I just read my last posting on this blog and think I should
write the very last post. Brad went home to Jesus March the 18th
2019. He was finally confined to a hospital bed in our home and within a few
days could not talk or eat. He was mostly unconscious. But hopefully he could
hear as we sung to him, talked with him and prayed. He was in this condition
for several days. I prayed that he could hear me as I sang Jesus loves Brad and
Softly and Tenderly Jesus is calling “Come Home.”
His memorial service was beautiful with family and friends
speaking of him with great love.
I thought my grief would not be so hard because I had been
saying goodbye for so long, but it was and is very hard. I know Christians do
not grieve as others do because of the resurrection and the presence and comfort
of the Lord. And He is a present help and comfort.
Nietzsche wrote of the “long obedience
in the same direction.” Eugene Peterson used the phrase for a book title; a book
I read many years ago. My beginning of reading his many books. But this is
something different. This book, the one I am living now, is called a slow
obedience in many directions. Slow because I travel with confusion, sorrow with
uncertainty, experience insights that melt away as fast as they are gathered. Slow
because I insist on his being as yesterday and fail to embrace his person now.
Many directions because he, Brad, my husband with Alzheimer’s,
is constantly different, constantly progressing backwards into something less
than childhood—a sweetness overlaid with fear—an insanity that grapples with
both sunshine and dark shadows. A forgetfulness that is sweeping away not only
now but all the yesterdays.
I have not written because of depression:
And that is too bad because I have read some excellent books
on dementia that I need to share. I will in a later post.
Too many nights Brad does not sleep. He unmakes the bed
and then tells me he is cold. He gets up looking for me—I leave a light on
because he fears the shadows. Tonight as I slipped into bed with him to read
the Scriptures before returning to some quiet evening time he cried—cried about
his condition. We talked about it as much as possible. I rarely understand him
and he does not often comprehend my words. But the Spirit helps. We talked of
the knowledge and knowing that will come to him when he is at last with Jesus. And
the scripture, (I read from a Gospel and a psalm most nights), was just right.
Only a psalm:
When the Lord
brought back the captivity of Zion,
We were like
those who dream.
Then our mouth
was filled with
Laughter,
And our tongue
with singing.
Then they said
among the nations,
“The Lord has done
great things for
Them.”
The Lord has
done great things for us,
And we are glad.
It is hard to feel it now. Hard to grasp that God will
turn our sorrow into joy. But He will. He will. I love the song I am placing here because it reminds me of Brad who is now mostly blind and has trouble walking.
Recently I encountered two sources on Alzheimer’s that are helpful. The first a book by a past governor of Wisconsin, Marin J. Schreiber.
Schreiber writes about his journey with his wife Elaine; his book is My Two Elaines: Learning, Coping, and Surviving
as an Alzheimer’s Caregiver. While I ordered the Schreiber’s book intentionally,
I also ordered a movie from Netflix’s not realizing that it was partly about a
wife who had Alzheimer’s. The movie is based on a true story about a man who is
trying to build a home, on his own land, for his sick wife, and is harassed by bureaucrats
in his native Canada. The movie, Still
Mine, stars James Cromwell and Geneviève
Bujold. It is a love story.
The book My Two Elaines is a small book with beautiful pictures of Elaine
and some very sound advice such as “Unfamiliar settings such as hotels can be
particularly upsetting to people with dementia because they have trouble
re-orienting.”
And:
Asking others to help does
not mean you’re not strong enough or not trying hard enough.”
But I did think that there
was too much emphasis on the two person concept. That is, that those with
Alzheimer’s become a different person than they were before they began
suffering with the disease. The author wants to see his wife of his past as
different from the wife he now is married to. I want to put a Christian
perspective on this, but first the movie.
I loved Still Mine partly because it attaches the lives of the two main
characters to their past. The husband and wife are the parents of seven grown
children although only two of them are in the movie. The husband and wife love
each other and they speak about their past with each other. They live on a 2000
acre farm and neither want to leave their land although a daughter tries to
persuade them. (And here one needs to know that the husband although in his
eighties is healthy and strong.)
But the beauty of the movie
is that even with the dementia issue the wife is loved for who she is and will
be. She may lose who she is but her husband will love her for her whole self,
past, present and future. And isn’t that how God sees and loves us.
There are a lot of arguments
and conclusions today about identity. But for a Christian, our identity is in
Christ. And I believe God gathers, in Christ, all of our being up into a whole
forgetting only the sinful part that is lost (thrown away in redemption.)
I believe we must love the
whole person even when they have forgotten themselves.
I am trying to apply some of
my thoughts in a practical manner.
My husband should not walk
anymore by himself. He is legally blind and sometimes he forgets to look when
crossing streets—I’m not sure he can see well enough when he does look—but he
is now persistent that he must walk. Even on Sunday afternoon when it is 100
degrees outside. Three times this week when we were unable to walk because we
missed the cooler mornings he slipped out the back door and walked. Today I saw
him and followed. And it was a hundred degrees I reminded him, in a rather loud
voice, when we returned home. He wasn’t hot he said.
But this is not just a new
Brad, this is the tenacity that has always belonged to Brad. It is too early in
the journey to put locks on the inside of the doors. I will simply keep working
at finding a better rhythm for our days.
On an early trip back to my roots, when our children were
small, we visited Pattonsburg, Bethany, McFall, and St Joseph in Northern
Missouri. I had forgotten how hilly parts of the landscape were. I had
forgotten the sounds and the smells. Standing outside the car on the side of
the road I took a deep breath and remembered home. The farm and the house in
Pattonsburg. The one room school house, and the brick school in town. Going to
the Methodist church in town and marching down the street with the band in St.
Joseph. “Here comes a band that is so big they don’t have enough uniforms,” the
announcer said during the apple blossom parade. How many times can you sing 99
bottles of beer on the wall going to a basketball game in another town?
Those are memories and they were made like the hills with many
ups and downs. But what can you do when you suddenly find that the hill only goes
down, down all of the way?
I told a friend that I had expected to hear the news I heard
at the doctor’s office on Tuesday, but nonetheless it still stunned me and I
had not yet absorbed it. And I still haven’t. Brad has moved from mild
cognitive impairment to early stage Alzheimer’s. That means the hill will keep going
down—it won’t get better—it won’t level out…..
For my devotions I use Touchstone’s
Daily Devotional Guide. I am actually addicted to it. There is usually an
Old Testament reading, a Gospel reading, another New Testament reading and one
or several Psalms. But the day after receiving the news from the doctor I ended
up skipping my reading in Exodus. I started it but somehow reading about how to
furnish the tabernacle just wasn’t helping—but yes, the Psalms, always the
Psalms—they are, through our union with Christ, our prayers, because they are
his.
Steady all the way through, he is there, Jesus is there. Afterwards,
at home, Brad prayed for us. Not I, but Brad. And he talked of how we must
continue to enjoy our future. It is downhill, but the end is home. The saints
in the City of God—those enrolled in heaven. The city full of angels. The City
of light. The Father, Son and Holy Spirit.
We were having our morning coffee when Brad said he woke up
thinking of the verse, “In my Father’s house are many mansions.” A good morning
conversation. I looked up the verse in my New American Standard Bible reading
several verses. Jesus said:
“Do not let your heart
be troubled, believe in God believe also in me. In my Father’s house are many dwelling places; if it were not so I
would have told you, for I go to prepare a place for you. If I go to prepare a
place for you I will come again and receive you to myself, that where I am you
may be also.” (John 14: 1-4)
Over the last several years, since we found that Brad has mild
cognitive impairment, and since he has not been able to work, I have been, probably,
over concerned, with our house. It is now one hundred and eleven years old. And
it was looking very old indeed! In some places the paint had completely peeled
off and we had already experienced the sewage backing up in the downstairs
apartment. We got a reverse mortgage and have been slowly repairing and renewing
our home. But thinking of the above verses I realized I am too, too concerned
about my earthly living space.
As I studied and thought of the verses through the week
several phrases and words jumped out at me. The beauty of that place that Jesus
has and is preparing is that it is his preparation and his alone. No worries;
we rest in him.
Brad is finding it harder and harder to do simple tasks. He wanted
to make coffee himself one morning, but he needed me there to show him each
step and still it was hard. In that place with Jesus the tasks will be joyful,
graceful and once again full of dignity. And dignity will be given with grace
because we are in Christ and belong to him.
William Hendriksen in his commentary on John points out that
Jesus isn’t just coming to take us somewhere, (heaven), he is taking us to “himself.”He writes:
“Observe that instead of saying what one might expect him to
say, namely, ‘And when I go and prepare a place for you, I come again and will
take you to that place,’ Jesus says
something that is far more comforting: “I will take you to myself’ (or: to be face to
face with me …). So wonderful is Christ’s love for his own that he is not
satisfied with the idea of merely bringing them to heaven. He must needs take
them into his own embrace.”
I am learning to be still in my soul and body, just sitting
and listening and visiting with Brad. We have coffee every morning except
Monday when he goes to a small men’s Bible study. With our morning coffee we
sit in the kitchen/family room and visit. Morning and evening are the hardest
times for Brad to put his thoughts together and remember words and concepts.
But he does remember so much of the past. And we talk about the past and people
we have known.
Yesterday he asked me where we lived before we lived here. (We
have lived in this house for 30 years. Thirty one in August.) I told him, and
then he wanted to know which of the children were still at home when we moved
here. We talked about all of the people who have lived in our house and in the
apartment downstairs. About the different children who have moved back home and
then moved out again. About Miles Saunders who lived in our front bedroom for a
year, and Gwen Davies who lived in our apartment before going to the mission
field. And all of the great granddaughters who have lived down stairs. One was
even born down there.
Often in the evening, (Brad usually goes to bed by 8:30), we
sit on the front porch and visit. And watch for airplanes. That is something
Brad can see because of their flashing lights; we have a small local airport
near us so there are low flying planes.
But homes don’t last forever—except—the
home that is found in Jesus. Found in him now, and found in him forever.
For a Christian, discerning the times is important. How do we
live in the midst of unbelief or revival? How do we react in a society that has
reached the edges of collapse amid the decadence of materialism? Or how do we
live during the years of spiritual hunger and intentional seeking after God?
The same is true when we consider the lives of our loved ones when they are
sick and in need. And part of that discernment is discovering why someone close
to us is finding life so difficult. Perhaps why they are reacting in anger, why
they do the seemingly strange things they do.
Almost thirty years ago, visiting my father-in-law and his
wife, my husband’s step-mother, we laughed about several incidents but then
never considered that anything was wrong. My father-in-law, and he could be
rather pushy, made a big deal about his wife using instant coffee in the coffee
maker. He said this because coffee grounds can look like instant coffee when
they have been used, and so not ‘remembering’ that instant coffee would have
disappeared if boiling water was poured over it, he lectured my mother-in-law
about using the wrong coffee.
Later, on Sunday morning, Amy called me into their bedroom to
help her convince her husband Jack, that he was dressed strangely. His plaid
shirt did not match his checkered pants. Jack had always been a very sharp
dresser and she didn’t understand why he insisted on dressing that way for church.
(She outflanked him in pushiness.) I don’t remember who won that battle, but I
carefully stayed out of it.
I am sure that Amy, experienced many other dilemmas before
they both discovered what was wrong, Alzheimer’s.
Watching a loved one, especially a spouse slowly lose parts of
themselves, is devastating, to say the least. It is called the long goodbye.
My husband Brad was at one time the main Steinway piano tuner
in Sacramento.He tuned for both
individuals and concerts including the University of California at Davis, and
the Mondovi Center. It was a wonderful career, an honored career. And I enjoyed
the fruits of his labors in many ways including attending many concerts. Our
experiences together were so fun: back stage at ‘Governor’ Ronald Reagan’s first
inauguration concert which included Jack Benny, back stage at a Johnny Cash concert,
backstage at a Garrison Keillor show where we were invited to sit with the
performers as they waited for their turns on stage. What a gift.
And the friends, so many. Piano teachers, concert pianist,
families, churches—God has blessed us both through these many friends.
And then Brad kept forgetting tunings he had for the
university on Sunday afternoons. He forgot to pencil them into his appointment
book. And that became one of the final problems—over about a three year period—he
slowly lost the ability to schedule the Sunday appointments and after he lost
the person who made his weekly appointments he couldn’t do that job himself. I
heard him on the phone telling old customers how glad he was to hear from them
and that he would gladly tune their piano, but he never made the appointment or
called them back. I took over the job. At the end he couldn’t drive and one of
his son’s drove him on his days off. And then he couldn’t tune—partly his eyes—partly
his inability to sequence—and I am sure just loss of memory.
There were earlier clues. They started slowly but finally came
fast and furious. An inability to follow rules and sequences in games, our two
favorites, cribbage and scrabble. I put them away out of my sight several
months ago. An inability to take care of money or business issues. But it
happens slowly at first. The questions come. Why didn’t that bill get paid? Why
is it that every time he takes checks to the bank he makes a mistake on the
deposit slip?
And now the loss of language, and the loss of memory of recent
events. (But not all!)
What I am trying to show here is that there are early clues
and awareness is a friend although painful. The doctor gives a small test,
checks everything else out, and then if needed sends the patient to a neurologist,
who gives further tests and does Magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) of the brain.
And all of this is so important, because how else to
understand the person you love and their loss and yours. I find myself trying,
praying, to put away the demand sound in my voice when I ask why are you doing
that? What are you looking for? I already told you we are going …! How now shall
we live, Francis Schaeffer asks in his timely book. Indeed, how shall I, or any
of us without the love and promises and presence of Jesus Christ in the midst
of our sorrow.
Today Brad went for a walk, he does that safely for now,
although he does get lost trying to use his bike. He told me, when he returned,
how he had met a man in the park who was a Jehovah Witness and who had also
spent time “in the big house.” Brad used to do prison ministry. He sat and
talked with the man about Jesus. Perhaps in the end God turns us from what
seems like great events toward his better events—witnessing to the lost about
Jesus.
Then he showed me Joshua the high priest
standing before the angel of the Lord and Satan standing at his right hand to
accuse him. The Lord said to Satan, “The Lord rebuke you, Satan! Indeed, the
Lord who has chosen Jerusalem rebuke you! Is this not a brand plucked out of
the fire?” Now Joshua was clothed with filthy garments and standing before the
angel. He spoke and said to those who were standing before him, saying “Remove
the filthy garments from him.” Again he said to him, “See, I have taken your iniquity
away from you and will clothe you with festal robes.” Then I [Zechariah] said, “Let
them put a clean turban on his head.” So they put a clean turban on his head
and clothed him with garments while the angel of the Lord was standing by.
(Zechariah 3:1-5)
My husband has tucked away among his keepsakes a shirt his
mother made him when he was a little boy. It is covered with pictures of trains
and train items. It is so old it is starting to fall apart. Clothes and
memories are often intertwined. Brad has always loved steam engines. When he
sees the shirt he is probably thinking of his mother and his many experiences
with trains.
The Bible sometimes uses clothes as metaphors which embrace
the promises of God. Sometimes clothes are a picture of our sinfulness and our repentance.
People have an interesting relationship with clothes. The good wife of Proverbs
clothed her family in scarlet. Jacob gave his favorite son Joseph a coat of
many colors. The armies of heaven are
clothed in white.
But how clothes are worn and treated can be a symptom of disease.
In practical terms people experiencing
mild cognitive impairment and different forms of dementia have a problem with
clothes. And a problem with cleanliness. No one knows why they don’t like
showers or bathing. But many do not. No one knows why they don’t like to change
into clean clothes.
Thinking about this I thought of the verses I have placed
above from the prophet Zechariah. And while I have at times not had the
tolerance I should have, about not showering or changing clothes, God truly
blessed me with promises that these verses and the rest of the chapter
provided. But first the biblical context.
Joshua, as high priest after the Babylon captivity, represents
the people gathered from their exile. Satan wants to accuse them of their past
sin, but God wants to redeem and does redeem them. Joshua does not change his
own dirty clothes, it is God’s command and God’s doing.[1]
And there is a promise at the end of the chapter of the coming Branch, the
servant of God. The Messiah.
Sometimes I think we, me, as caregivers get a bit snobbish.
About cleanliness. But this person who loves to stay in the same clothes day
after day, and generally would if allowed—has that sweeter disposition—it’s the
people who he cares about, it’s the books he wants to share and the
conversations he hopes for. His is a heart transformed in the middle of a
reluctance to conform to my expectations. So, as some expert I read, I can’t
recall who, stated, two or three showers a week is enough. And if necessary lay
out the clean clothes. And you might add, it is going to be hot today you might
want to wear a short sleeve shirt, or I think it is rather cold outside why don’t
you take your jacket.
And now the blessing. As usual the biblical text is speaking
of a particular time in Jewish history. After the exile, while the temple is
being rebuilt. But the text is also a promise of God’s work in his people’s
lives and a promise about a coming savior.
Thomas Edward McComiskey in his commentary on the text writes
of Joshua receiving a clean turban and points out that this replaced the shame
the people felt because of their past sin and exile. As he puts it, the turban “crowns
the high priest’s glory.” McComiskey goes on to remind his readers of a crown
in the New Testament. He writes:
“The New Testament speaks of the “crown of glory” that
completes the believer’s process of glorification: ‘And when the chief shepherd
appears, you will win the crown of glory that never fades away (1 Peter 5:4;
see 2 Tim.4:8; James 1:12; Rev. 2:10).’ As Joshua stands before the heavenly
assemblage in this vision, he symbolizes his nation, but he foreshadows as well
the experience of the believer under the new covenant.”
The image I am left with is of a Savior who will clothe all of
our brokenness with a clean turban, a crown of holiness, which is his and his
alone. I will see him, Brad, in the cleanest of clothes that will shine with
the righteousness of Jesus. And because of that I see him different now—glorified
with the love of Christ.
[1]
For good commentary see, Joyce G. Baldwin, Haggai,
Zechariah, Malachi, in Tyndale Old
Testament Commentaries & Thomas Edward McComiskey, “Zechariah,” in The Minor Prophets: An Exegetical &
Expository Commentary. Vol. 3 (Baker).
So why Tacos With Grace? I wanted to have grace in the name
and when I went looking through the post I had written, the taco part just
jumped out at me. As a family we have experienced many taco meals. They used to
be big family events, first at my husband’s home and then after we were married
and had children at ours. My husband’s grandmother, Mary Curd, was partly Native
American, a great cook, who had her own Mexican recipes. She taught her
daughter, my husband’s mother to make tacos and she taught me how to make enchiladas.
There were a lot of Louisiana relatives
who gathered with my husband’s Oklahoma, New York and California family to
enjoy the feast.
Yes, grandma and her family belonged to the great exodus of
families who traveled to California out of the great dust storms of the plains.
Finally, settled in Pacific Grove, Mary worked in the canneries of Monterey.
But this is about gatherings, feasting, enjoying hospitality
alongside mild cognitive impairment, dementia and Alzheimer’s.
Large gatherings, even family gatherings, are hard for those
with various dementias and mild cognitive impairment. My husband tends to sit
off by himself and can be very quiet. He loves to see all of the great
granddaughters—yes they are all girls. He likes to play with the children but
sometimes there is just too much noise. Here are the problems:
Noise: (Most people with these disorders have trouble with
noise. When I am putting dishes away in the kitchen Brad is always asking me if
I broke something.)
Confusion with so many people: (comprehension is hard and with
many people talking comprehension is impossible.)
Confusion with a table full of food: (Brad has trouble with sequences—he
will just stand there looking unable to make food choices or even understand
that he should pick up a plate first. I usually guide him or do it for him.)
Too long a time is tiring: If the gathering is at our house, I
suggest that when everything is too much Brad just go in the bedroom and read
or lie down. If we are somewhere else with a lot of people I try not to stay
too long.
Hospitality is a Christian gift and blessing but it must be
approached differently for people with brain disorders. My sense of care for
the other has now to be mostly focused on Brad. One of the great ways hospitality
happens in our family is when a son and his wife comes and takes us out to eat
and brings a movie to watch. Or a daughter brings food and her family and we
eat together. Or old friends, just a couple, invite us for dinner, so only four
of us eat together and share conversation. Or maybe just one family member or
friend comes and sits, drinks coffee, and talks.
We are called to be kind and full of love like our Lord. This
is sometimes hard because it feels like isolation when ministry goes from many
to one—but God cares for the one as much as the many. Psalms 136: 23 “Who
remembered us in our low estate, for His lovingkindness is everlasting.” He
remembers us even when we are forgetting many events and people. He loves us
through Christ our Lord.
There are those days and times when reality comes unglued. The
shattered reality then gets scattered all over my sense of security. We are
watching, at home, a movie, sitting side by side. He keeps looking behind him
for something. “What is it I say?” “I am looking for you, I want to sit by you
he says.” I am stunned but it doesn’t happen again. Not yet.
We put the groceries away in the back of the car and, as he
always has, he takes the cart to put it away.I wait and then I see him return with the cart, open the back of the car
and start to reach for the groceries. I ask him what he is doing and he says he
is putting the groceries away.
We are having tacos for dinner. He actually makes the salad,
while I cook the tacos and grate the cheese. And then he dumps his very hot,
hot sauce all over the salad instead of putting it into his taco. I yell, “Stop”
grab a large serving spoon and remove the top part of the salad with the hot sauce
and put it on a separate plate.
It isn’t, as some think, just memory loss. It is confusion,
loss in many ways. This is mild cognitive impairment which we were told may get
better, stay the same or progress into some type of dementia such as Alzheimer’s,
a disease his father died with—probably his grandfather also. The grandfather’s
death certificate says died of insanity. When we obtained it, almost thirty
years ago, we had no idea what that meant.
My husband’s younger sister has now been diagnosed with early
dementia.
But here is something good. He loves to read. He loves to
visit and will start a conversation with strangers, well, just because they
smiled at him. He does, after all, look like Mark Twain. Just a week ago a lady
stopped us in the grocery store. She asked me, “Has anyone ever told you your
husband looks like Mark Twain?” Both my husband and I laughed. Strangers have
walked up to him on the street to tell him they know who he is.
And he looks for an opening, to tell the stranger, about
Jesus.
Brad is so sweet now—will yes—sometimes when I can’t
understand him, or he can’t understand me, he gets loud. (And I have gotten
loud, thinking he can’t hear me when actually he isn’t comprehending what I am
saying.) But this is my time for learning patience. I am not a patient person
and I too often forget that something is wrong. I have spent too many years
enjoying the fun (yes, fun) of sparring with him over intellectual ideas. Our
two ideal games, scrabble and cribbage, we can no longer play.
God is giving me his grace and insistently pulling away, here
and there, my very rough edges. And he is teaching me to trust in ways and
places I have-not experienced before. Everything,
is now my responsibility and so I am learning to hand it all back to the Lord I
have walked with for so many years. Without the Lord Jesus Christ, ... But now, instead, while there is grief there is a great deal of joy,
even fun. Yes, again, fun.
I will use this blog to write about our journey through this
awful disease. Many do not understand it or think of it as only memory loss.
Too many caregivers have been deserted by both friends and family (Not me!). I
want to share what this journey means from a Christian point of view. It is an exploration for me as well as others.
Here is a book I recommend: Second Forgetting: Remembering the Power of the Gospel During Alzheimer's Disease by Dr. Benjamin Mast