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THE CITIZEN, WEDNESDAY, JANUARY 21, 1998. PAGE 7.
re•
Son uses humour to cope with Dad's Alzheimer's
By Janice Becker
Citizen staff
The story of a father deteriorating
from the effects of Alzhiemer's
could be depressing, heart wrench-
ing, but when related by one son, it
becomes a tale of heartwarming
hope.
With the shine of truly loving
emotions in his eyes, John
Freiburger, now of Belgrave,
speaks laughingly of his father,
Carl, and the disease they dealt with
together, along with other family
members, over the last six years.
The tale of Carl coping with
Alzhiemer's begins in January,
1992.
Due to a personal situation, John
returned to live at his parents' home
on the edge of Bluevale that winter.
His mother was ill and help was
needed.
Before the end of the year, John's
mother passed away and his father's
personality began to change. For
months, the family a'tributed the
change to the stress of his wife's
death.
Though she had been gone for
some time, Carl, who at the age of
77 still had his driver's licence, con-
tinued to return to the hospital to
visit his wife.
"He became confused when he
couldn't find her," said John.
In dealing with his loss, Carl
became obsessed about taking his
walks, a life-long routine.
That need for routine began to
show up in every aspect of his day,
John said. "The smallest change
would upset him."
As the months passed, Carl's
insistence on routine and his quick
mood changes intensified.
Though diagnosed in 1993 with
the first stages of Alzheimer dis-
ease, John said he and his brothers
and sisters, refused to accept the
suggestion.
"Dad just doesn't want to remem-
ber, he doesn't care," was how John
explained the family's feelings
towards their father's condition.
However, as his father's daily
caregiver, John began to notice fur-
ther changes in his personality.
Smiling, John tells how it was
often a struggle to get his father to
take his evening bath.
"I would run the water, but he
would refuse to get in. He would
become angry and we would argue
every time. He was like a child.
Once, I left him to get in and min-
utes later, saw his car heading down
the road."
John soon realized his father's
problems were more than just stress
and the need for routine. He began
to read literature available on
Alzheimer's and saw the similari-
ties.
"I still had not accepted my father
as suffering from Alzhiemers until I
read about the first and second
stages of the disease and it just
clicked. I thank God for the litera-
ture that is out there. Once I under-
stood it, it was easier to accept."
It was then that his caregiving
relationship with his father began to
improve.
"Alzheimer sufferers are not stu-
pid," he adds, "Dad just had his
own way of doing things.'
Even the bathing became an easi-
er obstacle to overcome, said John.
"If he didn't want a bath, I let it go
and tried the next day."
John soon discovered his father
preferred to bath in the morning and
the struggles were over, in that area
anyway.
"I soon realized I was here to
make him happy. I would have done
anything to make him happy."
With a grin creasing his cheerful
face, John tells how they sang non-
sensical songs together while his
Dad drummed the table.
"They never made sense, but he
was happy."
They also had a code whistle of
sorts for John's arrival home from
work. John would recite his portion
upon entering and his father would
finish the tune.
One day, the ending notes were
followed by a loud crash from the
livingroom. As it turned out, Carl
had fallen asleep in a rocker, and
not one to be thought of as lazy, he
quickly jumped up upon hearing the
familiar sounds.
However, this time, he stumbled,
hit the coffee table and broke off the
corner.
John found his father sprawled
across the table, a smile on his face
and a simple explanation, "I guess I
was asleep."
One suggestion for caregivers is
to not set the sufferers up for fail-
ure. "Don't ask too many ques-
tions," said John. "Don't put them
in'a situation where they can't
answer."
As John tells of the years with his
father, story after story emerges of
difficult times coped through
humour.
As a new business owner, John
had developed the routine of bring-
ing the day's cash receipts home to
do the bookwork' in comfort. He
noticed, on more than one occasion,
the cash was $60 to $80 short.
He then asked his staff to be very
careful when dealing with the
money. He soon learned the advice
to the staff would not stop his cash
shortage.
One day upon arriving home,
depositing his work on the kitchen
table and going to clean up, John
returned to the kitchen, having for-
gotten something.
He came upon his father going
through the receipts.
After making other arrangements
for doing the business' books, John
said money from his wallet began
disappearing.
To catch his father in the act, he
set up a video camera in the corner
of the kitchen and soon had three
occasions on tape. The family
laughs about the incidents to this
day.
Carl's proclivity for picking up
things, a symptom of Alzheimer's,
did not stop with John's money. A
walk through the neighbourhood
could result in pockets full of fallen
apples which were eventually stored
in dresser draws as well as odds and
ends from yards and the ballpark.
However, even this habit had its
up side. For the children of the com-
munity who had forgotten a ball
glove at the park, they always knew
where to come looking and if a
neighbour was missing a tool, it
could probably be found at the
Freiburger home.
John is very thankful for the
understanding of the community.
They helped make dealing with his
father's tendencies much easier, he
said.
One of the most difficult
moments in caring for his ailing
father, said John, was the day he
Carl Freiburger
had to take away his driver's
licence. At the age of 80, Carl had
achieved a lifetime of driving with a
clean record. He did not understand
why he could no longer drive.
To handle the next task of taking
away Carl's car, John thought the
easiest idea would be to disable the
vehicle, rendering it undriveable.
However, his father would have
none of that. He simply walked to
the nearby garage, asked the
mechanic to have a look and the car
was running by the time John came
home from work.
After filling in the mechanic on
his motivation, John's plan worked
on the second attempt.
"That was the hardest thing a man
would have to do," said John. "My
father looked so sad, deep down.
That really hurt me."
As John continued to cope with
his father's deteriorating state and
his own life, he tells of cases where
his father actually helped him, gave
him something he really needed.
"Sometimes I would come home
from work and Dad would be stand-
ing in the garage ready to go out
somewhere. When I asked him what
he was doing, he would just say
`Someone is coming to pick me up,
aren't they?' I couldn't let him
down."
"I would take him for a drive in,
the country and stop and visit a
friend. I needed to get out and
socialize too, instead of working all
the time. Dad did that for me."
Another great experience for John
and Carl was Carl's twice-weekly
visit to the Seniors' Day Centre in
Wingham.
For Carl, there were activities and
socializing and for John, there was
staff who understood what he was
going through.
It was also through that staff that
John came to realize he could no
longer look after his father at home.
They were able to see things differ-
ently than John and recognize the
changes.
A three-month trial stay at a gov-
ernment-funded nursing home dev-
astated the Freiburger family
because of the conditions under
which their father was kept.
Often drugged and locked in his
room, Carl was upset, disoriented
and always asking to go home.
The family spent much of every
day with their father and hired
someone to be with him when they
could not. This expense was on top
of paying for his housing at the
facility.
Then, because of a chance con-
versation with a customer at his
business, John learned of a senior's
home near Lucknow and, after talks
with his brothers and sisters, the
decision to move Carl was made.
John cannot say enough about the
Country Road Lodge, operated by
the Farrishes, which his father now
calls home.
More like a home than a hospital,
Carl is completely off drugs, other
than common, off-the-shelf med-
ication, and is comfortable in his
new surroundings, where he has
been since June.
"He enjoys coming to visit me,
but now he is ready to return to 'his
home'," said John.
His father is now doing very well
and is relaxed in his surroundings.
Through the many ups and downs
of caregiving for a parent with
Alzheimer's, John said the support
of his family was very important.
"Regular visits from my sisters
helped maintain Dad's routine and
my brothers came as often as they
could."
"It is hard not only on the family,
but their spouses as well. They have
been great," said John.
He tells of one brother-in-law
who sits for hours playing cards
with Carl.
With a glint in his eye, John
speaks of his father as an honest,
trustworthy and straight-dealing
man. "A handshake was good
enough for my Dad."
Though the story of dealing with
a parent with Alzheimer's disease
could quite easily be a tale of hard
times and endless struggles, those
are not the type related by John. He
remembers the happy times.
He tells that accepting the dis-
ease, understanding it through read-
ing and learning to go with the flow
are key to coping.
John has a little advice for those
in similar situations: "have a good
cry, get support and talk to people at
a centre that understands
Alzhiemer's."
"People often fear their own
future when a parent has
Alzheimer's disease, but I don't.
Dad is happy in his own mind as
long as he has a good place to go."
After almost six years of watch-
ing a parent change, his dedication
to his father is evident in one simple
expression.
"He did well for all of us. He was
a good father."