I learned about Alzheimer's disease up close and personally. Over a span of five years, it slowly robbed my grandfather of his faculty as an artist, craftsman, and human being and stripped him of his dignity, leaving his family and friends clinging to the memory of the man he once was.
Typical of Alzheimer's, it started by taking his short-term memories. Though he could detail his life growing up during the Great Depression, being the only kid in the neighborhood with a pair of shoes, he forgot about his daily swim in the pool or a trip to the grocery store.
At first, he shared his favorite memories of he and I - watching me pound nails into a deck he was building or how I always beat him in a game of "last one in bed's a rotten egg" - only two or three times in the same phone call. But then the retellings became as frequent as if he was a record on repeat, five, ten, a dozen times every time we talked.
And though I knew that his animated stories were growing numbered, sometimes it was okay, as when he would sing the same songs over and over, giving glimpses of his old self, belting out silly ditties and improving on oldies but goodies. Still, slowly and insidiously, the disease continued to take more and more of him.
I remember during one of our yearly visits having dinner one night, and amid the chicken parm and salad, he came out of an unusual quietude and began to fret that his mother, long since deceased, was going to be angry with him for being late, that he better get home before he got in trouble. He expressed guilt for spending time with a "girl", my grandmother. No amount of assurance or correction could convince him of fact that he was safe and sound in his own home, suffering from Alzheimer's.
It was hard to make sense of what was happening to his mind. He wandered off, even entering a neighbor's home thinking it was his own, causing my grandmother panic and embarrassment, and he had toileting accidents and falls. My grandmother was tortured by the dilemma of whether to continue doing her best to care for him or relinquishing care to a nursing home. Once the paradigm of intelligence and sophistication, my grandfather was now reduced to a child.
Toward the end, though my grandmother and mother tried to prepare me for what I would see when I finally saw my grandfather face-to-face, by that time in a nursing home, I wasn't prepared for what I saw. I caught sight of him from afar, in a blue wheelchair, his once six foot-two inch height condensed into a shriveled, brittle bag of bones. His head drooped down over his legs, his features down-trodden, his wrinkly, dry hands resting gently on his knees. My tears rushed forth. He didn't recognize me. I barely recognized him. Still, he could smile and squeeze my hand, perhaps sensing I was someone he loved even if he couldn't remember my name.
On my very last visit, this past March, my grandfather was even more a shell of the person he once was. There was an emptiness in his eyes, the life and sparkle deadened into a fixed stare. Though his body remained, heart pumping reliably, he was gone.
Before my grandfather became sick, before the Alzheimer's really gripped him, I used to say that I didn't know what I would do if my grandfather died. Not "when" he died, but "if" he died. He had, in my eyes, an immortality, a life, a joy, that I hoped would never end. When I thought about the inevitable, a sick fear gripped me, and I dreaded how I would react to "the news". I feared I would be a basket case, unable to carry on without his light.
But this is the mercy of Alzheimer's disease. In its long, wide path, it helped prepare us for his death. We had time to ready our hearts. We had glimpses of the loss before it was final. After such a trying, arduous path, we were almost relieved when the end finally arrived.
Too, my grandfather wasn't witness his own demise. Unlike cancer or some similar fate, his decline wasn't apparent to him, only to his loved ones, whose love for him, especially my grandmother's, knew no bounds and was unceasingly strong, knowing not weariness or failure. Though those who witnessed his deterioration pained for him and the person he once was, we were grateful that he didn't have to know what was happening to him, that he didn't have to understand the terrible robbery that was taking place.
My grandfather was the kind of human being who made this world a better place. His intelligence, gentility, and kindness made life fuller for those people whose paths he crossed. He deserved a better end. But we don't get to pick our passing. In death, those who go on living must find the silver lining, the glimmer in the darkness.
Alzheimer's disease was a rough and ruthless teacher, reminding me to treasure every moment, every memory. But it also had a kind mercy, a mercy which guided me, at times gently, through the grieving process, helping me come to grips with the impending death of a man who was my teacher, my joy, my grandfather, my guiding light.
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