I choose to Live

I have spent the past several weeks observing the changes in Dad's
attitudes as he has come to grips with the current phase of Mom's
Alzheimer's disease.

Dad had recently used the word "depressed" for the first time in
referring to himself. He is naturally struggling with the energy
issues and frustrations and depression that plagues the spouse of an
Alzheimer's patient. He has never before in life considered
depression a part of HIS life and he has struggled within himself to
acknowledge that the changes taking place in Mom were truly tearing
him down also.

But this is not the change I refer to....

Dad has come to accept on a new level that Mom's fading away is
reality. Naturally he has known there is little he can do to change
the course of the disease yet he is only now more fully accepting the
changes that have arrived and are yet to come.

Dad signed Mom up for twice weekly half day "memory loss day care" at
a local church. Tuesday and Thursday Mom spends four hours with other
patients and spouses and parents and children with memory loss
issues. The volunteer assistants are wonderful and loving and kind to
Mom and also are responsive to the fears and concerns that Dad has as
well.

This was a huge step for Dad to take and he called me on the first
day feeling very emotional that this was the "first step" of many
steps yet to come. And all steps will be downward.

But that is only part of the change I refer to...

Dad has taken up a new hobby. Dad has apparently declared to himself
that he chooses to live. He has begun to again search for pleasure in
things that he wants to do rather being completely consumed with the
thought and care for Mom, that if not left unbalanced would sap him
to death as well. He is jumping into finishing his greenhouse system,
installing drip irrigation for his tomatoes and roses and tending to
plants in the hothouse that will be set out later in the Spring. He
is working with life and excited about something again. He is more
full of life on the phone with details of his hobbies and questions
for me to look up on the internet.

Dad chooses to live. Praise God.