The green chair by the door

He sat in the green crushed velvet chair by the door. He had his face in his hands and he was staring at the floor. He didn't move for about an hour. When we tried asking him what was wrong, for the first few minutes he couldn't even reply. He was trying to hide the fact that he was crying.

When we finally got him to tell us why he was so upset, he told us he was worried about David. You see, his hallucinations are a permanent part of his reality now. Sometimes he confuses seeing us around the house with the characters in his mind. He thought he had seen David in the house, and was now worried because no one (we) could tell him where David went or when he had left. "They just up and left without saying a word!"

He feels abandoned most of the time. He remembers loved ones in long-ago time periods. He forgets that the loved ones he's searching for are dead, and the loved ones he has here with him he doesn't know at all. I feel like he knows we've been around for a long time, sometimes he even makes comments about knowing Stephen his whole life. But he doesn't know why, doesn't know who he is and if we try to tell him it's his grandson, he laughs and looks at us in disbelief. Stephen, when he remembers him, is still just a little boy. Which is why a few nights ago when he said my name, it almost made me cry.

Everything about this is unbelievable. It's all so surreal and we're almost to the end of the road. There is no way to learn to cope with this. It will haunt us for a time, I think. Maybe it will always haunt us. I have felt so guilty. I have become numb. I learned to turn off my compassion and go through the motions mechanically. I used to cry every night, every time he mentioned Grace, every time he looked at Stephen and asked him for his name. At some point, you have to turn it off. If you don't, it will kill you. I swear to god, the suffering you watch an Alzheimer's patient go through will kill your spirit.

I'd give up anything to reverse life's fucked up sentence on him.