Ten days in a dementia unit

Almost four months later and it feels as though I may always be awake at 2 am most nights, still hanging out with Bill and Dad, the doors locked and halls closing in, waiting for the unit staff to let me out to go check on my mother, or to trade off shifts with a sibling. Often, Bill from across the hall can’t sleep either, so he watches classic movies or shares a cozy snack with a staff member, then marches the halls, smiling his sweet, vacant smile.
 

Tom wanders the halls during the day, his steps falling deliberately, each with a sense of purpose. His steps slow when he nears Dad’s room, his neck craning as he turns to see. Even as he slows, his feet keep moving. He cannot bear to stay too long near the room.

Just as Tom gets closest to the door, his speed increases, two like polarities propelling him away from what he sees in my father’s room. His eyes take on a questioning, then a pleading look. “How is Dean?” he asks.
 

Inevitably, the day would arrive when my father's appearance became so sick and frail, even his fellow dementia unit patients realize something was amiss.

Bill and Tom had become my father's closest buddies, the three amigos hanging out and bonding as only those with all the time in the world and no time to waste can do. But as my father slipped away, became unaware of his surroundings, and eventually into unconsciousness, Tom became inconsolable. Soon, Bill took to his own bed.

The nursing home had an open-door policy except for during medial procedures and for necessary privacy. They found that closed doors contributed to resident anxiety, especially when a fellow resident - someone who to them had essentially become a family member - suddenly disappeared after an illness.

Seeing my father motionless and unresponsive in bed, Tom was stricken, the look on his face  forlorn and stressed. Tears glistening, his voice was tight as he held out a hand toward me and then pulled it quickly back, unsure.

“He’s a good boy,” he assured me.

From somewhere inside his Alzheimer’s-fogged brain, he had managed to find a phrase that expressed the depth of his affection and admiration for my father.

 

On the day after my father died, his fellow residents saw family members coming and going in the hallway. A few seemed aware of what was happening. Some did their best to comfort us, patting our backs, shoulders, arms.

As my sister and I walked down the hallway carrying some of Dad's things past those sitting in the community room, Tom's head was turned away from us. My sister walked over to him, to thank him for him for his friendship to our father and to say a few words. When he turned to look at us, his eyes were heavy with tears.

 

No words could describe that look in his eyes.

 

Spending ten days in a dementia unit can have quite unexpected long-term effects, as I am just beginning to realize. That much time locked in such a place can have an unraveling effect on the psyche. While I can still claim visitor status, I find myself less able – and willing - to distinguish between those with memory problems and the so-called “normal” people.