Marci's Thoughts On Walking

My father always believed that life's experiences will teach us things about God if we allow them to do so.  If he could have understood them, my father would have loved Marci's thoughts on what Alzheimer's has taught her about walking in the Spirit.  Marci is a very gifted teacher and was recently the speaker at a church retreat.  The thoughts below are adapted from her notes for that engagement.   Her long walks with Stan are at an end, but she will not be sorry she took them.

In January of 2011 my father-in-law, Stan, who has late stage Alzheimer’s, moved in with us along with his wife, Connie.  One of the few things he could still do for the first four months after his arrival and enjoyed immensely was going for walks.  Because my mother-in-law has hip problems and cannot walk much without great pain, I began daily taking long walks with Stan.  Slow beyond belief, our pace allowed for much thought and prayer on my part, as well as leisurely conversation between both participants.

 

At the time, I was studying about the Holy Spirit in the Bible and trying to put into practice my understanding of what I was learning.  The Bible speaks of life with the Spirit as being a walk.  The King James Version says in Romans 8:4 that Jesus met the requirements of the law so that we can walk, not after the flesh but after the Spirit.  The NIV uses the word “live” instead of walk, but the original Greek word literally means “to tread all around, i.e. to walk at large.”  Visual aids help me to better understand nebulous spiritual concepts, and here in God’s Word was a picture to better understand how the Spirit works in us.  A walk implied two things to me.  First, it is not a work; it is a walk.  Second, to “walk after” implies subjection (The Normal Christian Life, Watchman Nee p.200-201).  I have to choose to be subject to the Spirit and His leading in my life.

Note Card: The Mine

Written on a 4x6 note card by Stan Julin.


In an earthly mine, men are looking for (usually) one precious thing.  In the mine of God, there are all kinds of precious treasures.  Each one is the mother lode with veins running in every direction and leading to other mother lodes, rich, each one beyond all the others.

Nobody digs in the mine of God without effort; so those who do not dig never know what they are missing.

Stan Julin Hospitalized Update 5

May 20, 2011

Stan Julin's family has received word that Stan will soon be taken to his maker.  He is, for the most part, refusing nourishment and the family has decided that a feeding tube would only prolong his life in the face of Alzheimer's and Bone Cancer.

Everything possible is being done to make him comfortable, and some success has been achieved in managing the extreme agitation that so plagued the early stages of his hospitalization.  The family is considering options for moving him to the home of Seth and Marci so that his passing can be in the place that has been his home recently.

Stan has long been a stranger and a pilgrim, a citizen of the next country.  The passage home long ago secured, the faithful preparations made, the lights of the great city visible upon the hill just over the river, there remains only the crossing.  Make ready the feast; the good fight is fought, the race run.  The pilgrim and dear son of his maker is coming home.

Tommy the Player Piano Man

May 20, 2011
In the lobby of the hospital where my father is a patient, there sits a player piano, plinking out a variety of tunes for the enjoyment of patients and visitors.  This calls to my mind a man by the name of Tommy, with whom my father was once associated.  Let me introduce you to Tommy.  Tommy was another man who made his living by rebuilding pianos.  He worked a niche market; he specialized in rebuilding player pianos.  I have no idea how modern player pianos work in the computer age, but the old ones, the ones that are now true collector's items, were two complex machines combined into one.  The first machine was the piano itself; the second was pneumatic machinery that was crowded in around the piano parts.  Tommy, therefore, was a specialist at the repair and rebuilding of a particularly complex type of piano.

There is something else to understand about Tommy.  He was blind.  The rebuilding of player pianos was a skill learned long before he lost his sight, but during the time my father knew him, Tommy could only barely distinguish day time from night time.

Stan Julin Hospitalized Update 4

The consensus amongst the doctors here at Florida Hospital Altamonte is that my father probably has bone cancer in his spine.  Although a life-threatening illness is usually good news for someone with advanced Alzheimer's like my father (someone redeemed by Jesus, that is), this particular diagnosis is probably not good news.  It is not so much a way out, as it is simply a recipe for adding pain to Alzheimer's.

We are facing another night in the hospital, but have been blessed with a much nicer room on the cancer wing.  The previous room was a bit like a hallway with some hospital furniture it it.  Now, we're in a spacious room with a recliner and a couch that converts to a bed .  This is the good news from today because the new situation will be much easier on my mother.

Strong medication has made my father more pliable, a blessing for the coming night watch.

One more thing, I just want to say thank you to everyone who visits this blog, whatever your reasons may be.  On these long night vigils, when my father's struggles have given way to sleep and I am able to look at the laptop, I can look at the blog's stats, and see that while we struggle on with my father's needs, there are people thinking of him and of our family (and praying too, I presume).  It helps to lighten the load.

Stan Julin Hospitalized Update 3

As it turns out, the decision was made to attempt an MRI at Florida Hospital Altamonte.  The endeavor was successful, and so it was not necessary to transport my father to another site.

We are now enduring another night in the hospital as we await a doctor's analysis of the images taken.  The concern centers on two vertebrae in his back.  One of them appears to be cracked and is probably giving him considerable pain.  The other seems to have some sort of growth that may be cancerous.

I am not going to provide details, but due to the Alzheimer's, he is a difficult patient in the extreme.  His family members are suffering quite a bit from the stresses of caring for him.

Stan Julin Hospitalized Update 2

Tonight was a much smoother night than the one before.  My father slept soundly most of the night except for the mandatory '4 AM-flip-on-the florescent-lights-and-stab-the-patient-with-a-needle' routine.  (Yes, I'm sure hospitals have reasons for that particular maneuver.  I'm just as sure their reasons are not good enough.)

My mother also got some good sleep, except for having to get up and hold my father down for the above described insanity.  She was, a little while ago, so sound asleep that, when she wakes, she will be surprised to find my brother sitting in the chair I was in when she last dozed off.

I got almost no sleep, but I'm back home and will be falling into bed for a few hours as soon as I post this blog.

The plan for today is to have dad transported to the downtown Florida Hospital, where he will undergo a sedated MRI.  We are unclear at this point whether he will be returned to Altamonte, remain downtown, or be discharged thereafter.

Stan Julin Hospitalized Update

May 17, 2010
Doctors at Florida Hospital Altamonte have determined that Stan does not have a small bowel blockage after all.  However, they have found other problems, the most serious of which is a problem with two of the vertebrae his back.  The plan right now is to transport him by ambulance to the downtown Florida Hospital, where they can get a better look at the problem.

He has managed to get in a couple good sized blocks of sleeping time, which should prove helpful to his disposition.

Stan Julin Hospitalized

May 17, 2011
Stan Julin has been admitted to Florida Hospital, Altamonte Springs.  He was taken to the Emergency Room due to frequent complaints of abdomen pain and refusal to eat or drink for a couple days.  He was diagnosed with a small bowel blockage and admitted to the med/surg unit.

He is very disoriented and fighting every aspect of his care.  This is seriously interfering with treatment options.  Please pray that God would calm his mind and heart and that a good methodology of treatment, which accounts for all of his circumstances, can be found.

Note Card: Feeling the Weight

Written on a 4x6 note card by Stan Julin.


February 21, 2007
Not only was Jesus grieved about his sacrifice and his betrayal, but also he wanted his disciples to feel the weight and grief of it.  God does not want us to escape the pain of the narrow gate, the tough journey, the watchfulness for betrayal.  We have sinned; we also should know in our being the payoff of sin, how it saps our strength and ultimately kills everything that it infects.

Itty-Bitty-Almost-Mashed Potato Pieces

May 14, 2011

A funny thing happened tonight.  My wife was away from home as the speaker at a church retreat, and my son was at a school event.  So I ate dinner with my parents.  The main dish was baked potato with toppings.  There was also asparagus and a separate bowl for each of us with garden salad.

There were a number of delays getting things situated so that we might actually begin eating.  I was late getting home from work.  Then, my father damaged something that had to be repaired before we could proceed with the meal.  Then, when the food was ready but before we sat down, my mother carefully cut up my father's potato into itty-bitty-almost-mashed pieces so that the process of feeding him (or getting him to feed himself if we were so lucky) might go smoothly.  Finally, after the usual confusion of getting dad maneuvered into a chair and getting that chair positioned strategically relative to the food and to my mother, I headed around the table to my spot so that I might say the blessing.

Note Card: On Music

Written on a 4x6 note card by Stan Julin.

[Blog author's note:  My father was fascinated by the understanding that man was created in the image of God, and many of his note card thoughts are related to that idea.  It has been my intent to avoid sharing note cards that speak in detail of the image of God because my father and I frequently spoke of turning those thoughts into a book.  This is a possibility that I have not forsaken, and to avoid undermining such an endeavor, I have held those note cards in reserve.  However, we went last night to a concert put on by The Geneva School.  (My son attends there and sings in the choir.)  This school routinely puts on musical and dramatic performances of such quality that I am always much awed that juveniles can perform so powerfully.  My parents were also in attendance, and my father was moved to tears by what he heard.  As a result, I have been thinking since about my father's note card regarding music being a byproduct of man's nature in God's image.  I finally decided to share the thoughts that follow.  These thoughts are deep, and I think the reader will benefit as much from a second read as from the first.  Enjoy!]


October 1998

The one who writes music is the originator thereof; the one who plays it is the means.  The one who enjoys it is the target, the consumer.  This could be a triad in connection with music, but it is not the triad of the music itself.  The foundation of the actual music is the rhythm of it, consisting as its framework of key, tempo, time, etc. as expressed by the bass notes.  The theme of it conveying the haunting melody is that part of it inviting words and which is the part others enjoy of beauty and grace and which they remember as the song.  These are the treble notes.  These cannot successfully oppose and overcome the bass notes which are too insistent and penetrating and carrying to resist.  Rather, they must coordinate with the bass notes in order to make sense and to be enjoyed and to avoid confusion.  Within the rhythm framework, melody usually has more liberty of expression then the bass notes have.  Then, fit in amongst the bass and melody lines are many other possible places to fit other notes which are harmonious to both bass and melody.  The filling of these places results in many other possible musical lines which enrich the basic combination of the two – rhythm and melody.

Note Card: Jesus' Words

Written on a 4x6 note card by Stan Julin.


Date Unknown
What happens to the emotions of a person if they are beaten down early in life?  Do they get beat so that they submerge?  Cease to exist?  Go into hiding?  Does this happen to men more?  Or is it just as likely in women?  Are emotions acquired as family characteristics such as laughter or other recognizable mannerisms?  What does it take to open the door and let them out?  A knowledge of God (a knowledge of his personal characteristics)?  Why did people want to hang around Jesus and to touch him? 
 

The Great Sycamore

May 3, 2011

Perhaps the best description I have seen of how it feels to watch a loved one fade into Alzheimer’s came from the pen of my son, Caleb:

My grandpa’s mind is like a tall sycamore.  His memories, once green, slowly fade into brittle brown leaves until they break free…never to be grasped again.  One by one his memories fade, and one by one they drift down.  All we can do is helplessly rake up his memories in a hope that, by some miracle, he will grasp them again.  This Thanksgiving, the question on everyone’s mind was how long?  How long till his branches lay bare of memories?  How long till winter?  It seems like every time we see him, something else has fallen from his branches.  After our Thanksgiving meal, he was standing awkwardly in the kitchen feeling useless.  When asked if he would like to help clear the table, he said with much gratitude, “Yes…I was just feeling so awkward standing here.”

Whose Cat Are You?

March 2, 2011
Laughter and tragedy are not exclusive of one another.  My family has always been able to laugh, even in tragic circumstances.  In fact, we are finding that Alzheimer's Disease is no exception to the fact that even bitter tragedy often bears with it sweet laughter.

This morning, before I left for work, I walked into my parent's part of the house.  I wanted to make sure my father's disposition was stable before I made tracks for the office.  I have the ability to work from home and sometimes do so if it looks like it will be a rough day.

"Good morning," I called out as I entered the room.  "I'm about to head in to work and just wanted to be sure you two are okay before I do."

"Yeah, Seth," my mother responded.  "Thanks.  We're fine.  I'm doing better than I was doing last night."  She had been discouraged the previous evening, and I was glad to hear that her outlook had improved.

"Good," I replied, preparing to leave. 

"I've moved up in the world!" my mother said.  She gets a certain glimmer in her eye when she has something funny to say.  She had that glimmer now;