November 2006 Vol. 25. No. 11

Published by the Humboldt Senior Resource Center in Eureka, California. HSRC is a non-profit community-based organization offering services for senior citizens, multi-generational families and caregivers.

Alzheimer's Month: Walking the long road together
What are the new private fee-for-service Medicare plans all about?
Senior employment: Experience Works replaces AARP
Light a candle for Alzheimer's
Memory screenings set Nov. 14
Honoring veterans: Take a sentimental journey with us Nov. 11

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Melissa Merryman-Kinder with her mom, Edie Merryman

For the first six months that Melissa Merryman-Kinder visited her mother in Timber Ridge's Renaissance residence for Alzheimer's patients, her mom, Edie Merryman, begged to go home.

"This is home," Melissa would assure her. And then she would drive away in tears.

Now, 14 months later, it is home, and the matriarch of the Merryman clan that made famous the restaurant above Moonstone beach doesn't ask anymore.

The process of this new life Melissa is living with her mother began some seven years ago when in a routine doctor's appointment, the doctor began prescribing Aricept for Edie, one of the new drugs that postpones the devastation of Alzheimer's.

Her mom was always afraid that she would get the disease because most of the elders on her side of the family who lived long enough did develop Alzheimer's. But still, Melissa couldn't bear to tell her the truth. And now Edie doesn't ask anymore.

The hardest part of the long road of Alzheimer's for Melissa is "overwhelming guilt that I need to see her every day, and I can't do that. It's always kind of sitting there in my heart," she explained. The mother of three young girls, 14, 11 and 8, Melissa has her share of swim team, soccer practices and gymnastics classes to ferry the girls to and from. She gets in to Eureka to see her mom at least three times a week, bringing along the girls on some of the trips. Edie doesn't always remember who they are now, though she still recognizes Melissa.

The one regret that she has was the extra move that the family pressed upon Edie - from the old familiar family home into a year-long residence at Ocean West. Now Melissa would advise families not to move a person whose confusion can come simply from a different kind of light switch. Edie moved then into Timber Ridge McKinleyville until behaviors dictated a more sheltered structure. It was heartbreaking for the whole family.

The sweetest part of the experience for Melissa is that her mother - always somewhat harsh and difficult, feisty and opinionated - is now sweet and tender. "For anyone who loves the innocence of children, you wouldn't abandon an infant, and you couldn't abandon an 80-year-old in the same state. She's a totally different person than the one I grew up with. I'm enjoying this stage because I didn't get this as a child."

The family face of caregiving is our focus this month of national observances - Alzheimer's Month, Family Caregivers Month, Mental Health Month. The Kinders - and their Nana - could be poster children, as could any of the 2,400 families in Humboldt County with a family member who has a diagnosis of Alzheimer's or other dementia.

The process led Melissa to the caregiver support groups and classes led by Maggie Kraft, director of the Adult Day Health Services program of the Humboldt Senior Resource Center. "That was the best thing I did," Melissa recalled. "I could hear other people's stories. I wasn't alone. We were having the same experiences."

Melissa has volunteered to work on the community gifts committee, one of the many subcommittees fundraising for the New Alzheimer's Center being built by HSRC. "There is a passion for me to make that center successful even though my mother won't get to enjoy it," Melissa explained. "It's hard to get people involved who haven't experienced this. But I'm living it," she added. "It's a long road. Like the book title, it's a long goodbye."