Is That Your Father?

It's happened to me twice now at the memory care facility where my husband resides. Today, I was combing his hair and speaking to him softly. The other day I was sitting next to him, holding his hand tenderly.

"Is that your father?" comes the question from someone younger who's visiting one of the other residents.

"No, this is my husband."

"Oh!" and the facial expression clearly indicates a slight embarrassment at having made such a supposition, along with undertones of assumption about our respective ages at marriage. Not that a big age difference would be a bad thing. Of course.

For some reason, at this point, I feel as though I need to explain that my husband is not quite a year and a half older than me and that he is in the later stages of Alzheimer's. This results in a look of pity followed by another, "Oh."

He hasn't ever looked a lot older than me, because he isn't a lot older. But I guess the ravages of this disease have taken a toll on him that I only really noticed in recent photographs. His cheeks are a little sunken in, his eyes are duller, his hair is losing its luster, his frame is thin and gaunt, his shoulders hunch over. He has "little old man" posture. Most of the visiting spouses (if any) are older than I am, so on the one hand I suppose it isn't surprising that younger people might assume the usual octogenarian age group and mistake him for my dad. But on the other hand, it's a tiny bit distressing.

This disease is so cruel and relentless. It steals everything from you, every bit of your dignity. And then it robs your family, too. It robs them of you. And then it robs them of good memories of you, because it goes on for such a long time that many members of your family have never known you or don't remember you any other way. And that's really sad.