Annie is my best friend. I’ve been there with her through two years of her living with dementia. When I first met her, she was diagnosed with mild cognitive impairment. A year ago I wrote an article about how her garden had slowed her disease. Before you go on, please read about it here to get an idea of where it all started.
Both of us have raised bed gardens in our community garden plots. We have to volunteer to help out periodically with some of the light upkeep there. As I mentioned before in the article above, Annie loves flowers. In bright daylight she can see bright colors very well. While she can’t always remember what the flowers are, they help her remain focused on their natural beauty. It puts her in a state of calm and meditation. She can sit for hours caressing the petals. It makes her feel needed by them. While she’s doing that it gives me time to work in my vegetable garden next to her garden.
About six months ago, I started noticing little things happening with her impairment. First it was, “Where did I put my phone? I just had it.” I know as seniors, we all have some things we forget. But this was happening on a daily basis. Our Senior Center had a class on early onset dementia that we both took about the same time. Annie was quite aware of what was going on and, to her credit, was fighting it.
We were walking together almost every day. Once in a while she would ask me, “Where are we?” My reply was, “Where do you think we are?” With a blank look it became obvious she didn’t recognize where we were. And we had walked that same route many times before. Before long she would say, “I know where we’re at!” It didn’t happen every time we walked, but it was happening more frequently.
In July I had to travel back to western New York State. My youngest sister was having a very serious operation on her carotid artery. She got through it as well as the surgeon expected considering the state of her health. I had to stay with her for a little over two weeks. She wasn’t able to drive her car as the seat belt would compromise her wound.
Annie and I talked on the phone while I was away a couple times daily. We were just checking in to see how our day was or had gone. One week into my stay with my sister I got a serious surprise from Annie. She had decided to go for a walk by herself. Usually this wasn’t a problem. But that one day she got lost. Totally disoriented. She told me later that day she was walking on the sidewalk and saw a man working on his lawn.
She asked him directions to where we both lived. But she couldn’t remember the address. The man was able to take Annie to the public safety building in the village we live in. The policewoman asked her name, and also where she lived. Again, she couldn’t remember the address. Annie told her the Senior Center knew who she was and where she lived. The policewoman called them, got the address of our building, and returned Annie back home safely.
When I returned we went for a long walk together. We discussed what had happened. Her older sister, who lives in our village, didn’t want her to walk by herself anymore. Annie of course disagreed and was very adamant that she was fine. Actually, as it turned out, she wasn’t fine.
A week later a part-time senior helper came to be with Annie in the mornings. That did not go well with Annie at all. She insisted to her sister and son again that she was fine and didn’t need a helper. They are both part of her health care team. Her son has her health care proxy and takes care of Annie’s finances. So the decision was final. Temporarily anyway.
Since I’ve known her, Annie can’t see or process certain things. Her eyesight is fine, but there are synapses from her optical nerve to the back of her brain. She can’t see text unless it’s really large, written on extremely white paper with contrasty black ink, and in bright light. The other problem that was getting worse is that she was having trouble recognizing some objects, even fairly large ones. Not all the time, but enough to make me and her sister realize that it was happening.
Annie got to the point where it was getting obvious to her care team, and me, that she needed more help than any of us could provide. Her son and older sister decided it was time to move her into an assisted living facility. Everyone was concerned about her safety, especially falling. Since she couldn’t see or process things, her apartment was getting cluttered. She was constantly moving things around. Annie called it sorting. But she didn’t know where to put her things, especially clothes. And she couldn’t remember where she put other things, especially her cell phone.
The time arrived for her to move about 45 days ago from when I’m writing this article. Thirty days before the move, her sister and I started to pack up the things that she would need at her new home. Since she can’t cook or bake where she’s at now, all of her cooking utensils, baking pans, mixers, and most of her cook books got donated. Annie excelled at baking before the dementia, so that took an emotional toll on her. It still does as her long-term memory is excellent.
Before the moving company came to move all of her belongings, her brother and sister-in-law came and took Annie to her new home. She knew what was going to happen, and had seen her new apartment two weeks before the move. It seemed to me like Annie was defeated emotionally. She did go quietly, trying to accept the inevitable. Did she want to move away from the building where we both were living? Absolutely not. Everyone said it would take her time to adjust. Even now, she’s not happy, but trying to adapt and adjust. But every day seems to be getting better for her. She’s made a few new friends there which I think is wonderful. We still talk every day on the phone. That helps both of us immensely.
Even though I don’t have a vehicle, I have friends and her sister from time to time to take me over there to visit and pick me up after a few hours. I’ve been very blessed for those friends in my life. When the weather was better we went for walks on the sidewalks there. The city she lives in now is a lot larger than where I live now. A four-lane city boulevard is less than a block away. Annie does realize that for her safety she can’t be walking off by herself.
There are a few benefits for her to be living there. Three regularly scheduled meals in a dining room near her apartment. Weekly live music performed by volunteer musicians. The halls are quite wide so Annie gets a fair amount of walking in to help her get enough exercise. Since she and I love to walk, that’s a blessing for her. And there are almost daily organized exercise classes led by staff members.
I never thought in my wildest dreams that I would become so close to someone with dementia. Within a week after I moved back to Wisconsin while living with my sister temporarily in western New York State during the pandemic, I met Annie. I’ve learned a lot about the transition from mild cognitive impairment to dementia in these two years plus. The most important thing is to have an incredible amount of patience with anyone who has dementia. I remember her older sister asking me what I learned from Annie after I was here about two months. I told her the same thing. Patience and lots of it.
I’ve been very blessed having Annie in my life. She’s the best friend I’ve ever had, or maybe ever will have. Where will Annie’s journey go from here? I guess we’ll find out…sometime, somewhere in the future. Blessed Be!
PS: If you’re interested here is a link to living with dementia.
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