My darling husband and I were sitting in a lovely restaurant ordering breakfast this morning.  Five minutes later, I was sniffling and looking frantically for a Kleenex in my purse.  It was all because of the eggs.

Charles was diagnosed with Alzheimer’s five years ago.  He is a kind, sweet, loving man.  Sometimes his Alzheimer’s symptoms drive me nuts, though, and I know it will only get worse.

Alzheimer’s has robbed Charles of his ability to speak fluently in certain situations, one of which is ordering food in a restaurant. It has also made him less flexible in his thinking, more dogmatic, and more stubborn.  I don’t mind helping him by ordering for him, which he has asked me to do.  I don’t mind that he basically wants a fried-egg-and-sausage breakfast or a burger-and-fries lunch or dinner when we go out, because I know it is challenging for him to remember or imagine other meals in that setting.  I didn’t even mind that after eating breakfast at the same place the day before (we were traveling, and this was the hotel restaurant), he was upset because they fried the eggs together rather than separately.  But when he became upset because I wouldn’t explain to the waiter that he wanted the eggs some other way that he could not articulate (and that I did not understand), and he raised his voice, and I saw the confusion and pity on the face of the young waiter, I lost it.

I wish I were more patient and less sensitive.  I wish I didn’t get so upset about silly things.  I wish I could focus completely on Charles’ confusion and frustration and not on my own.  I wish I didn’t feel like grinding my teeth when the eggs arrived, he continued to grouse about them (although they were exactly the same as a thousand fried eggs he has eaten since we have been together), and then he finally said, “I guess these are okay the way they are.”  I wish my emotions would trot along with my compassion and understanding, instead of breaking the harness and running away.  I wish the damn eggs hadn’t ruined the meal.