A woman had recently been admitted to hospice and her family wanted to go out of town to attend a wedding. The volunteer coordinator asked if I might be able to stay with her for an evening.
Bev (not her real name) was a divorcee in her 70’s who had had vascular dementia. She’d experienced several strokes and had been told she was in heart failure. I know she had a constellation of other health issues as well. As a former director of nursing at a nursing home, she knew where this was headed.
When I first came in, Bev offered me a drink. I made a rule for myself when I started volunteering for hospice to say yes when I was offered food or drink because people often feel the need to give me something and–to be honest–I really like eating and drinking. But when I asked Bev what she had, she threw me for a loop.
“There’s beer and wine in the fridge,” she said. “Do you like tequila? What do you like? There’s hard stuff, too.”
And she wasn’t kidding. Bev had the most well-stocked home bar I’d ever seen. Several kinds of tequila, rum, multiple flavors of vodka, whiskey, bourbon, you name it…. I’ve been to many bars that did not have that selection of alcohol.
“Do you have any soda?” I called from the kitchen.
“For a rum and Coke?” she asked. I laughed out loud, but it wasn’t a joke. I grabbed a Coke. Just a Coke.
Bev kept forgetting who I was and why I was at her house (although this didn’t stop her from continually offering me alcoholic beverages throughout the evening). She’d ask me to remind her who I was, but it didn’t seem to bother her in the least that there was someone in her house that she didn’t recognize.
Despite her dementia, Bev was pretty clear on some things. She knew she was in hospice, and she knew she had limited time. She was certain of how she wanted to die.
She told me that she had a large extended family and they spent a lot of time at her house. She told me that she thought it was partially because they loved her and partially because she kept her bar stocked. At least four nights a week she had a crowd at her house. They drank, played cards, watched movies… And she had already told her family that this was not going to change now that she was in hospice.
“The party goes on,” she told me. She didn’t want a bunch of solemn goodbyes.
Then she asked me if I’d pour her a glass of tequila. I didn’t know what to say. This was the first and last time a hospice patient had ever asked me to play bartender. I had a cell phone number for Bev’s daughter, so I decided to give her a call. I asked if her mother was allowed to have a glass to tequila.
The daughter said that Bev’s doctor had told them it was okay for Bev to have one drink each night. I felt a little bit uncomfortable pouring a drink for my hospice patient, so I brought her the bottle and a glass. With shaky hands, she poured it herself.
As we were sitting together and Bev was having her tequila, there was a knock on the door. It was two guys delivering a hospital bed. Bev’s daughter had indicated that they might be stopping by.
“Where does the bed go?” one of the guys asked.
“Right here,” said Bev, motioning to her dining room. The two guys and I gave her a funny look.
I decided I had better call Bev’s daughter. I explained to her that Bev was intent on having the hospital bed in the dining room. Bev’s daughter wanted to know why, so I asked Bev. She took a long drink of her tequila before answering.
She explained that she wanted to be in the midst of everyone. She didn’t want to be isolated upstairs in her bedroom as her condition progressed. And, she told us, she needed to make sure the bar was stocked. This was something that Bev had given some thought to. Her daughter hesitantly agreed, and the two guys brought the bed in.
They set up the bed and left. Bev turned to me and asked (again) who I was and why I was at her house. After I told her, she told me I should get myself a glass of tequila. My high school and college peers had not pressured me to drink as much as Bev was pressuring me to drink.
Although she was having difficulty remembering who I was, she was open to sharing details of her life with me. She told me that her husband had left her a few years ago. I had a feeling it was a few decades ago, but that didn’t matter. She mentioned that he “couldn’t handle the party of my life.” She told me that her husband thought she was an alcoholic.
“Maybe I am an alcoholic,” she said, leaning in. “But I’ve had a pretty good life.”
Her daughter got back about 10 pm. At this point, Bev was fighting to stay awake on the couch. As I left, she offered me a drink “for the road.” I was putting on my coat in the foyer when I heard her ask her daughter about me.
“Now, who was that? She seemed nice but I guess she doesn’t drink. I offered her the special tequila,” she said.
About a month later, the volunteer coordinator called to let me know that Bev had passed away. I didn’t ask for any details. I wanted to think she passed away in that hospital bed in the dining room with the party continuing around her.
I can’t drink straight tequila, but that night I had a margarita.
Bev was wrong about me. I do drink. I only wish I could’ve used some of her good tequila in that margarita.
When Dementia Knocks 