Nightmare of Alzheimer’s

It is fortunate Princess Yasmin Aga Khan Jeffries never had to institutionalize her mother, Rita Hayworth (“Alzheimer’s: A Daughter’s Nightmare” by Paul Hendrickson, the Washington Post, April 11). As a daughter of an Alzheimer’s victim currently living out her last horrifying years in a sanitarium, I can tell anyone firsthand of the helplessness and despair I feel daily about this situation.

But the truth of the matter is, a family has to be financially able to sustain this environment. Perhaps I am trying to relieve myself of the guilt I feel. But there is no way I can financially, at age 36 and single, quit my job and care for my mother full time, and be sure all of her needs are taken care of.

Prior to institutionalization, my father retired from his job of 25 years to take on this task. This was an equally agonizing situation to watch and be a part of. No matter how much support our family could give him, he was the one changing his wife’s diaper four times a day, patiently giving her showers two to three times a day, even though she kicked and tried to hit him, and eventually would break into tears because she didn’t understand any of it.

After four years of trying to do the impossible, and after family therapy group sessions for months, my father made the decision to put my mother in a “home.” The family fully supported his decision.

Three years after her institutionalization, my father died of cancer. Even though there is no evidence to support my personal conclusions, I know the stress he was under for all those years contributed to the deterioration of his own body.

To those in similar situations, please evaluate your decisions carefully. If you have the finances to provide the necessary care for these patients in your home, as Yasmin did, then you are truly fortunate. If not, institutionalization, although not the only alternative, is a viable one and most probably the only feasible one.

RITA V. ELSTAD

Long Beach