The Art of Remembering
By Wendy Mengel
@wendycmengel
He walks quickly, panicked. Away from me in the parking lot. Toward a street and traffic and away from the car. I am walking about 10 feet behind him, going as fast as I can without trying to make it look like I’m chasing him. My heart is pounding. What am I going to do if he gets away from me?
I catch up to him and try to touch his arm gently, just to turn him around. “No!” he shouts, and rips his arm away from me. He turns and looks at me with a mixture of anger and fear behind his eyes. “Get away from me!” he shouts.
I speak desperately. “Dad, it’s me, your daughter. Let’s get in the car, please.” I’m not sure how much longer we can stand in the parking lot while he shouts without people noticing. I’m embarrassed by what’s happening, my lack of control, how it looks to others. “Dad, please. It’s just me. Let’s go.” I try to sound calm but my insides are racing. Lord, help him remember who I am.
***
“Mommy, will you cozy me?” I hear his little voice over the monitor and smile to myself. This is our nightly dance. We put our three-year-old son Judah to bed, only to have a conversation via the video monitor for several minutes before he’s actually falling asleep. We give a few more hugs and cozies and say goodnight again.
He rolls over, pulls his covers up, and we hear him say goodnight with a “Boop she boop she boo” shoutout to Daniel Tiger at some point.
I sigh with a smile. I love this routine. The words and phrases remind me of the exact phase we’re in—where Daniel Tiger is the absolute best and going to bed is slightly hard, but he still wants to be cozied by his mommy and daddy. Where he’s old enough to hold a conversation with us over the video monitor but young enough to still have a monitor in his room. These aren’t memories I’ll catalog in the baby books, but they perfectly capture the sweetness of our sometimes mundane, yet precious, days. Lord, please help me remember these moments.
***
“Your dad has some type of early-onset, aggressive dementia.” The words leave the neurologist’s mouth coolly, lacking emotion, as if she’s said them 1000 times to families over the years. And I’m sure she has. But all I can see is my dad in front of me changing daily—instead of the funny, social man I’ve always known, I now see a man who can’t find the right words, spends money impulsively, and doesn’t know what to do at the grocery store.
He still loves my mom dearly—that has never changed—and he loves us girls, his three daughters. But now, we take care of him.
It progresses quickly and there is a sharp, fast decline in the fall of 2016. He goes from not being able to work but staying at home, mostly happily, to needing full-time care at the house. He is still mobile and strong, and his body is young and healthy despite his deteriorating brain. He is strong enough to run away from one of his caregivers in downtown Denver when they are visiting the zoo. But he’s not safe by “himself.” He throws rocks at a young woman who comes over from the home care agency. He gets lost when my mom takes the dog into the vet for five minutes and asks him to stay put on an outside bench. The police are called and my sister finds him streets away, crying by a strip mall sign, not sure where he is or what’s happening.
What is it about losing one’s memories that is so tragic? It feels heavy every single day, like a weight on our family that can’t be shaken. No matter what, his dementia is getting worse. There are two medications he can take to potentially slow the decline, but nothing reverses it and nothing stops it. It is a continual loss of what makes him who he is—his personality, memories, sense of self.
At what point is Dad even my Dad anymore? Lord, this is horrible and unfair. Why is this happening?
***
As a mom, there are many things I am not great at. I am not a great cook. My kids eat too much mac ‘n cheese and casseroles. I am not a great home decorator, or interior designer. Other people’s homes look so much more beautiful and put together than mine.
What am I good at, though? Documenting my family. I have a monthly “update photo albums” reminder on my to-do list. With photo albums, picture taking, and baby books, my two boys’ lives and their details thus far are well preserved. I think it’s the nurse in me. I was taught: “Document, document, document. If you didn’t document it, it didn’t happen.”
I tend to feel this way as a parent, too. But I sense in myself a panic at times, as I imagine what it would be like to forget these things. I have to write them down. What if I forget or can’t tell them someday? What will that mean for our relationship, or for me as a mother?
***
Memory is not just documented details and dates.
It is holding my second son and feeling the warmth of his little baby body close to mine, seeing his hand rest on the top of my breast while nursing, and remembering the same experience with his older brother.
It is kissing my husband after he’s shaved his “no-shave November” mustache (typical of every firefighter) and instantly being taken back to 2006 when we started dating in college.
It’s hearing my dad’s voice on a saved voicemail and feeling my eyes well with tears, remembering how I would call him everyday and he would answer with, “Hi, Winnie!”
I’ll never hear him say that again, but the sound of his voice calms my soul, just like it did while growing up.
Each day I am cataloging the beauty, joy, sadness and wonder as I live, in the way that I look at my children, hug my husband, listen to their voices, and take it all in. It has to be more than just the conscious memories I can recite, or retell. Somehow, kind of mysteriously, these moments are imprinted in me deeply, from the day to day experiences of my life. By the grace of God, he is writing these things on my heart. I hear Him say, Trust me.
***
I’m a little timid as I walk in the room. It smells like I remember it, a little bit like soap and cafeteria food and wheelchairs. I peer past the curtain separating the two sides of the room and see him sitting in his wheelchair, feet and hands contracted so badly that he cannot use them anymore, head tilted to the side where it rests on a pillow, his gaze staring out. He’s looking out the window so I set down my purse and position myself where I can see him, and am in the line of his vision.
At first, his eyes are blank, seemingly empty. His mouth is drawn downward, and there is a little drool escaping from the side.
“Hi, Dad,” I say, getting choked up. It’s been over 15 months since I’ve seen my dad in person due to COVID. He lives at a long-term care facility, and it has been shut down to visitors. When it finally opened up, I had just had a baby and wasn’t vaccinated yet, so I couldn’t go. Now, I finally get to go see him in person.
“I’ve missed you so much. I’m sorry it’s been so long.” I start to cry, when I look up to see and feel his eyes lock onto mine. His whole face changes—his mouth curves up, his eyes brighten, his eyebrows raise, and I hear, “Oh, hi Sweetie!” so faintly but so clearly.
I weep. Tears of joy and sadness at the same time. He knows me. He will always know me.
Even if it’s just for a moment. Thank you, Lord.
We are written on each other’s hearts.
Guest essay written by Wendy Mengel. Wendy lives with her husband Charlie and two boys, Judah and Shep, in Littleton, CO. She is a nurse and a mom and loves to process motherhood through writing. You can find her almost all the time with a cup of lukewarm coffee, trying to enjoy each day of this beautiful life. She is a new member of the Exhale community. This is her first published essay.
Photo by Jennifer Floyd.