A friend at work loaned me her copy of "Jan's Story" by Barry Peterson. He is a CBS news reporter, and the book is the story of his wife's journey with Early Onset Alzheimer's Disease. She was in her early 50's when she was diagnosed; she was living in a facility with the end-stage of the disease as the book ended (her body remains relatively healthy even as her brain deteriorates). It was a well-written, interesting, informative book that talked about the stages they moved through as a couple for years. He apparently adored her - he portrays her as a perfect, happy, cheerful, exuberant, intelligent woman before the disease took over.
I understood his descriptions of his own journey into depression and suicidal thoughts as he struggled to be the best caregiver he could be. I share the following quotes here, because I don't want to lose them -- and because I've been there. Barry's daughters and granddaughter pulled him back from the edge -- just as my love for Jessica and Elisha yanked me back.
P 135 – “… there was another storm of emotion forming; … why keep going? Why? It is a volatile and dangerous question. And when there seems no purpose and no destination in life, there looms a dark place where there is an answer, an frightening but calmly appealing answer. And I thought perhaps in that darkness I would find, if not solace, an end to the pain.”
Pg138 – “I was finally and hopelessly lost in the darkest part of a valley, a deep abyss, a place that offers no good rason to go on. In this valley, in this blinding blackness, all you can see is what is gone. And you only see that in your memories.”
P 139 – “It was the pain, not my life that I wanted to end.”
And so I was pulled back from the edge that Anna leapt from. I understand in my head and in my heart, but the pain endures unchanging.
