DIARY OF A FORGETFULNESS #2

The diagnosis

While I waited in the living room, I went through a mental review of a large part of our lives, like a movie, the memories and all the beautiful and the not so good episodes that we have lived throughout these forty years. I made an effort to try to figure out when your forgetfulness had begun. From time to time I was in doubt, and in the middle of the movie in my thought I had to stop and ponder whether it really would have been in that moment that you had begun to forget.

I trembled with anxiety when the doctor called me to the office. Sitting tightly clasping my hands in the arms of the chair, I heard what I feared most: there was no doubt, every examination confirmed that you were suffering from a type of insanity.

From that moment all forgetfulness had a name, a why.

And when I was approached by the ill-disposed neighbor complaining that you were ringing her bell instead of mine, I could already explain that the culprit had a name, Alzheimer.

In addition to finding that the neurologist’s dark room matched his words and the diagnosis, I also thought that at that moment of receiving such devastating news, the approach might have been different. Because in addition to medication there is another very important approach to take into account: the follow-up of those who will move to be side by side with this disease.

In a mixture of indignation and emotion I put your reports and exams quickly in the backpack, because I needed to get out of there, because I had tears about to flow down. Because I wanted to hold you.

Everything is alright…

Not today.