The real life Notebook
Just like the Hollywood film The Notebook, there isn’t anything James Dargan wouldn’t do for his dementia-stricken wife after 53 years together…
‘Standing at the bar of my local rugby club, a pair of piercing blue eyes caught my attention. A beautiful woman with dark hair was sitting at the opposite end. When she saw me, she smiled.
‘I remember you,’ she said. Her name was Judy and I’d accompanied my friend on a double date with her a few years before.
Back then, I wasn’t interested in girls, but now as we chatted, I realised Judy was beautiful, vivacious and a chatterbox. By the end of the night, I knew I’d met The One.
‘Fancy going to the pictures tomorrow?’ I asked, as the evening ended.
‘I’m on a date, but I can meet you Monday?’ she suggested. So, two days later, we went to see St Trinians at our local cinema in Harlow, Essex, but we barely saw a minute as we chatted – and kissed – our way through it.
A few days later, we went on a date to Wimpy and, using a silver cigarette packet, I made an engagement ring and proposed.
‘ Yes!’ she beamed. She said she’d told her mum after the cinema that she was going to marry me.
We were so happy and spent the next two years seeing each other every evening except Fridays – and even that break was only at her dad’s insistence.
‘He says we need a night apart,’ Judy told me. So, we’d write each other letters on that evening and exchange them on a Saturday night.
Finally, in March 1965, Judy, then 20, and I married in a local church. She did some modelling in her spare time and looked an absolute knockout. After that, married life was bliss. We did everything together and never spent a night apart.
Judy was a terrible flirt and it drove me mad sometimes, but we always came home together.
We were dedicated to each other, always writing romantic Valentines and anniversary cards. Forever holding hands, we were literally inseparable.
Whenever I’d tickle her palm, she’d smile. ‘Dinky doo,’ she’d say, which was our way of saying we loved each other.
In time, we went on to have our sons Jeremy, now 51, and Nicholas, 47, and Judy doted on them. She scrimped and saved, making sure they went on every school trip, had every possible opportunity. The boys were always beautifully dressed, just like Judy, and had the best haircuts, which she did herself. They wanted for nothing.
We loved spending time at the beach, I went to their football and rugby games. We were very lucky, but we worked at our marriage too. Always talking, laughing and enjoying life together.
As the boys grew, moved out and eventually started families of their own, Judy and I would go to the gym together. I did weights while she took part in her water aerobics class and she loved being a nan. She always
took care of everyone.
No matter the occasion, she spent ages doing her hair and make-up, too. Age hadn’t changed her beauty. ‘ Why does it take so long to get out the door?’ I’d always teased.
But in 2014, Judy started suffering panic attacks – I can’t remember exactly when or why they started, but it was so unlike her. Then she became distant – I’d ask her questions and she wouldn’t respond. Concerned, at a routine check-up, I spoke to a nurse.
She knew Judy well and thought she seemed more vacant than usual. After that, tests were run, we saw a psychologist and in April 2015, we got a diagnosis.
‘Judy has the onset of dementia,’ a specialist told us. It was a real shock and we both burst into tears. But after we got our heads around it, we handled it how we handled everything – head-on and together. We told the kids, who were incredibly supportive and for a time, I continued my work as a new business development manager. It meant trips to Denmark, but by the end of 2016, it became impossible to leave Judy. She’d call me at 2am while I was away, confused and disorientated. ‘I need you to take me to hospital,’ she’d say. I hated being apart from her, so I retired, and became Judy’s fulltime carer. As the dementia took hold, little pieces of Judy disappeared. She wasn’t as vivacious or as talkative. But she was still my Judy
Most days, I’d get out the old photo albums and re-tell her our love story. I’d made photo collages of our decades together which she liked to look at.
Eventually I had to wash and dress Judy, even applying her make-up each morning and doing her hair – and let me tell you, I was much quicker at it than her!
Sometimes I get glimpses of the old Judy. I was putting her to bed recently and I held her hand as always. ‘Dinky doo,’ she said, tickling my palm. My eyes prickled with tears. She was still there…
People always say I should get help, but I don’t want to be without Judy. She looked after me for more than 50 years and now it’s my turn.
Our relationship has been compared to the film
The Notebook as the main character has dementia, too, and her husband tries to remind her of their life together. But unlike the film, Judy, now 74, is at home with me and I never want her to leave.
Now, at 77, I have to feed her, she doesn’t really speak and she’s losing mobility, but I take her out every day in her wheelchair and we go to groups with other dementia sufferers.
It’s heart-breaking that she struggles to recognise me, our boys and the grandkids.
But I still love her every bit as much, and I’m trying to make the best of a bad situation. She’d do the same for me, I know it.
Being with Judy still makes me incredibly happy – she’s the love of my life – our lives are just different now.’