I miss the smile, the sense of joy, that dementia has taken away from Connie, and all of us…

I MISS THE smile.

Dementia is cruel in what it takes away from its prey. It takes the mind, but it also takes the body, bit by bit. As the mind goes, confidence goes and steps become smaller, hands reach out in fear of a fall and the stress of it all drapes the body.

When I look back over pictures of Connie, my favorites are the ones that capture her love of life and people, being with and doing for others, and that almost always is captured in a smile. Sometimes the smile is soft. Sometimes it is silly, accompanied by a laugh I can’t see or hear in the pictures.

But in the pictures, there is joy and now, when we sit and talk, take walks, that is mostly gone. There is, in her, a sense of being lost, of being afraid, of not being able to find words. From time to time something will come to her, or she will see something and there will be a hint of that smile but it’s fleeting.

Dementia takes so much that it is hard to catalogue and track what is lost. It is taken bit by bit, and often unnoticed until one day it hits you that there has been a change and the going-away is speeding up.

I don’t have much more to say about this. Those of you who know Connie and have been with her will know what I am talking about. Meanwhile, we have pictures and memories. We can look back over our shoulders at them as we go down this path that seems, more and more, to lead only to darkness.

Rich Heiland, has been a reporter, editor, publisher/general manager at daily papers in Texas, Pennsylvania, Illinois, Ohio and New Hampshire. He was part of a Pulitzer Prize-winning team at the Xenia Daily (OH) Daily Gazette, a National Newspaper Association Columnist of the Year. Since 1995 he has operated an international consulting, public speaking and training business specializing in customer service, general management, leadership and staff development with major corporations, organizations, and government. Semi-retired, he and his wife live in West Chester, PA. He can be reached at [email protected].