What We Learned From My Father

His body held on and his mind went first.

By Neil Solomon · 2 min read

My father lived to be ninety-four. He passed in the middle of 2024. In his last years he lived in our house with us, and I learned some things from the experience. I am listing them the way I would tell them to a friend across a table.

His body held on and his mind went first. In his mid-nineties he was in fair shape physically. It was his memory that went. When he first came to live with us, he could remember his life from about the age of fourteen into his thirties or forties. Near the end, it was from fourteen to about eighteen. Hired caregivers can bathe a person, feed him and sit with him. They cannot make the decisions that a failing mind can no longer make. That part belongs to family or to someone the person chose.

If the mind is clear, the person can direct everything. A man who still knows what he wants can tell a caregiver, a doctor and a family how he wants things done. That is the time to say it, and to write it down.

Care at home can cost less than people think. Where we live, round-the-clock care at home cost about a quarter of what the same hours would cost in the United States, going by a national survey of caregiver rates. A housekeeper and a doctor who visits the house cost little too.

Someone he knew was there every day. I believe he would have been lonelier in a building with strangers. I cannot prove it. It is what I think.

It was a blessing. I reconnected with my father in a way I had not since I was a child. It was not easy, and it was not a huge burden. I made peace with everything my father was.

It could happen to any of us. A fall, a virus going around the world, a slow loss of memory. None of these were in our plans.

If I could pass one thing to another family, it would be that there are more choices than assisted living in the United States. The idea that everyone has to die in one is sad to me. For some people it is the right place, with good people. For others, there is a spare room, a few caregivers, and a son.