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Closing the Week on a Good Note

We ended the week by attending a concert by our local symphony orchestra. We hadn’t attended in about a year because Kate gets tired in the evening. Last night the program included a Beethoven piano concerto by someone who is an outstanding musician. I encouraged Kate to go. She readily accepted. That is in keeping with how she has handled everything this week.

We left at intermission so that Kate could get to bed. As were walked through the lobby, I saw a friend, and we walked over to speak with him. When we walked away, Kate said in a very disturbed tone of voice, “You shouldn’t have said that.” I didn’t know what she was talking about and when I asked she said, “You know.” I asked again. She said, “You told me I should have told them about our moving to Texas.” I told her I hadn’t said that and that she hadn’t anything about Texas. I could quickly see that she wasn’t accepting that and didn’t say anything more. Everything was fine after that. She was in a good mood all the way home and all day today.

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Two More Good Days

Yesterday Kevin arrived for his quarterly visit. We met one of his high school friends and her mother for dinner. Afterwards, we went to a concert sponsored by the Knoxville Opera. It featured music from Porgy and Bess and a number of arias from familiar operas as well as several well-known songs from movies or Broadway shows. The included pieces like “I loves you, Porgy,” “Summertime,” “Somewhere over the Rainbow,” “Nessun Dorma,” and “Old Man River.” The singers were outstanding, and Kate was very enthusiastic.

We got to bed late last night; so we got up a little later this morning. I did get up for my walk. When I returned, Kevin got up, and we talked until Kate was up and ready for Panera. That was close to 10:00 a.m. We had some conversation with friends at a nearby table. It turns out that one of them is the mother of a high school friend of Kevin’s

From Panera, we went to church. Before going into the sanctuary, we stood around and chatted with friends. Kevin chatted with our pastor. Kate leaned over to me and asked me the pastor’s name. I told her, and she said, “I knew that.” We walked into the sanctuary and took a seat in one of the pews down front. As we sat down, Kate said, “Now I know where we are.” I asked her where. She said, “First Pres.” The she chucked softly and said, “I saw it on the sign.” She meant the screen at the front of the church that was scrolling upcoming events. We also spoke after the service with some friends we had not seen in a while. When we said goodbye, Kate asked who they were.

We went to lunch and then came back home for about 20 minutes before leaving to see The Hunchback of Notre Dame at one of our local community theaters. There were several very good singers in the large cast. We came back home where Kate worked in the yard for a while. Kevin and I came inside and talked about choices for dinner. We finally decided to go to a local seafood restaurant near downtown. We had a good meal and came back to the house. I put on a CD of Chris Botti. Kevin read a TCU magazine and Kate worked on her iPad. I joined them for a while. It was a pleasant respite after another good day.

As Kate readied herself to go to the room, she asked if she should connect her iPad to the charger. When I got to the room, she was getting into bed with her clothes on. I asked if she would like me to get a night gown. She said she would. When I got back she had taken her slacks off and asked me if she should put them on her chair beside the bed. I told her that would be fine. She said, “I thought so; I just wanted to be sure.” She is increasingly asking what she should do. In fact, she did just that as we got home from the theater. As she loses touch with more things, she looks to me for guidance to make sure she is doing the right thing. These are always things she would never have asked me about in the past.

This is one visit during which Kevin is bound to see more of the changes that Kate is exhibiting. She seems more childlike and less sensitive to the fact that Kevin will interpret her actions as something related to her diagnosis.

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A Very Good Day

When I walked in the house yesterday afternoon, I found Kate and Mary seated in the family room. They were chatting though Kate had her iPad open to a puzzle she had been working on. I could see that they were getting along just fine. That made me happy.

The next step was to see that Kate got ready for dinner and the concert last night. It was then 4:45, and I had made 5:45 reservations at Casa Bella. From there I knew that we still had a long drive to the concert. Kate was in an especially good mood. When I told we would be leaving in 45 minutes, she got right up. She also asked me to get her something to wear while she showered. I did and put the clothes on her bed. She was ready in about 35 minutes. She had actually put on the clothes I had placed on the bed in her room. It wasn’t until later at the restaurant that I noticed that she was not wearing matching shoes, but they were both the same color.

Casa Bella is a restaurant we have frequented for over 40 years. We had our usual veal piccata. I had a glass of wine. We split an order of amoretto bread pudding. We almost always get the amoretto cheese cake, a longtime favorite of ours. Over the past year or two, I have noticed that she is forgetting that it is our favorite and occasionally order something else for a change.

Sitting there was just like old times. I could almost imagine that she didn’t have Alzheimer’s at all. If the evening had ended after dessert, I would have said it was a great day. As it was, the best was yet to come. The program was presented by Gentri, 3 tenors from Salt Lake City. They seem like a very wholesome trio. The theme for the evening was love. All of their songs carried out this theme. They sang a mixture of old and new music, some of which they had written themselves. The group was warmly received by the audience. What was important to me, however, was Kate’s reaction. She loved them. She was very enthusiastic. That is twice in a week that she has enjoyed a live performance, the earlier one was the play, An Act of God, that we saw in Asheville this past Sunday. Gentri closed with an encore of three songs from Les Misérables. It turned out to be a wonderful end to a very good day.

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Another Great Day

I am glad to report that Kate had a great day yesterday. I did as well. The greatest pleasure of the day was seeing Kate enjoy herself so much. Here’s what happened.

Last week, we bumped into Marty Lang, a long-time friend whom we met soon after moving to Knoxville in 1971. He is a Methodist minister whose career has been outside a local church. He has been very active in social justice efforts as long as we have known him. His wife died about 2 years ago, and he has been seeing someone else recently. We talked about our getting together as couples. He followed that conversation up with an email inviting us to lunch.

Yesterday we had lunch with them. Kate was apprehensive about going. Although we had just seen Marty last week, I knew she could not remember him except to recognize his name. Neither of us had met his new friend. Having known Marty a long time and also aware that his friend had had a career in christian education, I felt confident that she would enjoy herself.

It turned out I was right. It was an especially good get together. When Marty met us in the restaurant, he was carrying a small potted plant with beautiful yellow flowers for Kate. When Anne joined us, we entered into the typical kind of “get-acquainted” conversation. Anne is very good at asking good questions of those she is with. She also is a good listener. Kate was quite comfortable with this kind of conversation because it involves the kinds of things that she can still remember – family, growing up, dating, etc.

We spent almost two hours with them. There was never a lull in the conversation. When we got in the car to go home, Kate was enthusiastic about our time with them. It was good to see her enjoy herself.

That wasn’t the only good thing about the day. About an hour after we got home, I took her for her monthly facial. Less than an hour after that we were at Casa Bella for Opera Thursday. As usual, we sat with the same two couples. While Kate does not talk a lot, she feels comfortable with them. Equally  important, the singers last night were especially good. It is a very intimate setting, and we were right in front of the singers. What a great way to finish what had already been a great day. I hope we will be able to continue having periodic days that this.

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Good News

After the past couple of days I was a little concerned about how Kate would respond to the Chamber concert today. As it turns out, she loved it. We had seats on the third row in the center of the orchestra. The artistic director is outstanding. His humor and enthusiasm bring a lot of life to something that many people consider a drag. What is even more surprising is that the first two pieces (out of a total of only three) the group played were contemporary pieces with all the characteristics that are implied by “contemporary.” If we had been listening on the radio, we would have quickly changed stations. As it was, we were both engaged. I think we were heavily influenced by the opening commentary about the pieces as well as being so close to the performers who were outstanding. It was truly an excellent performance.

An interesting sidelight is a story told by the percussionist. Among the instruments he played today was the vibraphone. He said that when the group had their first rehearsal last week, he was surprised at the sight of the vibraphone. When he examined it further, he discovered it was the very same instrument on which he took his first lesson on the vibraphone many years earlier.

Let me also take a moment to repeat something I have said before but seems like it is becoming a stronger habit, Kate’s asking my permission to do things. About thirty minutes ago, Kate asked me if she could close her eyes (that rest) for a few minutes. I told her that would be fine. Shortly thereafter, she got up and went to the bathroom to brush her teeth. When she returned to the room, she asked if she could use her iPad. As always, I told her that would be fine. I do realize that by telling her that it is all right may reinforce her emerging habit. I do, however, sometimes say they she doesn’t need my permission. In this case, I did tell her that I didn’t want her to think I want to control everything she does.

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Thinking About the Future

Since Kate’s diagnosis 6 years and 4 months ago, I have contemplated the future and what life would be like. At that point, I never imagined that we would be able to do and enjoy life so much. Today I am beginning to see more clearly that time when we won’t be able to do so much. In fact, that time is really upon us.

The first time I can recollect feeling that way was on our Caribbean cruise in January 2016. I had signed up for that cruise as a test to see how Kate would do before committing to a longer Mediterranean cruise in May of that year. I discovered that Kate did not seem to enjoy the cruise. As I recall, she didn’t attend but one night of the entertainment after dinner. That is something she has always enjoyed in the past. I think she also found it challenging to be with different people at dinner each night. Fortunately, she continued to get along well once we were home. I cancelled the Mediterranean cruise reservations.

Over the past six months or so, I have noticed, and expressed in this journal, that she seems to be getting less pleasure from movies than she did in the past. There have been notable exceptions. For example, she loved Hidden Figures that was about the team of African American women mathematicians working in the US space program. More recently, she has been getting less out of other types of performances. I was really disappointed when we had to walk out of Der Rosenkavalier starring Rene Fleming this past Saturday and another local theater performance a day later.

We are in Asheville to celebrate our 54th anniversary. I have kept our schedule to a minimum. We’ve only had tickets to one event each of the three days we are here. As I mentioned earlier, we ended up not attending a concert yesterday. It turns out that we have spent our time mostly in the hotel and eating several nice meals. Even that has been rewarding for me. I think it is clearly less rewarding for Kate. I have the feeling that she would be happier at home where she could work in the yard in addition to her iPad.

At this moment, she seems contented. About 15 minutes ago, she was getting tired of sitting in the lobby after breakfast working on her iPad. I asked if she would like to go back to the room. She said she would. As we approached the room, we saw that the maids were about to go in and clean up. We told them to go ahead. We came back to the lobby where we are sitting on a sofa. It is rather comfortable. We have reservations for lunch at 11:30. Following lunch, we are attending a chamber concert. Then we will come back to the hotel to pass more time before dinner this evening at a restaurant that is very near the hotel.

We leave for home in the morning. I would like to have lunch first and then go home. We’ll see what happens. It probably depends on how early Kate is up as well as how eager she is to be home. The last time we were here (September), we ended up going home after breakfast and eating lunch in Knoxville. I suspect that is what we will do this time.

We leave for Texas on Saturday. I hope that the travel this week does not cause added confusion while we are there.

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Taking Stock Again

Kate and I just returned from a local theater where we left another performance at intermission. This is only the second time we have ever left a performance. Yesterday’s Live in HD at the Met was the first. The interesting thing is that they had something in common. Both were farces, something that Kate does not enjoy. In each instance, they were “bedroom” farces. I do enjoy farces when they are done well, and yesterday’s and today’s performances were quite good. The Met, of course, was especially good. Neither was good from Kate’s perspective.

This makes three performances in three days that she didn’t care for, and I know she couldn’t follow. I can’t help believing that it also may be a sign that Kate’s further decline. I don’t intend to immediately discontinue trying to find things that she will like, but I will be more careful in my selection of things we attend.

I must admit that this also has an impact on the way I feel about the way things are going. Right now I am feeling a bit discouraged. It is interesting that this occurs the day before I make my first public presentation about being a caregiver for someone with Alzheimer’s. I had been a little concerned that I was going to be overly optimistic. I wonder if this will cause me to be more balanced.

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Taking stock of where we are

As I mentioned before, my moods change with Kate’s moods and behavior. At the moment, I am in a somewhat sad mood. This relates directly to what I perceive as a shift that Kate is making to the kind of behavior that we commonly associate with someone who has Alzheimer’s. She seems more distant than usual. This is difficult to tell because she has exhibited signs of distance from things going on around her for a long time. It just seems like they are even “deeper” or more distant than in the past. I find this understandable since she has so little short-term memory, her long-term memory is also poor, and she is unable to comprehend so much of what goes on around her (TV, movies, plays, conversation).

My feelings right now are at least partially associated with a couple of things that happened during the week. The first involved my brother Larry. He came to Knoxville last Sunday afternoon. We had dinner together. The next morning we met him at Panera. The three of us talked for a while. Then we came back to the house where Kate remained outside to pull leaves while Larry and I talked. I left to attend Rotary. Larry was preparing to leave for his farm but went outside to chat with Kate before leaving. When I got home after Rotary, I asked her when Larry left. She didn’t know. I probed a bit, but she was unable to tell me anything. She did not appear to remember that he had been here.

The next day we visited our friends the Davises in Nashville before visiting with Ellen. I had told Kate several times over the previous two or three days that we would be going to see the Davises. I reminded her the morning we left. We talked about it in the car as we left. When we arrived at their house, she didn’t know where we were and asked, “What now?” I told her we would go inside and visit with the Davises. She said, “Tell me their names again.” I did. We went inside and talked for about an hour. Then we went to lunch for another hour. When we got in the car to leave, she told me how much she enjoyed the visit. Then she asked me to tell her their names again. A little later she asked, “What is your brother’s name again?”

Today we went to a Live in HD at The Met production of Der Rosenkavalier. This was Rene Fleming’s last Met performance. It was outstanding, but Kate wanted to leave at the end of the first act which we did. I had noticed she seemed bored. She yawned audibly two or three times during the first act. Although she was not very loud, the people in front and in back of us could certainly hear her.

We have now seen quite a few operas. It was the Live in HD productions that really generated her interest in opera. Today it made no difference. I knew that she was tired going in, but I suspect it was more than being tired. It was a complex comic opera. I know she must have been confused and tuned out. I fear this is just the beginning of things to come.

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Good Evening and Slow Morning

Last night we went to a theater production of Honky Tonk Angels. It was a somewhat corny musical tied together by a series of popular country music. Most of it was quite familiar to the audience – at least to us. Kate loved it. It was the most enthusiasm I have seen her express in a while. I was glad to see it as I was beginning to think it might be over.

This morning she was slow to get up. She got up somewhere between 8:00 and 9:00 and got something to drink. Then she went back to bed where she remained until I told her it was time for lunch (11:35 am). She got up and dressed quickly. She perked up after lunch. We didn’t get dessert but on the way home she said she wanted something. I stopped at a new bakery near our house where we got a couple of blondies.

When we got home, I came inside to check email and upload a couple of CDs to my computer. She remained outside until a few minutes ago. She was just doing some pruning.

Tonight I will not give her Benadryl. I have been doing that to help her with the drippage she has had with her cold. I hope that she will be more alert in the morning. I am also going to start my regular letter to her doctor. She has her next appointment on March 10. I have questions about her medications as well as whether or not there might be value in seeing a neurologist.

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Too Tired for Evening Performances

One of the things that Kate and I have enjoyed on previous cruises is the nightly entertainment following dinner. We have now had 5 nights, and she has attended only 1 show. She has just felt too tired. I have not pushed her. I had wanted the trip to be as leisurely as possible. To force her would serve no purpose at all. I still feel comfortable leaving her alone in the cabin. I am not sure that I will feel that way next time (May). If I can’t leave her, I will just remain in the room with her and miss the shows myself.