I watched as my grandpa struggled with the jar of chocolate covered pecans. The grandpa who always taught me random words, who always asked me if my ‘interstices’ needed filling, who always ate dessert right alongside me when everyone else was stuffed. The grandpa who taught me about business, who talked openly about worldly affairs in front of me - teaching me. My grandpa with his dry sense of humour and witty sayings. That grandpa wasn’t reflected right now. His hands were shaking, his eyes unfocused, muttering to himself. He seemed confused as to how to open the jar. While he muttered something about “angel,” I offered my help - he didn’t seem to understand. I was nonplussed. My grandpa was never like this. He was one of the smartest men I knew, what was wrong? My heart sank as I watched his blank face. My grandma had a sad look in her eyes as she watched him and murmured to me, “you don’t have to stay, Korintha”. As I drove the ranger home my eyes stung, wind whipping my face. But the wind did not dry my eyes out; they were still moist, with a fogginess that blurred my vision. I was concerned. I knew my grandparents were getting old, but was my grandpa alright?
Heart heavy as I walked to the house, the cool February air nipped at my nose. Grandpa had recently been moved to a geriatric ward in the hospital. The section he was in was for elderly people with brain malfunctions. “How’s Grandpa doing?” I asked my dad as my backpack slid through my fingers and landed on the ground with a dull thud.

“Not great, they have him on a dementia medicine,” my dad responded.
Grandpa had been on medicine to help him sleep while he was home, but as his confusion and lack of control heightened, my family found it prudent to move him to the hospital. Everyday when I got home from school I would ask my dad the same questions; “How’s Grandpa doing?” “have you visited him lately?” “is he getting any better?”. Each day I would be met with disheartening answers.

My grandpa’s sickness was taking its toll. My grades were slipping. I couldn’t seem to focus. Things were piling up on top of me and I felt as if the weight was crushing me, demolishing my will to try. The stress mounted as I went through troubles with my friends. My parents were now disappointed in me for my slipping grades, my sisters didn’t seem to want anything to do with me, and my grandpa, my amazing, loving grandpa, couldn’t make sense of his surroundings.

“Did you visit Grandpa?” I asked yet again when I got home.

“Yes,” my dad said, “It was actually pretty funny. I visited him today and he was talking about how he wanted to get out of there. He said he didn’t trust the nurses and would bust out as soon as he figured out those ‘damn doors’, which are made so only employees can open them. I was trying to calm him down saying they’re completely trustworthy - they’re doctors. He responded with ‘I don’t think this is a hospital’ he then leaned in and lowered his voice before saying ‘It’s a slave labour camp’”. I laughed a little at this; he had said some weird things since this ordeal had started. One of those interesting comments was when he said as my dad visited, “I don’t like these people. They don’t do what you ask them to. Except that big black guy - he’ll do anything if you give him five bucks,” this was amusing partly because, first of all, there wasn’t a big black guy, and second of all, Grandpa didn’t have his money with him.

Throughout all of this I always remained optimistic, in a sense. It had never really occured to me that my grandpa may die. I always thought that something that bad couldn’t happen, that somehow he’d get better. I had never really experienced anything that hard. Although I may know more than others about the world, I had lived a sheltered life when it came to pain. That was why it was so hard to believe when my dad told me. That way why I felt as if I was suffocating when my dad said, “He’s probably going to die, Korintha. He doesn’t have much longer.” Safely away in my room, where none could hear or see, I cried. I cried until my eyes hurt. I cried until I had no tears left, and when I ran out of tears, I sat there shuddering. Sitting with head bowed and shoulders hunched, my body wracked violently. I couldn’t imagine life without my grandpa, he had always been there. He was the grandpa only two houses down. The one that respected me and treated me like an adult. The one that loved me and spoiled me like a kid. The one who would always grin and say, “I see you combed your hair with an egg-beater again.” I couldn’t imagine living without his crooked smile, his witty jokes, his warm hugs. I could feel the crusty remains of my tears, with a few fresh ones mixed in. They tickled my chin and I swiped at them angrily. My eyes were sore and burning, a knot had collected in the pit of my stomach.

My grandpa’s condition worsened. My dad now carried a solemn air about him I had never seen before. “How is he?”, there it was, the question I dreaded the answer to, yet insisted upon asking every day.

“Not good. Turns out he has a rare kind of dementia, it’s called Lewy Body’s Dementia. The medicine they gave him actually makes it worse”. My stomach plummeted, worse? How could this be happening? I wasn’t ready for this. I wanted to see him, to visit him. But I also didn’t want to. I was afraid. I was afraid I wouldn’t remember the old him if I went. My dad had said he had gotten to the point where he was hardly lucid. He would rarely speak and his eyes were unfocused. I had some deluded notion that maybe, just maybe, he would respond if I went. I wanted to be able to speak to him one last time. I had thought maybe he would speak if I went, because that’s fair - me getting to say goodbye. But life isn’t fair. Life isn’t like all those books I had been filling my head with. My grandpa wouldn’t be able to speak again simply because I wanted a goodbye. There was a reason those books I read were called fiction - because they weren’t real. Because things like that didn’t happen in real life.

I debated for two days whether I wanted to see him one last time or not. My dad discouraged it; he said I would regret seeing him in that state as my last glimpse of him. That was exactly what I was afraid of - regret. I feared I would regret it if I visited him. But I also feared I would regret it if I never gave him that one final ‘goodbye, I love you’. In the end my love for him and yearning to see him won out. It was a Wednesday night. I texted my church leader telling her I wouldn’t be there tonight, telling her this might be my last chance to see him. As we drove my gut twisted with dread. I sat in the back of my dad’s car with too little space for my legs, my parents were in the front. My legs were cramped, but I didn’t notice. Watching the lights fly by, I thought of what awaited me. I was grateful my parents didn’t attempt to start idle conversation with me. My mind was too far away.

We finally arrived at the downtown hospital. I stiffly got out of the car and joined my parents in walking towards the door. As we walked into the lobby the sharp, clean scent that all medical places seem to carry assaulted my senses. There was a kind, smiling lady at the reception desk who pointed us in the right direction. I attempted to force a smile onto my blank face as we passed her. Taking the elevator in silence, we waited for the jolt and accompanying ding that announced we were on the right floor. We walked down the beige coloured hallway until we reached the doors leading to my grandpa’s wing. The doors required a nurse to let us through, so we buzzed the bell and waited for them. Looking around, I saw a sign outside the door that said ‘no admittance under 16’ and another below it stating, ‘make sure to close the door, be careful of eloping patients’. I thought this was an odd way of stating that the patients may try to run away. My mind flickered to the sign above it though, why shouldn’t kids younger than sixteen be allowed in? It made me uneasy as to what I may see.

As the nurse ushered us in, the sterile hospital smell once again invaded my senses. This time it wasn’t pleasant - it was overpowering. The smell enveloped me. It made it seem as if they were trying to hide something malevolent beneath the smell. My head pounded, and I felt slightly sick as I looked around the room. Elderly people were scattered around. None of them seemed to be with it. Some were muttering incoherently, others were staring at a wall with an expression that didn’t seem to have a mind behind it. All needed help accomplishing even the most mundane of tasks.

We were led back into the hallway to wait with the rest of our family as my two cousins were in the room with my grandpa. Both of my aunt and uncles, as well as one each of their kids were there. “Was Mom here?” my dad asked quietly.
“Yeah, she left recently,” my uncle Greg, responded. I couldn’t decide if I was happy or sad that I had missed my grandma. The thought of seeing her as she took in the shell of her husband might’ve been too much for me.

We quietly walked into the room to see Savanna, Greg and Lynn’s daughter, and Gabby, Rob and Susan’s daughter, already there. Savanna’s eyes were red and swollen, Gabby looked a little lost; and then my eyes settled on him. Grandpa. A feeling of dread washed over me and engulfed me in its icy embrace. My eyes grew wide as I realized the extent of what my father had spoken of. He was a shell of the man I knew. His skin sagged off of him, having lost too much weight to fill it. Bruises covered his frail skin. He was the thinnest man I had seen. Simply skin and bones, his arms covered with bandages. I looked closer at the bandages, and wished I hadn’t. They covered his forearms. The bandages were stained with blood, and underneath, was something I would never wish upon anyone. The whole expanse of both his forearms were purple. Due to the hallucinations and confusion caused by Lewy body dementia, my grandpa had incessantly clawed at his arms to the point where there was no skin left unharmed. They had bandaged his hands as to prevent further damage. Those same hands were now twitching and waving around his head, as if swatting at bothersome flies. He was agitated, clawing at his own hallucinations and muttering “no, no”. His eyes were a dull, glassy, aqua blue. Occasionally flicking up towards the occupants of the room, but never focusing.

I stared in horror at what the dementia had done to him. Lewy body dementia shows itself in hallucinations, confusion, tremor, and memory loss - often being mistaken for Alzheimer’s or Parkinson’s disease. It had wrecked my grandpa; reduced the strong and intelligent man I knew into a frail, muttering man with tremors wracking his body.

The walls seemed to be closing in on me, forcing me to face what was right in front of me. Something I had never put too much thought into. My breathing hitched and my hands shook. I had been afraid he might not remember me, but he couldn’t even see me. My blurred vision just made the scene more distorted. I felt a tear fight its way through my lashes and stubbornness, splashing on my cheek and slowly rolling downwards. I felt like that tear - fragile, weak, and a symbol of the sorrow and pain no one wants.

My grandparents were my life, why was this happening? Why did I have to be so young? I had always had a distorted notion of age. With my grandparents being eighty-nine, I never realized that really, the average age to live to was around seventy-eight. I wasn’t ready for this. I didn’t know what to do. Sitting by, I simply watched my grandpa sink - farther and farther away from me. Tears continuously dripping onto my face, I left with the rest of my family when Gabby asked quietly, “Could I have a minute alone with him please?” We stood outside in the hallway. My parents, aunts, and uncles made idle chit chat on the paintings dotting the halls. I wasn’t in the mood to talk. I had too much to think about.

I wandered slowly and aimlessly down the hall, staring with an unseeing gaze at the art. I felt hollow. My feet hit with heavy thuds as I swayed. I couldn’t come to terms with reality. That had always been my problem - I constantly lived in the past, remembering the good old days. The halls echoed ominously. Blank, dreary walls stared back at my blank, dreary face. I slowly made my way back to my family as they prepared to leave.

Rob, Susan, Gabby, Greg, Lynn, and Savanna all said their goodbyes to Grandpa, then to us. I hugged Savanna tightly, feeling a little comforted. I tried to soothe her, I’m not sure I had ever seen her cry before. When they left, I re-entered the room with my parents.

A nurse came in with a small container of sherbet. “You want some Korintha?” my mom joked, as I was notorious for my love of desserts, but this one was laced with medication to decrease Grandpa’s anxiousness. My vision clouded even more so when I realized my grandpa couldn’t even eat it. This threw into sharp relief just how bad his condition was. He tried to turn his head away from the spoon, feebly lifting his arms in an attempt to ward her off. He mumbled incoherently, never stopping the incessant babble. The nurse finally got the spoon in his mouth. Making a sound somewhere between a choke and a sob, Grandpa tried to take the spoon away - but his arms were too thin and weak. The nurse threw an apologetic look at me as she tried to get my grandpa to have more.

“It’s time to take him back,” the nurse said quietly. I nodded mutely, the lump in my throat not allowing for any other response. We slowly wheeled him back into the main room, saying our reluctant goodbyes to an agitated, lifeless face. I tried to kiss his forehead. I wanted to convey just how much I loved him, and always would. Just how important he was to me. But in his confused state, he turned away. Just like he had been doing the whole night, he turned away while muttering and shaking. Just the same. Nothing had improved. I was so foolish to think I may actually be able to speak to him, to see some flash of the man I knew. Fairytales, Korintha, your head’s full of them I bitterly thought to myself. We walked slowly in a heavy silence back to the car. I sat in the back and faced the lights of the city so my parents wouldn’t see the lone tear slowly marking it’s path down my face.

I didn’t do my homework that night. I didn’t care. I sat there staring dully at my white wall, waiting for sleep to claim me in it’s comforting embrace. Waiting for sleep to claim my worries, if only for the night.

The next night we visited him again. This time my mom didn’t go and instead came my two sisters. I couldn’t decide if I thought he was better or worse. He obviously wasn’t as agitated, but he was also not even slightly together. He was out. Completely out to the world. Occasionally he would murmur in his sleep. I would hope then that he was having pleasant dreams, as I could tell his life here was almost through.

Some drool mixed with phlegm had left a track out the corner of his mouth. He sometimes would give a little cough before shifting and, once again, becoming oblivious. Amber stared at him, I could tell she hadn’t come to terms with it yet. She was still trying to deny it. Or maybe she was just trying to hide, she never was really the one to let her barriers down. Victoire, my oldest sister, was similar to Amber, although she was showing more emotion. Her eyes were cloudy and rimmed with red, but no tears fell. As for me, I stared blankly. I had cried too much for my liking yesterday and was slightly relieved he was no longer his anxious self. I was thankful they had covered his forearms and most of the rest of his skin. I didn’t want my sisters seeing that, this was bad enough.

We were in a different room than yesterday. Yesterday’s was a visiting room whereas this one was where he actually stayed. There was a bed with nets around it, which my sisters and I were using as a seat. There was a small nightstand. I looked closer and realized there were pamphlets on what to do when our loved ones were dying. That really hit home - dying.

Deciding to leave, we slowly got up and hesitantly walked to the door. I lingered as my family walked on. Something felt missing. I felt as if there was something I should be doing. It didn’t feel complete. So I walked back to the edge of the bed-like stretcher and said softly, “I love you Grandpa, so, so much. You’re an amazing grandpa and I couldn’t have wished for more. Thank you so much. I love you. Goodbye,” and I rejoined my family.

That was the last thing he heard from our world.

That night was the same as the last. I didn’t do my homework but instead hoped for relief in a fitful sleep. The next morning, however, was very different. My loving, amazing grandpa had died at around 5:00am on February 17th. I went to school and trudged through my classes, not really paying any attention. I didn’t tell my friends. I just kept my head down and waited for the last bell.

Days turned to weeks. I still was at a loss. My grades fell even further. I drew into myself. My friends didn’t find out until a couple of weeks after, when one asked me how my grandpa was doing, as she knew he had been sick. One day I couldn’t stand it, and tried talking to another of my friends about it. When she interrupted me and started off on something else, I shut up on the matter.

Time passed, but time only numbs it. It’s still there, waiting to be woken when you least expect it. But you learn to live with it, you learn to not let others see the pain.