Her eyelids blink. But the eyes do not move. I squeeze her warm hand with my fingers. No response. Except for the blinking eyelids and the slow rise and fall of her chest,, nothing. No other part of her body move.
And yet, and yet I keep telling myself that my wife is still alive. There is no conscious response from her in any form, but her heart is still beating, her lungs still breathing, stomach still working. The latter only because she, her body, is spoon fed three times each day. Spoon fed because her body can no longer chew food. Swallowing, an autonomic response, remains functional.
So is my wife really still alive? Or something else?
My mind drifts back to earlier times when this exuberant, vital woman filled each day with smiles, with laughter, with compassion and creative energy, a woman ready at a moment’s notice to drop what she was doing to go adventuring. A wife whose loving devotion to me, to everyone in her family, was unrelenting. and so much more. So very much more.
It had begun slowly, repeated questions, me wondering if she simply had not heard the answers. A slow recognition that something was affecting her short term memory. And the deterioration continued until it was obvious to everyone that something was slowly eating away at her brain.
We adapted, changed routines, avoided doing things that would lead to problems. She stopped driving. I started doing the cooking as her mind was less and less able to organize events. She continued to smile, to help as best she could. Then one day I noticed her chopping up vegetables in her usual rapid slicing motion. her eye to hand coordination was off and she cut herself. No more knives.
Communication became more and more difficult. Her mind was often in some other place. Suddenly she wanted to visit her mother. Okay, fine, let’s go see mom. Her mother was several thousand miles away in Mexico, but, by then I knew that as soon as we walked out the door, her mind would have forgotten the urge and we’d be in a new world.
There were conflicts. anger when she suddenly felt confused, couldn’t figure out why the world she wanted did not exist. Fortunately, as with visiting mom, such moments quickly disappeared into the void.
I knew she was dying. I knew the disease that was destroying her mind could not be stopped. Helpless, sometimes I would pretend it was just a dream, some fiendish nightmare we’d both wake from.
We never did. The disease kept destroying, her mind kept dying. I kept trying to make the best of a situation I had no control over, a reality I could not believe was happening.
And here I am now. Is my wife still alive? this question has become irrelevant. All that matters is that our daughter is absolutely committed to caring for her mother in the most loving way possible until her mother’s last breath.
My role is to simply support our daughter’s love.
My precious wife’s eyes still blink. Her lungs still breathe. Her heart still beats and her hand is warm in mine.
Death has its own timetable.
tio stib