute to register who I was when she looked at me. There are no words I can come up with to express how I felt in that moment but, I think, untethered comes closest. I need to take this journey - I need to write this out - as much for me as for anyone who might be going through the same thing. It's no small thing that my mom's sister Dorothy, who is truly my second mother, has a more advanced version of the same disease. Actually, Aunt Dot (as I will refer to her from now on) has been diagnosed with Pick's Disease which is another form of dementia where brain function specific to the left frontal lobe of the brain, (where language is controlled), is lost. Alzheimer's is not localized to one area and affects every part of the brain. The only "perk" I came across when researching these diseases is that The University of Connecticut's Memory and Aging Center has reported that some Pick's patients have discovered new talents for music and art.
As of this writing, the U.S. is the only developed country without a national strategy on Alzheimer's. Needless to say, this journey with her feels like nothing short of landing on the moon with no Tang, no spacesuit and a map of Cleveland.
