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Living Joyfully During the Holiday Season

The Christmas season has always been special for Kate and me. We had our first date on December 19, 1961. Exactly one year later we became engaged. Since then we have celebrated the season in many ways. Like most people, much of that involved time with family, but we have also made December trips to places like New York City, London, Paris, Vienna, London, and several locations in Germany.

Life is very different now. We gave up international travel in 2015 and travel to our children’s homes in 2018. Since then, we have celebrated the season at home. Now that Kate is in the last stage of Alzheimer’s and requires total care for all of her daily activities, we don’t get out except within the halls of our retirement community.

Despite these changes, we are living joyfully this Christmas. Living in our retirement community has provided us with a considerable amount of social contact and special events of the season; however, sharing the season with Kate has made this a Very Merry Christmas for me.

By now, most of you know that music has played a major role in our lives, so it should not surprise you that we have binged on holiday music day and night the past few weeks. More importantly, Kate seems to have risen to the occasion. She has been unusually cheerful and talkative, especially in the past two weeks. For example, almost every day in the past week, she has given me a smile when I greeted her in the morning. That is significant because her mornings are the time of day she is least likely to smile or talk.

Her afternoons, especially after 3:30, are her best time of day, but they have been even better this week. Our regular caregiver was out a few days, and we had several others filling in. I might have thought this would have a negative effect on her, but it hasn’t. She has been just as cheerful with them and other residents.

Our evenings are often special. Three nights ago was a good example. Kate was unusually talkative and spent the better part of an hour talking to me. She was trying to tell me about some experience she had had. As she talked, she laughed at a number of things she said. Of course, none of what she said had actually occurred, and I wasn’t able to understand most of what she said; however, she was happy. I was too.

Yesterday was the sixty-third anniversary of our first date. We didn’t go out for dinner. We ate in the dining room of our retirement community as we do every night, but we were together. Nothing could be better than that. We are, indeed, living joyfully this Christmas season.

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Our Relationship at Stage 7 Alzheimer’s

From time to time, people have asked if Kate still knows me. That’s a good question for which there isn’t a simple answer. It depends on what one means by “knowing.” My answer is “Yes, she does,” but I don’t believe she always remembers my name or that I am her husband. I know that one night last week, she looked at the caregiver and said, “Where is Richard?” She often recognizes me as someone familiar and someone she likes.” Every day she shows signs that this is so.

On the other hand, there are frequent times when it appears that she doesn’t recognize me at all and doesn’t have any special feelings for me. That is most common in the morning and began more than five or six years ago. Some mornings, she seems to recognize me immediately and gives me a big smile. That happened yesterday morning. She was very happy to see me. She frequently responds the same way when I return home from lunch.

She is most likely to “know” me in the evening after the caregiver leaves. In those moments she connects with me in a way that suggests a closer relationship than she has with other people. I suspect some of that is brought on by what I say to her. I always recount memories from past events in our relationship. She responds with loving smiles that tell me that those memories and I am special to her.

Most evenings, she is not talkative but conveys her feelings with her facial expressions, by holding my hand and running her fingers across my hand and arm. Some nights and a few mornings, she is talkative. We’ve had a good number of those in the past few weeks. One evening in the past few days we talked more than thirty minutes. These are moments I treasure.

Another time when she conveys that she knows me is when we are getting her up and putting her to bed. We have to roll her on her side in bed to dress and undress her. I always assist the caregiver who stands on Kate’s side of the bed and rolls Kate closer to her. I get in bed on the other side of Kate and put my right arm under her shoulder and my left hand on her thigh to roll her to me. I continue to hold her in my arms while the caregiver does what she needs to do.

Kate doesn’t like being rolled; however, she relaxes when she is in my arms. She affectionately runs her hands across my back. Frequently, she talks to me in a very natural way, and, sometimes she laughs as she speaks. Strange as it seems these are moments involving a physical and emotional connection. They are romantic moments for us. Yes, she knows me, and our love is still alive although it is expressed in ways we could not have imagined before.

It doesn’t matter to me whether she remembers my name or that I am her husband. Our relationship remains strong. For that, I am grateful.