Memories for my Father

Memories for my father

October 31, 2013

On a winter day in Indiana in 1981, my then-64-year-old dad took a face-first tumble from his garage roof while trying to remove accumulated snow. His crash landing fractured his nose and both cheekbones. When he awoke from surgery to repair the damage, we discovered he had permanently lost his short-term memory.

At the time, he and my mom owned and operated a small landscaping business. Mom did the paperwork, dad did the planning and communicating with customers, and they had a small group of workers to do most of the heavy lifting.

Mom quickly realized he could no longer deal with customers effectively because he would immediately forget every conversation. Rather than close the business, she became his memory. She listened in on all customer phone calls and accompanied him to customer meetings to take notes about their conversations. She then translated her meticulous notes into work instructions to remind him of what work he had agreed to do for each customer. She also accompanied him to each job site to make sure he was reminded of what he was supposed to accomplish each day.

Amazingly, he never forgot what he knew about landscaping and could apply his skills as well as before the accident. He simply could not recall any immediately recent event or exchange. They managed to run the business effectively for several more years.

My wife and I were living in Connecticut at the time, and on every home visit we always found Dad in great spirits. He had always been a voracious reader and could no longer enjoy that pleasure because the moment he put a book aside he could not recall what he had just read. But he never stopped trying, and books were scattered all around the house, opened to the last page he had turned. He once joked that one good side effect of no memory was that TV shows no longer had reruns.

I never once saw him demonstrate an ounce of anger or disappointment about the bad luck he had encountered in losing his memory.

My mom was simply amazing, too. She never complained and did whatever it took to help him keep their business and only means of support operating. They finally retired and closed the business when he turned 70. They had saved enough to look forward to a peaceful retirement.

About a year later, Dad was diagnosed with terminal leukemia. The oncologists told us they could slightly prolong his life with chemotherapy, but in recognition of dad’s missing short-term memory, they told us it would be a horrible experience for him because he would have to be hospitalized, and every time he woke up he would be terrified because he would not know where he was or why he was strapped to a bed. Mom could not stand putting him through this suffering and decided to let him go peacefully.

I was full of guilt at being so far away during what would clearly be his last year alive because I felt like I was failing my parents. My wife came up with what turned out to be a brilliant idea. She reminded me that about the only meaningful conversations we could have with Dad since his injury was to jog his memory by reminding him of some old family memories. He never forgot the distant past, and once reminded would spend long periods of time retelling stories. It took a bit of patience because he would finish a story and then begin again ... and again.

She suggested we send Dad memory cards. She explained that we could buy a large supply of greeting cards, and every day until he died, we could write down a memory about Dad’s life and mail him a card describing some past event in his life to jog his memory.

That’s exactly what we did. Each new card would start out with, “Dear Dad, do you remember the time when ...” — and the memory of an event would follow. It turned out to serve several purposes; it helped me recall many fond memories I had forgotten, it helped my mom recall and remind him of their shared memories, and it definitely provided immense pleasure to my dad during the last year of his life.

Mom told us Dad couldn’t wait for the mailman to show up each day so he could open his next memory card. She told us it made her cry to see the pleasure on his face as he read each new message and began to share the rest of the story, and the sad look when, for whatever reason, a card was delayed in the mail.

It cost little, but it provided a small way to be there more often for Dad in spirit if not in person. I will always be grateful to my wife for her loving thoughtfulness.

As Dad was dying in hospice, my brother and I were on either side of his bed when he woke up for the last time. He recognized us and smiled. For some reason, I asked him if he was afraid of dying. Ever the optimist, he said no because he couldn’t wait to see what was on the other side!

His answer and the peaceful smile on his face are memories I will never forget.

Mike Tower