Enough to make a grown man cry
Loving wife’s heartbreaking spiral into dementia
Devoted husband Eugene McIntyre is rarely away from his wife Roseanna’s side. She is his world, and he hers. But dementia has stolen from him the woman he’s been married to for 45 years. And he misses her sorely every day.
Eugene and Roseanna were mortgage-free, their three daughters had flown the nest and he was preparing to park up the HGV he’d driven long distances for many years to embark on the exciting new journey retirement promised.
Always keen travellers, the couple spent hours together, planning new adventures to far-flung destinations – and the making of new memories.
But six years ago, Roseanna made a routine trip to the supermarket in the car – and returned home without it.
That was followed by a number of other episodes that betrayed her failing memory.
It was during foreign holidays that symptoms of what transpired to be dementia came to the fore.
A celebratory 40th wedding anniversary cruise on the Queen Elizabeth liner, which saw them visiting Singapore, Kuala Lumpur, India and the UAE, passed with only minor lapses.
But during a holiday in Mexico, Roseanna had what her husband describes as “a bit of a wobble,” which, at the time, he put down to the heat.
“She went to the toilet and did not come back,” said Eugene.
“I went to the apartment to look for her. She wasn’t there. I went back to the pool, to the reception and back to the room again before returning to reception to report it.
“There she was, wandering about looking for me. That was a little bit frightening. The complex was big and quite secure, but still your mind runs riot.”
A year later, half way through the first week of a dream holiday in Egypt, Eugene says his wife “seemed to snap, go into another world.”
“She thought her grandkids had been kidnapped,” he said.
“She started accusing people of stealing her things. She went out on to the veranda one night and told people her granddaughter was lost and she needed to form a search party.
“I heard quite a commotion and had to go out and put it right.
“I tried to explain to her that nothing had happened and everyone was fine at home.
“We had to Facetime the family, let her see them and speak to them, and that settled her down.”
Acutely aware that Roseanna needed urgent help, Eugene tried to cut short their two-week holiday and fly her home.
With the only available travel option to Glasgow involving stop-offs at Cairo, Paris and London, Eugene decided he had no choice but to ride it out until it was time to go home. Roseanna underwent numerous tests to eliminate other explanations for her worrying symptoms – including heavy duty pain killers she’d been taking for many years after suffering a serious leg injury.
Because she was aged under
65, she was referred to the early onset dementia team. She was no