An unwelcome guest invades my partner’s life
I’VE yet to write a word about my partner Kitty Fitzgerald having Alzheimer’s. ‘Why not?’ she asked me recently. I had no simple answer.
Mention Alzheimer’s and many people say ‘my mum/dad had that’ which is a bit different to it afflicting your partner.
Those who know Kitty will be familiar with a colourful, strongminded, feisty character, with a good sense of humour and a colourful dress sense. She retains these atttributes despite the presence of the unwelcome Mr A.
Kitty is also the author of (among many books and plays) one of the most interesting recent novels from these shores.
Pigtopia is a fable about Jack Plum, a large unwieldly young man with learning difficulties, more at home with the world of pigs than humans, something beyond the comprehension of his fellow beings. This leads to tragic consequences. The book’s written mainly in Jack’s own idiosyncratic language which after a few minutes is easy enough for the reader to follow.
Pigtopia began life as a BBC radio play; the book has been translated into 22 languages, won a Barnes & Noble Award for most promising new novel and was Amy Winehouse’s favourite work. There’s also a film option out. Yet Alzheimer’s cares for none of this. It is heartless, pitiless, a thief without a conscience, a plunderer of lives without remorse. It chooses the genius and the doltard, the former Olympic athlete and the slothful, the beautiful and the plain.
Over the last three years, I’ve been witness to this unwelcome guest nudging closer into Kitty’s life. It began with something absurd, her lost handbag turning up two days later inside the washing machine. I can still hear our relieved laughter before the potential of this absurdity became apparent. A pattern was forming,
Much of Kitty’s childhood as an Irish immigrant was spent in digs.
Irish immigrants were not always popular then and she was encouraged to keep everything out of sight, a sensible strategy at that time, but not so these many decades later when the location of
those hidden items is likely to slip from her memory; hunt the purse, or hunt the bag, or hunt the glasses or hunt whatever, becomes a regular and frustrating activity.
There is something about Alzheimer’s that’s in common with the Buddhist Zen philosophy.
In Zen we are encouraged to live in the present, not be trapped by the past, nor be over-distracted by dreams of the unknown future.
Sufferers from Alzheimer’s increasingly know only this present and, as the disease takes a grip, a discussion of the play or film the two of us viewed the other night can become problematic – it’s hit and miss.
Close contact with Alzheimer’s also brings a great need for patience on behalf of the partner, family or friend, something not always my own leading attribute.
Whatever does get lost, misplaced, forgotten or abandoned, however disruptive, is not the Alzheimer sufferer’s own fault – a fact of which you need regularly to remind yourself. One big major support in all this is Kitty’s daughter Jo, who lives in Lancaster, runs her own care service and knows her way intimately through the system.
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My heart bleeds to see how bravely the one I love battles against this unfair and unexpected enemy which could come visiting anyone. It’s the luck of the draw
On the small details of everyday life; you’re likely to miss the Metro when searching for a vanished shoe. You’re late meeting friends when a purse suddenly goes AWOL. You’re too late for the film’s opening because there is not a sign of the lipstick. Or Kitty might ask the same question several times wthin a few minutes.
Mobile phones – vulnerable for all of us. These are a frequent victim of those suffering memory loss and Kitty’s replacement mobiles have kept Samsung in business.
All this may give a false and unfair impression of my life with Kitty.
Her uninvited condition is one that fills me with compassion and my heart bleeds to see how bravely the one I love battles against this unfair and unexpected enemy which could come visiting anyone. It’s the luck of the draw.
Thanks for your suggested collective nouns for a group of British Prime Ministers. More on this next week. ■ pmortimer@xlnmail.com ■ Planet Corona ,The First 100 Columns, IRON Press, £8.00