By Camilla Hewson Flintermann
Often he spoke of how he worried that he would
see me fading and worn down by his care, and that
before this could happen he would rather move to a
nursing home, so I could "have a life" again. Even
when he was experiencing serious episodes of
dementia, as happens with about a third of persons
with Parkinson's, he still retained his loving
concern for me, and accepted help from others so I
could have respite. All of these things were
evidence that he was still taking care of me, in the
only ways remaining to him---the caregiving was
still mutual!
After a crisis, when he fell repeatedly but refused
my help, not knowing who I was, things came to a
head. He was refusing to take his medications, or to
let me come near him, nor would he let the Life
Squad members whom I had finally called help him to
bed. It happened that a mutual friend, who is also a
therapist, came over to be with me, and Peter did
allow her to give him the medicines, and then agreed
to be helped to bed. As she sat with him for more
than an hour, while the meds restored his lucidity
and he recognized me at last, he talked with her
about his life, and expressed the belief that he was
"ready to go." He had always insisted on a Durable
Power of Attorney for Health Care which refused all
but "comfort care" when his quality of life became
unbearable for him. He told her how he feared that
his Parkinson's was destroying me, knowing that I
had recently been put on an antidepressant to help
me cope with his increasing dementia. His greatest
concern was that he could somehow still take care of
me, even as his own life was ending.
The next morning, a Sunday, he insisted I call two
local nursing homes we had visited, leaving messages
for them to return the calls the next day. Within a
week he had chosen one to move to, and things were
under way. He never wavered in this, in spite of my
questioning if it was really time. If it had not
been for the increasing dementia, it might have
worked, though the separation after so many years of
togetherness would have still been terribly hard for
both of us. However, with the sudden complete change
in his life, the dementia accelerated, and he soon
became so paranoid that he refused to stay in the
nursing home, and was hospitalized in a geriatric
psychiatric unit in a city about an hour away from
home. After a week there, during which he often
refused food and medicines and his weight dropped to
104 pounds, it was clear that hospice was the next
step. He agreed to moving to their inpatient unit in
the hospital, where his condition continued to
worsen, and this mildest and most peaceable of men
even became combative at times, out of fear and
disorientation.
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