Away From Home With Dementia

We're all just walking each other home.

-- Ram Dass

Romeo wants to go out for tea, out for dinner, out to a movie, out for a walk, out for a drive, just out. Out, out, out. But most of all, Romeo wants to come home. And he wants to come home...NOW.

Who can blame him? He's in a strange place, with strange people, strange food, a strange bed. He's in a nursing home that's only a four-minute drive from home, and yet he's thousands of miles from the stone and stucco and shingle building with the archway entry, the place we call home.

Two nights ago, Romeo cried as I prepared to leave him for the night. He wants to come home with me. It tore my heart out. I want him to come home with me, too. But not like this. Not when it takes two people to move him from wheelchair to bed and back, to run him through physical therapy, to help him take a shower, to help him do anything. His medical needs complicate the situation further. Quite simply, it takes a team to take care of him.

I got on my knees at the side of his wheelchair, our eyes at the same level. I held his hands and kissed them as his tears fell on my hands. In the most steady and soothing voice I could summon, I was able to say, "Romeo, more than anything I want you to come home with me." I could have cried for days just then, but somehow an inner strength urged me on. "You must stay here, my Love, until you get stronger. I love you so much that I want you to stay here and keep working with the physical therapists every day, every day, until you get stronger, until it's safe for you to be home." He stopped crying as he considered this.

"Romeo, you know how strong our love is, how tightly we're bonded. You know that most of your spirit is at home with me every night anyway. I feel you there. And do you know that most of my spirit is here with you even when I'm not physically here?" Yes, yes, he agreed. He felt it. We both became silent, content, peaceful. We kissed and held each other and parted for the night.

No, we don't know when Romeo will be able to come home. And today, feeding the not knowing, stoking the doubt, we nearly finished filling out the 26-page application to Medicaid for Romeo's long-term care, should we get to that point.

Will Romeo be able to come home, ever? We simply don't know. But we both know, without a doubt in our minds, that we are quite literally with each other constantly, wherever either of us happens to be. It has always been like this, and it will always be like this. One day we'll know whether Romeo can come home, but perhaps it isn't so important to know. Perhaps it's more important to know that our home, our sanctuary, is within us and there really is no such thing as being away from home, wherever we are.