Living with Alzheimer's disease

Bill West's father has had Alzheimer's disease for 12 years. His mother has an undiagnosed dementia. A recent University of Washington study of families in which both parents had Alzheimer's found that 42 percent of their children developed the disease by age 70.

Bill was diagnosed with Alzheimer's at age 58. Now nearly 65, he appears to be in the final stage of the disease.

Bill enlisted in the U.S. Navy at 17 and became a radarman. He and his wife Doris lived in Fenton, Mo., until they retired to Lake Wapappello. Bill loved to fish. They wintered in the Rio Grande Valley in Texas.

Doris first noticed Bill was starting to forget where he'd put keys, tools and his billfold. A year later he was diagnosed with Alzheimer's disease.

People with Alzheimer's sometimes wander. Doris put alarms on the doors of their house and kept watch on Bill, but he still walked away from their home a few times, once traveling more than 4 miles. Twice Doris called the police to help look for him.

Their grown children helped her care for him, but she had to be constantly on guard. "The last two years I didn't leave him alone," she said.

Bill moved into the Missouri Veterans Home Alzheimer's Unit last May. Doris moved to Cape Girardeau in November to be near him.

Living on the ward required an adjustment, Doris said. Bill didn't want to go into the shower room that has a bathtub but didn't mind the shower room that has no tub. Dramatic mood swings are one symptom of Alzheimer's disease. Patients become upset but they can't explain why.

Unlike some Alzheimer's patients, Bill is still walking around and talking. But Doris says his chart indicates he's in the last stage of the disease. In that stage, the patient needs help dressing and bathing and the memory of his own life is a blur.

Doris has three children and Bill two, both from previous marriages. The closest lives an hour and a half away. When the subject of children came up, Bill asked her, "We didn't have any children, did we?"

"No, we didn't have any children," she said. "We had plenty between the two of us."

Jean Sherrill, a nurse in charge of the Alzheimer's Unit, said the staff worries about the wives — all but one of the 50 residents on the ward are men — as much as they do the patients. One wife drove to Cape Girardeau every day from Poplar Bluff, a distance of 83 miles each way. "It's like you need to be needed," Sherrill said. "Their lives are here."

Doris visits the ward every day and has lunch with Bill. "He's always looking for me, asking for me and waiting for me," she said.

When she leaves in the afternoon they say, "Good night, I love you, see you in the morning."

— SAM BLACKWELL