The House at the End of the Lane

My mother-in-law has Alzheimer's.

To the extent this disease can be diagnosed, Bonnie was diagnosed after a debilitating stroke four years ago. As with most folks, the path has been steadily downward with lots of bumps in the road.

We are moving closer to her and my wife's sister to help with the care that is required at this time of her life.

Bonnie,(my mother-in-law) has found us the perfect house to live in. It is a two story one down the lane from her house. She has already told her youngest daughter it would be perfect for us: lots of space and close to her. The only problem is there is no house at the end of the lane. The house at the end of the lane is the one in which Bonnie lives. Course she knows some of that now, because recently, someone came and moved the house so it is no longer there. Had it been there, it would have been perfect for us. However, Bonnie can't help wondering who it was that took it and when they moved it. It is all a confusing mystery to her.

Such is Alzheimer's. I compare it to Swiss cheese which I happen to like. Real Swiss cheese has those trademark holes throughout. Imagine your brain like that. Imagine that processing and memory are like that. One has a new experience and it is filed away in the cheese or sometimes in the hole. When one goes back to get the information, sometimes it is there and sometimes it is not. What is more confusing is when part of the memory is stored and part goes in the hole. Yep, it all gets rather mixed up.

Alzheimer's is all about the mind getting all mixed up. There are great medical explanations and great psychological explanations, but there is confusion, blank spaces and slowly all of that turns to darkness.

For Bonnie right now it is the house at the end of the lane. It is the house that isn't there.

Over time, it will become the person who isn't there.