“Now add the butter. Good.”
“Can I add the chocolate, Bubbie?”
“Of course.”
I slowly pour the melted chocolate into the bowl. My sister and I were at my grandmother’s house making her famous brownies. We’d made them together at least 50 times before. My grandmother, Sybil, glances back at the recipe sprawled across her cluttered kitchen table.
“Wait, we forgot to add the butter!” she says.
“We already put it in, don’t worry,” I reassure her.
That was six years ago. Bubbie Sybil now lives in a memory care facility, and we are not allowed to visit her because of Covid precautions. She was diagnosed with Alzheimer's a couple of years ago and can no longer retain new information. It has taken a lot of patience to adapt to this new form of communication with her, particularly for my father. He had to learn a new way to connect with his mother and reroute how he perceived both his and her worlds.
My father, Bradley, has always been a detail-oriented person who works best with reason and logic. So for him, dealing with a parent with Alzheimer's disease is especially taxing because no amount of medicine or surgery can cure it. Dad has devoted his time to managing “all the problems. Oh, you know: Is she taking her medicine? Is she getting her bills paid? Is she taking care of her house properly? Is she being taken advantage of by somebody?” It was easier for him to deal with the tangible problems that could be logically solved rather than the ones that couldn’t. Dad still visited her frequently, but his stoic personality and Bubbie’s declining comprehension abilities did not work well together.
About two years into her diagnosis, Bubbie started to get anxious about little things. Most often it was her clothing. She had an odd suspicion that her clothes did not belong to her. Every time we visited she would say, “That’s not mine” or “It can’t be mine, because it’s the wrong size.” And we’d say, “Well you’ve owned it for 20 years. Clearly it’s yours.’” My dad tried to reason with her like that, but it’s simply impossible for someone with Alzheimer's disease to think logically. This frustrated my dad. His whole philosophy up to that point was centered around logic, and there was no way for him to untangle this knot. He was at a loss for how to address Bubbie’s worsening condition.
Within his times of distress, however, something helped him keep his composure: seeing pieces of Bubbie’s personality seep through her wall of memory loss. Her talkative and playful, albeit unintelligible, conversation reminded him that “The important thing is to have the conversation, not to have it be about anything in particular.” She still says “I love you” and “I miss you” when we talk to her on the phone. She’s always loved animals, and she still gets excited when she sees the nursing home dog that visits every Sunday. And sometimes she’ll even talk about one day baking brownies.
Through this ongoing journey, my father has learned to navigate the world differently. He learned a vital lesson. “You don’t have to insist on things that aren’t important. You have to insist on things that are.” We still call and visit her as much as possible (even though those visits are through a window), and make sure she’s happy and comfortable. My father is stressing less about things that aren’t worth it. He’s learned to tell himself, “Well, this is who she is now. This isn’t something transient. You can’t argue her out of it. This is how she is, and you just have to learn to accept it.”
“Can I add the chocolate, Bubbie?”
“Of course.”
I slowly pour the melted chocolate into the bowl. My sister and I were at my grandmother’s house making her famous brownies. We’d made them together at least 50 times before. My grandmother, Sybil, glances back at the recipe sprawled across her cluttered kitchen table.
“Wait, we forgot to add the butter!” she says.
“We already put it in, don’t worry,” I reassure her.
That was six years ago. Bubbie Sybil now lives in a memory care facility, and we are not allowed to visit her because of Covid precautions. She was diagnosed with Alzheimer's a couple of years ago and can no longer retain new information. It has taken a lot of patience to adapt to this new form of communication with her, particularly for my father. He had to learn a new way to connect with his mother and reroute how he perceived both his and her worlds.
My father, Bradley, has always been a detail-oriented person who works best with reason and logic. So for him, dealing with a parent with Alzheimer's disease is especially taxing because no amount of medicine or surgery can cure it. Dad has devoted his time to managing “all the problems. Oh, you know: Is she taking her medicine? Is she getting her bills paid? Is she taking care of her house properly? Is she being taken advantage of by somebody?” It was easier for him to deal with the tangible problems that could be logically solved rather than the ones that couldn’t. Dad still visited her frequently, but his stoic personality and Bubbie’s declining comprehension abilities did not work well together.
About two years into her diagnosis, Bubbie started to get anxious about little things. Most often it was her clothing. She had an odd suspicion that her clothes did not belong to her. Every time we visited she would say, “That’s not mine” or “It can’t be mine, because it’s the wrong size.” And we’d say, “Well you’ve owned it for 20 years. Clearly it’s yours.’” My dad tried to reason with her like that, but it’s simply impossible for someone with Alzheimer's disease to think logically. This frustrated my dad. His whole philosophy up to that point was centered around logic, and there was no way for him to untangle this knot. He was at a loss for how to address Bubbie’s worsening condition.
Within his times of distress, however, something helped him keep his composure: seeing pieces of Bubbie’s personality seep through her wall of memory loss. Her talkative and playful, albeit unintelligible, conversation reminded him that “The important thing is to have the conversation, not to have it be about anything in particular.” She still says “I love you” and “I miss you” when we talk to her on the phone. She’s always loved animals, and she still gets excited when she sees the nursing home dog that visits every Sunday. And sometimes she’ll even talk about one day baking brownies.
Through this ongoing journey, my father has learned to navigate the world differently. He learned a vital lesson. “You don’t have to insist on things that aren’t important. You have to insist on things that are.” We still call and visit her as much as possible (even though those visits are through a window), and make sure she’s happy and comfortable. My father is stressing less about things that aren’t worth it. He’s learned to tell himself, “Well, this is who she is now. This isn’t something transient. You can’t argue her out of it. This is how she is, and you just have to learn to accept it.”
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