Rex's Story
By Robyn Raymer
Baby boomer Robyn Raymer has had to face the scenario all of us fear. Her ageing father started to develop symptoms of dementia. Robyn's father came to live with her and the stress really began to tell on everyone. She stuck with it for 18 months until late last year she realised she could no longer care for him at her Albany home. This is her account of that journey. It's filled with tears and sadness. But out of it emerges a story that inspires hope and understanding. And beyond that an abiding respect for the innovative work being done at the Alzheimer's Services of the East Bay project.
Last weekend my 86-year-old dad moved into an assisted living facility in Oakland, a block from Lake Merritt. The place's New Agey sounding name is AgeSong at Lakeside Park. Things are a little rough emotionally, but we are both taking it one day at a time. Hopefully the transition won't be too hard on my dad, a retired architect with dementia. It's definitely been hard on me. I've been deeply sad ever since I realized that I could no longer care for him at my home in Albany.
One reason--the main reason--that I was able to keep my dad, Rex, at home for as long as I did is this: There is a wonderful program on Channing Way in Berkeley called ASEB, or Alzheimer's Services of the East Bay. My dad has been a participant there for the past year and a half.
As a pre-dementia senior citizen, Rex wouldn't have been caught dead in a senior center of any kind. He was too shy, too much of an intellectual snob, and he just didn't think of himself as old (still doesn't). My hopes weren't high when I signed him up. And although the place had a good reputation, it scared me a bit when I first visited. It looked too small for the number of participants, and many of them looked frighteningly old and, well, demented. However, ASEB's social worker, Geri, reassured me when she made a home visit. Geri is warm, smart, practical, funny, and a lefty Baby Boomer like me. A couple of other social workers had previously visited my dad. They both meant well, I'm sure, but they treated my dad like a baby and told me a bunch of stuff I already knew. One sat at my dining table with my boyfriend and me and talked for an hour about her own parent's dementia, for which we paid her $200. She should've been paying us!
Little by little my dad got used to his "class" as I deviously called it. The people at ASEB are its best asset. From the nurses to the activity leaders to the chef to the office staff to the caregivers who help participants remember to go to the bathroom, everyone there--literally, everyone--is a loving, intelligent, intuitive person who cares about the participants and relates to them as individuals. I upped my dad's schedule from two days per week to four. I signed up to have him ride ASEB's (free) bus. His driver, Laura, is one of the most wonderful human beings I've ever met. She is gentle and courteous with her riders. She has a great sense of humor. She made me feel better on some terribly hard days. Even though Laura is always beautifully dressed, I never felt embarrassed to walk my dad to her bus in my funkiest nightgown. Laura has the rare gift of making people feel comfortable simply by being herself.
Rex the Architect
Gradually my dad began to do artwork at ASEB. This is a man who designed a hefty percentage of the office buildings and synagogues built during the late 1950s, 60s, and early 70s in Beverly Hills and West Los Angeles. As recently as three or four years ago he continually made artwork at home. He designed elaborate birthday party environments for my sisters and me, transforming our living room into a spaceship, a zoo, or a beach complete with snack bar. He built cool but somewhat temporary homemade furniture out of plywood and white contact paper. His home interiors were three-dimensional collages. He paved his backyard in Van Nuys with undulating spiral pathways made from the remains of a brick wall felled by the Northridge earthquake. He built a mid-century modern playhouse for his granddaughters.
For a while dementia didn't stop Rex's creative flow. His artworks got weirder, but they kept coming. But by the time he moved in with me, my dad's urge to create had petered out. He wouldn't help me make valentines or dye Easter eggs. He just sat and watched HGTV or just sat. This broke my heart.
But at ASEB Rex experienced an artistic renaissance. Every time I visited, the folks there had new drawings to show me. The work looked shakier than his old artworks, but his unmistakable style shone through. In addition to drawings, he made masks and ceramics. Once a 400-point-average Scrabble player, my dad also shone in word games, trivia, and name-that-tune. And he began to write, too (another skill that had gone by the wayside). When the art teacher asked him to describe a mask he'd made, my dad printed the following in his dear, familiar architect-style all caps:
THIS MASK IS--- "A MOMENTARY GLIMPSE INTO THE
SEDENTARY SHADOWS OF MY LURKING MIND.... POISED
TO LEAP INTO THE SHADOWS OF ABSOLUTE ECSTASY!!!"
After spelling every other word correctly, Rex signed this caption "Wrecks!" I still don't know if this was an intentional or unintentional pun.
Every time I talked to anyone at ASEB, he or she would compliment my dad's kindness and good manners with caregivers and participants. Apparently he would not eat lunch until everyone else was served and he often held hands with people who needed reassurance. I felt so proud--like the parent of an honor student.
ASEB resurrected aspects of Rex that his dementia had masked or blotted out. I will continue to send my dad there part-time until he has transferred his allegiance to his new home, where they luckily have similar programs to ASEB's. He's already doing drawings there: Yay! And he's fallen in love with his dining partner, a frail but beautiful old woman named Genevieve.
If you are an East Bay resident who's caring for a loved one with dementia or Alzheimer's, I can't recommend ASEB highly enough. They take MediCal and offer grants, by the way, so don't let finances stop you.
And of course, in these days of state budget cuts, this is a program that needs--and so clearly deserves--cash donations. Their website is at aseb.org.