My husband is in the late stages of dementia. He can no longer walk, process conversations or complete sentences. But he is still very much my husband.
Although he is in a care center, I am still caregiving and spending a great deal of time with him.
We are no longer the couple we used to be. Our roles are no longer what they used to be. Our social life, sex life, family life, and business life are no longer what we dreamed of fifty-eight years ago.
The disease has taken away most of my husband’s cognitive functioning. It has robbed us of our future, and he can no longer remember our past. But… we do have today and we do have moments of connection in small ways.
One of those small ways of connection was when I was reading a book to him just a few nights ago. He was tired of looking at pictures from the nature books I brought him from the library, so I offered to read him from a book I had just started, Heart of a Stranger, by Rabbi Angela Buchdahl. It is a story of faith, identity and belonging.
Rabbi Buchdahl is the first Asian American rabbi. She is the Senior Rabbi of Central Synagogue in New York City and the first woman to lead this congregation in its 185-year history. Under her leadership, the synagogue has grown to become one of the largest synagogues in the world.
I read parts of the book to him slowly, emphasizing certain words and sentences that were meaningful. In unison my husband and I teared up and began to cry together at some of the passages. I certainly was not surprised at my tears as I am accustomed to them, but I was amazed that my husband was able to exhibit emotions, something which he has not been capable of in a long time.
I’m not sure if it was the words, the rhythm of my voice, or something larger that touched him, but in those small moments we connected deeply. We communicated without words or explanations getting in the way. Some might call this the mystery of things unseen or understood.
The words of the great poet and mystic Rumi came to my mind as I headed back to my apartment alone that night:
Out beyond ideas of wrongdoing and rightdoing,
There is a field. I’ll meet you there.
When the soul lies down in that grass,
The world is too full to talk about.
Ideas, language, even the phrase each other
Doesn’t make any sense.
Perhaps, just perhaps, this is one of those slow-motion miracles – the kind that you might not notice unless you are open to awe and wonder in the midst of caregiving, changing Depends, repeating things over and over again, and struggling to stay patient and compassionate.
We are no longer the couple we used to be, but we are the couple we are. There is a field where we still meet. Somewhere beyond language, beyond explanation, beyond understanding but known to our hearts and maybe even our souls. It is our invisible lines of connection. He is still very much my husband and we belong to each other.
Reflection: Communication is more than words. It is something that passes between human beings that lands in the heart.
Today’s Practice: Be open to all that is unseen, unexplained, and unknown.