Anyone who has ever lived with someone who has any form of dementia knows, everyone in the household has to learn to roll with the flow. Objects disappear, only to reappear in weird places some weeks later.
One day it was raining hard outside. I mean a gully washer type of rain. All of a sudden I see a big stream of water flying past my door. Rushing outside, I found Alan, standing in the storm soaking wet, and happily watering the flower beds. The doctors warned his reasoning ability would continue to get worse. Yep, it is. And he can't understand why I took his car keys (to my car yet) away.
Bless his heart, he was never eaten up with horse sense anyway, so I missed that clue.
And sometimes necessity is the mother of invention. Case in point: It's too hot to leave my maine coon cat outside all day. So I leave the sliding door open enough for him to travel in and out at will during the mornings and again in the evening until it gets dark.
Alan never, NEVER EVER, closes a drawer, cabinet door or regular door when he's been in them. However, he can't seem to remember to leave the outside door in MY end of the house open for the cat. Fifteen or twenty times a day I have to say, "Alan open the door back up." All of a sudden he'll get out of a chair and make a dash out the door, only to come back in carrying the cat and shutting the door.
"Alan, open the damned door and leave the cat alone." The cat's used to it so just relaxes and enjoys the ride until Alan puts him down. He thinks it's another great game. Now he won't even come in at night until Alan comes to the deck and carries him back inside.
On the other hand, when we leave I put him in the house and make sure the doors are closed, only to come home and find my sliding door open just enough for him to get out. It's happened so many times now, it has to be the cat.
So Alan is slipping and the cat is getting smarter. Me…I just take my depression pills and my blood pressure pill and try to keep smiling. My mother always cautioned that my face could freeze that way. I wonder if this smile will someday freeze and they'll have to operate to unclench my teeth.
