People who know each other well often find that they understand the thoughts and feelings of the other without the expression of words at all. Last night, Kate and I had what I believe is one of those experiences. We went to our regular pizza place for dinner. We normally go on Friday night, but we went to a more special place that night. It is a much more romantic place than where we have our pizza. The pizza place is something of a dive, a really down home place where they specialize in all the Italian comfort foods – lasagna, spaghetti and meatballs, baked zita, etc. There is nothing romantic about it, but that is where we had a very touching moment.
We took a seat in a booth on the side of the dining room near the back. At first, Kate was quiet, not saying a word. Then with a touch of sadness she reached her hand across the table to me. I took her hand in mine, and she said, “Thank you.” I said, “For what?” She answered, “For taking such good care of me. You’re a good man.” At that moment, tears welled up in her eyes and in mine. I said, “We’re both getting sentimental, aren’t we?” She nodded. We didn’t say another word. We were silent for a few minutes. Then we went ahead as though that moment hadn’t happened.
I can’t be sure of exactly what was going through her mind, but here is what I think. She thanks me frequently, but last night was different. I believe she recognizes the fact that her memory is getting weaker and that it’s not going to get better, only worse. I don’t believe she remembers that she has Alzheimer’s or even remembers what that is. She only knows she is not functioning the way she should. I believe she knows our lives will not be the same again. Even if that is not precisely what she intended, I interpret her words as a way of saying goodbye.
Will I ever know what she was really communicating? Probably not, but it made me think of an experience our TCU friends Nancy and Charlie Hardwick had a few weeks before he died. He had shown signs of dementia a year or two before Kate. He looked up from his bed into Nancy’s eyes and said, “You know I’m dying, don’t you?” She did know, but she was surprised at his clarity in recognizing it himself.
I doubt that Kate goes so far as to see her present condition as a step in the dying process, but I believe she is coming to the conclusion that she won’t get better and is grateful that I am committed to caring for her whatever lies ahead. What makes me believe this? There are several things.
First, is that she has previously conveyed her awareness of her memory loss. Though it doesn’t happen often, she even says things like, “I don’t know what’s wrong with me?” Second, she not only recognizes that she has a problem, she works hard every day to remember my name, the names of our children and grandchildren, what city we live in, the names of the restaurants we visit. She tries, often unsuccessfully, to repeat them as if she were trying to imprint them in her brain. She obviously cares. Third, although not all the time, she is bothered by her memory problem. Her two or three anxiety attacks have been ample evidence for me. Fourth, she frequently demonstrates an ability to correctly read what is happening around her. She understands matters of life and death and suffering. She is very responsive to news reports. While she can’t grasp the explanations of news, she frequently exhibits the appropriate emotional responses to them.
Finally, the emotional way in which she expressed her appreciation last night communicates that her sense of what is happening is far deeper than a casual instance of having a problem with one of her jigsaw puzzles and my helping her solve it. She knows she has a serious problem.
It wasn’t very long ago that I thought she would simply drift away without suffering any anguish over her illness. That is clearly not true. Now I am asking “How long will this last?” I really don’t want to see her enter the next stage, but I don’t like seeing her suffer.
