Still Alice

by Lisa Genova

Attention, rehearsal, elaboration, or emotional significance was needed if perceived information was to be pushed beyond the recent memory space into longer-term storage, else it would be quickly and naturally discarded with the passage of time.

Her mother had comforted her and told her not to be sad for the butterflies, that just because their lives were short didn’t mean they were tragic.

She wished she had cancer instead. She’d trade Alzheimer’s for cancer in a heartbeat.

And while a bald head and a looped ribbon were seen as badges of courage and hope, her reluctant vocabulary and vanishing memories advertised mental instability and impending insanity. Those with cancer could expect to be supported by their community. Alice expected to be outcast. Even the well-intentioned and educated tended to keep a fearful distance from the mentally ill.

She didn’t want to become someone people avoided and feared.

The well-being of a neuron depends on its ability to communicate with other neurons. Studies have shown that electrical and chemical stimulation from both a neuron’s inputs and its targets support vital cellular processes. Neurons unable to connect effectively with other neurons atrophy. Useless, an abandoned neuron will die.

They talked about her as if she weren’t sitting in the wing chair, a few feet away. They talked about her, in front of her, as if she were deaf. They talked about her, in front of her, without including her, as if she had Alzheimer’s disease.

“What if I see you, and I don’t know that you’re my daughter, and I don’t know that you love me?” “Then, I’ll tell you that I do, and you’ll believe me.”

But will I always love her? Does my love for her reside in my head or my heart?

“What are you like with him?” Lydia considered this for several moments, as if she hadn’t before. “Myself.” “Good.”

“In case I forget, know that I love you.” “I love you, too, Mom.”

But I am not what I say or what I do or what I remember. I am fundamentally more than that.

I still feel, understand, and am worthy of the love and joy in those relationships.

I am not someone dying. I am someone living with Alzheimer’s.

I may never be able to retrieve what I’ve already lost, but I can sustain what I have. I still have a lot.

“My yesterdays are disappearing, and my tomorrows are uncertain, so what do I live for? I live for each day. I live in the moment. Some tomorrow soon, I’ll forget that I stood before you and gave this speech. But just because I’ll forget it some tomorrow doesn’t mean that I didn’t live every second of it today. I will forget today, but that doesn’t mean that today didn’t matter.

Be creative, be useful, be practical, be generous, and finish big.