Some mornings start quietly, maybe even peacefully. Then there are mornings like this one. The phone rang at 7:40 a.m., right as the bakery opened, and the voice on the other end was shaky. “It’s Dad, Mom fell getting out of the shower.” When you’re living with dementia in the family, those words are never just words. They are a lightning strike. One minute, she was pulling trays of muffins with her daughter, the next, she was sprinting across the street to her parents’ house. A block away felt like a mile.
By the time she got there, her mom was in a wheelchair, her dad had sunk into the recliner, exhausted, and her aunt Ann—one of those rare angels who gives and gives—was helping her mother get dressed. The dementia had already stolen her mother’s sense of place. She kept asking for her husband Carl, sitting just feet away. Something beautiful happened when they wheeled her into the living room and set her beside him. She reached for his hand, eyes fluttering closed, and they just breathed together for a moment. His eyes were shut too.
That tiny gesture said everything. Dementia had taken so much, but love was still there. Her father whispered he’d been up half the night. Mom had woken around one, confused, unable to recognize the bed as a bed. She refused to get out of the wheelchair, so he stayed with her, hour after hour, until nearly three in the morning. He told the story with the kind of weariness only caregivers know. Her only reply was “Oh, Dad,” filled with the sorrow of knowing how heavy his shoulders had become.
She left for the bakery again, thinking maybe the worst of the day was over. But dementia does not respect schedules. At 1:15 p.m. her sister called, “Dad needs someone right away, I’m stuck at lunch. Can you go?” The yes left her mouth even as her body wanted to say no. Walking into her parents’ house felt like stepping into the Twilight Zone. Some days her mom seemed steady. This was not one of those days. Her legs would not cooperate, and when asked where she wanted to go she simply said, “Let’s go.” Go where? With dementia, that question is slippery.
So they rolled with it, literally. Into the kitchen, down the hall, through the bathroom, looping into the bedroom and back again. Her mom wheeled herself tirelessly, her daughter trailing close to keep her upright. By the time they coaxed her into the recliner again, next to Dad, she was ready to rest. And once more, she reached for his hand. Those moments, as simple as they seem, are victories. A small “yes” to holding his hand. A little nap after a long loop through the house. A safe afternoon instead of a dangerous fall. Caregiving teaches you to celebrate those tiny wins.
Then came the magic hour of two o’clock, when Claudia, the daytime caregiver, arrived. Relief flooded through her like cool water on a scorching day. She almost clapped, almost cheered. She didn’t, of course, but inside she wanted to. She kissed her parents, said I love you, and walked out into the sunlight, her phone down to 16 percent. Once she would have panicked over that. Now, after living inside the unpredictable storm of dementia, she doesn’t panic over a phone battery anymore.
This is what family looks like when dementia moves in. It’s messy, exhausting, sometimes heartbreaking, and strangely beautiful too. There are mornings filled with fear and afternoons with laughter. There are falls and phone calls that spike your heart rate, but also quiet moments when a wife still reaches for her husband’s hand and closes her eyes as if everything is still as it was.
Caregivers like her father, Ann, and Claudia hold this family together. They are tired, but they are love in motion. Dementia has changed everything, yet it cannot erase that simple, steady thread. Because even in the haze of memory loss, even in the chaos of the day, a mother still reaches for her husband’s hand. And in that gesture, you see everything worth holding on to.
