Because I'm still your son

Dad,

You have Alzheimer’s. This means you don’t always remember things. It means you don’t always understand things. Still, even if it’s somewhere deep within you, I think you’ve noticed.

I don’t talk to you very much anymore.

In fact, I tell other people: “I don’t talk to my dad at all anymore.”

The exception is if you ask me a question that I can’t answer with a hand gesture. Or if I need to address both you and mom. And there will always be other exceptions.

But they will be the exception.

I don’t like this new rule of mine. But I don’t have much of a choice anymore. I have to defend myself. I still have to support you, and this is my way to do both.

Dad, I’m kind of afraid to talk to you. That’s the truth. I’m tired of you yelling at me. I want it to stop. I don’t think if I’ve ever admitted to you how much it hurts when you yell at me.

Like when I was in...was it middle school? High school? Either way, I remember I was at church at youth group, sometime at night. You were in the car. You were sleeping sprawled out in the backseats. I opened the door and told you I'd be a few more minutes because I wanted to be cool and chat with my friends more. I told you that, and then I closed the door.

Nothing seemed unusual.

I ran back to the sanctuary. There was calling and yelling and laughing. So I didn’t notice it at first.

It wasn’t until someone pointed it out to me.

“Hey uh, I think your dad is trying to get you...” they said.

I turned around. You were marching across the parking lot.

“He seems…mad.”

You were.

The only thing I remember from this next part is that you said that I hit your head. Screamed it. I guess this must have happened when I closed the car door.

My memory blanks on what happens next, and then returns when you drive me home, and I'm crying, bawling. You chewed me out in front of all my friends.

And my memory ends again.

I haven’t thought of this memory in a long time. A very long time. In retrospect it’s not that bad. You never physically hit me. Never even threatened to. Still, now that I recall it, I can feel like it was yesterday. It was that visceral.

Dad, do you know why I remember it?

Two weeks ago, I was asleep.

Suddenly, there was yelling. This is normal for you and mom at this point. But there was something about this that was different. It kept going. And going.

So I came out to the living room to investigate.

“What’s the problem?” I announced.

“Nobody cares about me!” you scream.

“Huh?” I mumble.

Reminder, I just woke up. I have no idea what’s going on. But in your mind, I think you take this as a sign that I’m not paying attention.

“it’s very painful!” you yell in Cantonese, really really yell. I haven’t heard you yell like this in a long, long time.

I suddenly see mom holding the vacuum cleaner. She isn’t particularly good about depth perception. I wonder if she hit your head with it. I’m trying to connect the dots about what to do next, still in my groggy state.

But because I don’t immediately do whatever it is you hoped I would do, maybe because you interpret my confusion as indifference, you scream again. “You always take her side!”

And now, I’m suddenly awake.

'Leave...’ I can hear the sensible voice in my head speaking to me. It tells me to leave, and reset the situation and let it diffuse on its own. ‘That’s how you win.’

But I don’t.

I don’t know if it’s because now I suddenly feel attacked, and it brings back memories of how you attacked me and how no one was there to stand up for me.

'You always take her side’ is never true. I’d challenge you to prove it, but you would simply see that I’m challenging you which would just prove your point.

And so I fight back. I know better, but maybe I actually don’t. It doesn’t matter what I said, or what you said back to me.

I should have retreated. But there is no retreating against Alzheimer’s, memory loss, confusion. It is merciless and it does not stop.

Like just the other day, when you kept looking for something in the refrigerator and couldn’t seem to find it. It turns out you wanted milk, but we had run out. So I offered to pour you almond milk instead. I asked you to tell me when to stop pouring. You didn’t respond or acknowledge me, so I asked it again.

Do you know what your response was? You growled at me and yelled: “Even something little like this we have to fight about?”

And then you went to your usual list of pre-planned bullet points: I never yell at mom (funny, I just yelled at her yesterday but you wouldn’t remember that). I don’t care about you. That you’re not hard to live with.

I wonder why it’s always these same points. I’m starting to wonder if, in your confusion, you’re starting to reveal your most core fears. If maybe these fears date to your childhood and you’ve never gotten over them.

It’s too bad, because this turns you into a self-fulfilling prophecy. You don’t think people like you. So you object, challenge, fight people on it. Which, guess what? Makes people not like you.

If there was ever a time to grow you it if this, seven years into Alzheimer's isn't it.

Which means, I’m the one that again has to adapt. Yes, me, again. Sigh.

And so I’ve made myself a promise: I will not yell at you again. But this also means I will not put myself in a place that could lead to me yelling at you. I will not put myself in a place that means you can manipulate me into yelling at you.

Yeah, that means I’m not going to talk to you anymore. I don’t want to hurt you. And I don’t want to be hurt anymore. That’s the cost.

Believe it or not, I think this is the kindest thing I can do for you. Because when I’m hurt, I don’t want to care for you, or do the other billion things that I do to support you.

I don't like this compromise. It's not even a compromise. It feels like a one-sided deal with the devil. But it’s the only way I have found to keep going. And I have vowed to keep going. That even if I can’t defend you against your feelings of lacking self-worth, I can still defend you as best I can against the onslaught that is Alzheimer’s and its many allies.

Because you're still my dad.

And I'm still your son.

I hope, even if takes another lifetime, one day you might come to know that.