In the first week of March 2013, six months after we bought her new car, Judy came into my office as I was working on a novel and dropped into my rocker-recliner across the room. Her pallid face and strained expression told me something traumatic had happened during her visit to see the grandkids in Centreville, and she wanted to share it with me. I swiveled my chair around to face her.
Judy looked me in the eye. “I want to quit driving!” she said.
Judy’s mother raised seven children and never learned to drive; when we married, Judy didn’t have a driver’s license, but she did know how to drive.
In the fall of 64, the Air Force moved us to Northern Quebec. One winter morning, when I got home from a twenty-four-hour shift, Judy wanted me to drive across town to borrow a respirator for our infant daughter, Suzanne.
“You go get it,” I told her.
Judy drove over snow-packed roads into the Bagotville hills to a friend’s house to borrow their respirator. After that, she started grocery shopping fifteen miles from our apartment while I minded infant Suzanne. When we learned that the fine in Quebec for driving without a license matched my monthly salary, Judy went for her driver’s license. I didn’t think Judy would ever give up driving once she tasted the freedom that driving her own car afforded her.
“Why do you want to quit driving?” I asked.
“I made a wrong turn in our old neighborhood,” she said. “I got disoriented. I had to drive around for twenty minutes before I recognized anything. I felt panicky! Construction has changed the area, but for goodness’ sakes, we lived in that neighborhood for eighteen years.”
Judy’s disorientation didn’t seem out of the ordinary to me; major thoroughfares had been rerouted and a new access into our Centreville neighborhood changed the orientation to the area. I didn’t think her notion to quit driving was a permanent thing. In a day or two, she’d need something from the store and, without thinking, she’d jump in her car and go get it; that would end any thought of her not driving.
Judy’s eyes found mine. “I don’t want to drive anymore.” She stared at her hands in her lap; I saw the anxiety in her eyes. There had to be more to this than she was telling me. She must have barely missed a pedestrian or narrowly escaped a serious accident.
“You could drive to the store or to visit the grandchildren,” I said. “I can take you anywhere else you need to go.”
“No. I want to quit driving.”
The tone in her voice made me back off. I figured Judy didn’t want to be one of those people who insisted on driving when she knew she shouldn’t. Her dad, when diagnosed with Alzheimer’s, had driven long after he should have quit.
Most people with dementia refuse to stop driving until a loved one wrenches the car keys from their tightly clenched fist. My sister-in-law, six or so years into a diagnosis of dementia, grabbed the car keys from my older brother’s hands as they prepared to go shopping. “I’m driving,” she insisted. On the trip, she swerved, she slowed, she stopped, she started, and she changed lanes so erratically that five police cars met them as she pulled into a store parking lot. That was the last time my sister-in-law drove a car.
Through the years, Judy had hauled children to doctor’s appointments, to church, and to whatever school or extracurricular activities they took part in without complaint. If she now felt uncomfortable driving, there was no reason she had to drive; our kids were grown, and I was retired.
“Honey, if you want to give up driving, there’s nothing stopping you.”
Judy’s wanting to give up driving should have been a major indicator of something more than ageing. Even though neither of us considered her to have a serious medical or psychological condition, she felt uncomfortable behind the wheel even before her diagnosis. Most people as they age fight giving up their car keys and those diagnosed with Alzheimer’s usually fight even harder. Yet, Judy voluntarily gave up driving. I didn’t see any sign of something more serious than aging.
Judy never got behind the wheel of her car again.
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During our first eight years in Regency, I became a dedicated golfer spending considerable time on the golf course or at the driving range. With our retirement home fixed the way she wanted, Judy didn’t mind being a golf widow. She had parceled out two soaps which she watched daily, and for quiz shows, she answered the questions before contestants. In her spare time, she made sugar cookies for the kids and grandkids; they all loved their Mimi’s (grandma’s) sugar cookies.
A few weeks after Judy stopped driving, I returned from a golf outing and found her standing in the kitchen holding a two-quart pot with tears streaming down her cheeks. Judy was a glass-half-full type person—she looked at the bright side of things. During my working days when I was away on business, if the car broke down, or a faucet leaked, or one of our children was sick, or had an issue at school, Judy handled it. A problem-solver, Judy didn’t depend on others for day-to-day solutions—she sought them out for herself.
I took her in my arms and pulled her close. “What’s the matter, sweetheart?”
She leaned back and held up a two-quart pot for me to see. The aroma of her well-seasoned chili filled the kitchen.
“I’ve been putting this pot in the same place for eight years,” she said. “Now, I can’t remember where it goes.”
I pointed to the bottom cabinet next to the refrigerator. “There, in that cabinet.”
“Oh yeah.” She put the pot in the cupboard and faced me. “I just drew a blank.” She smiled as if this was normal behavior.
I recalled her taco incident, her auto start-up checklist, her giving up driving, and all the times she had lost her purse.
“You’re having lots of memory issues these days,” I said.
“What else have I forgotten?”
“You forgot you used to cook tacos. When you got disoriented driving in Centreville, you quit driving. And you don’t remember where that pot goes.”
“I just lose track of things, that’s all.”
“It’s getting worse. I know you never liked to drive. And since I retired, I grill every evening, so you haven’t cooked Mexican in a long time. But not remembering where that pot goes—the pot you’ve been putting in the same place for more than eight years—that’s a big deal. We need to get you checked out,” I said.
Judy’s eyes sought mine. “I had a memory lapse, that’s all.” She moved to her chair in the den.
I followed her. “You needed a checklist to start your car.”
“I don’t remember that.”
“You see, you don’t remember the things you’ve forgotten. It’s time we got you checked out. We need to find out if there’s something wrong.”
She stared at me. “You don’t think I have Alzheimer’s, do you?”
The fact that her parents had Alzheimer’s has been preying on her mind I thought.
Judy’s father died OF Alzheimer’s at 76, and her mother died WITH Alzheimer’s of congestive heart failure at 85. Judy was now 72 years old.
“There are tests for this. We need to get you to a neurologist.”
Her troubled look transitioned to mild acceptance. This was more like my Judy. Not one to run away from life, she’d face whatever lay ahead. At the time, I was focused on fixing whatever was broken. I knew that there were a number of probable causes for these memory issues but didn’t think specifically about Alzheimer’s.