The Disease That Took Melina Away
ALZHEIMER'S
Following is the story of my great-grandmother, Melina Beauvais', struggle with the disease known as Alzheimer's until it took her life 10 long years after it was diagnosed.
Below you will find links to different websites relating to Alzheimer's for more information on this terrible disease.
We first realized that something was wrong with Melina in 1989. After the death of her husband we began to notice that she was forgetting things and doing things a normal person would not do. She burned old, important documents that included deeds, birth certificates, etc. She painted everything in the house with shoe polish and she fed her cat Coke and cereal instead of water and cat food. Finally, we realized she was leaving her gas stove on nearly all day. A year after Horace Beauvais died, Melina had to be taken out of her home because she was no longer able to be there alone all the time.
We bought a trailer and put it on the lot behind Dorothy's house. Every day Dorothy would go to check on Melina, fix her food and wash her clothes. She seemed happy here, and when she would come to visit at Dorothy's house she would tell us how she had visitors all the time. Her "visitors" consisted of her late husband, her young brother and mother, all of whom had passed away many years ago. She constantly kept leaving, telling us she was watching Robert and that she couldn't leave him alone. She almost burnt the trailer down at this time also. She often talked about crazy things, but sometimes knew what was going on. This went on for about a year or two, until we recieved a phone call at 4 a.m. one morning telling us they had found her roaming the streets, lost and not knowing who she was or where she was.
After that, Melina was moved into her daughter's home and put in the extra bedroom. By this time, she was more like a young child than a grown woman. Locks had to be put on all the doors because she was always trying to leave. She confided in me often that she thought my grandparents were trying to kill her. Pointing to my grandfather, she whispered, "He's trying to poison me." I don't even know if she knew he was her beloved son-in-law. The more Melina regressed, the more Dorothy had to take care of her. The roles of mother and daughter were reversed and it was hard on Dorothy. Melina was put into a nursing home for about 2 months, but was brought home. No one would take as good care of her as her daughter. And that was the truth.
We bought her toys and crafts designed for children for her to play with and these usually kept her occupied. She walked around the house, talking with everyone. She was completely healthy except for her mind. However, in the summer of 1991, she fell down and broke her hip. She was hospitalized for a month, and she deteriorated quickly during this short time. After the hospital stay, she never walked again. At night she was cleaned and put to bed, by day she sat at the kitchen table and talked to everyone. She had to be spoon-fed by me or my grandmother during meals. As the years wore on, she talked less and less. The aides and nurses that tended to her every day loved her though, for she always had the sweetest dispostion. At this point, she no longer knew who any of us were.
By 1995, she only spoke a few words here and there, her legs had begun to turn in and had to be held apart at night by a pillow so they would not stay that way permanently. At this time, Dorothy began to get sick. She could no longer take care of Melina the way she had. The aides and nurses took on all of the responsibilites of caring for her as Dorothy continued to deterioate. Eventually, her legs did curl up for good. As all Alzheimer's patients do, she was going back into the fetal position. She never screamed or hollered, only sat there, no longer even talking. Who knows where her mind was those last few years. What did she see, hear, feel, think? The saddest thing was that she was healthier than nearly all of us. Everything in her body was tip-top shape, except her mind. Had she not been struck down with Alzheimer's, she would have been leading a full, productive life for a 90 year old woman. She was healthier than her dying daughter.
Everyone felt that Melina held on for her daughter's sake. That she just couldn't leave this Earth with her precious daughter still here. They were extremely close and both of them had spent half of their lives taking care of the other. Dorothy passed away in September 1998 in the doorway of her mother's room while Melina lay there. Did she know? We will can only guess. She lived on another 5 months, joining her daughter on January 22, 1999.
To watch Melina go from a grown, wonderful woman to the mind of a small child, then to an almost infant-like state was heart-wrenching. Her death brought relief to her family, instead of anguish. Relief that she was free from the prison her body had become, relief that she was gone from the mind that had betrayed her. There were times through the years when clarity seemed to suddenly strike her. Her eyes would suddenly clear, and she would cry and apologize to whomever was taking care of her. Then she would lapse back. At those times, she knew. She knew what was happening to her, what she was becoming. How frightened she must have been. It is my hope, and my families, that someday soon a cure for this terrible disease will be found. No one should have to live the last years of their life with this disease. No one.
Alzheimer's Information Links
For victims & their family members
| The Alzheimer's Association |
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| Alzheimer Research Forum |
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| Alzheimer's Outreach |
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| Alzheimer's.com |
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| Alzheimer's Research Foundation |
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| Alzheimer's Disease Society |
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| Alzheimer's Disease Education & Referral Center |
To Dorothy's Disease
This website created December 1998 by Shanna Bourke
All photos, writings, and graphics © Shanna Bourke 1998, 1999
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