"The task before you is awesome. It takes faith, knowledge, and courage, but above all acceptance, patience, and love to deal with the challenges you will encounter in the days, weeks, months, and yes, years to come. For this difficult task you will need as much guidance as you can find."
In late 1984, sixty-four-year-old Mary M. Wall first experienced symptoms of brain degeneration. For the next seven years-until her death in l992-she would be the victim of a triple assault on her mind and body as she suffered from a combination of Parkinson's disease, Multi-infarctdementia (frequent small strokes), and Alzheimer's disease.
In Where Did Mary Go? Frank A. Wall shares his very personal account of their struggle with Mary's illness, beginning with the chilling recognition that "something is wrong with Mary." Determined to be the primary caregiver for his wife, he candidly discusses this stress- and emotion-filled time as Mary gradually slipped away from him and their children.
Confronted with the twenty-four-hour care of his beloved patient in all facets of her daily life, Wall describes in detail the care-giving problems and frustrations he encountered, the creative solutions he devised to cope with these obstacles, and his own anguish. To reduce the risk of choking and the inhalation of food, which were constant threats to Mary's well-being, every hit of food had to be processed to a pureed texture and fed slowly to her; liquids needed to be thickened so she could swallow them more easily; and throat obstructions had to be cleared with suction As Mary lost the ability to communicate verbally, her husband had to learn to interpret her eye communication and gestures.
Wall gives the reader a road map explaining what to expect as the illness progresses, including some of the signals, symptoms and reactions to mental confusion, incontinence, falling, wandering, and other related problems. He conveys Mary's reactions a various stages of her illness and her ability to cope with these diseases and their effects or her family. Especially revealing is the pictorial section showing Mary's decline from a vibrant, healthy individual through the torturous progression of her mental and physical decline until her death.
Wall shares many of the practical lessons learned during his care-giving, and with this hands-on experience provides new caregivers with insights about what to expect and how to cope with caring for their loved ones while also caring for themselves.
FRANK A. WALL is a retired Air Force Colonel and businessman.
148 pages
ISBN 1-57392-070-3