A woman was left feeling emotional after discovering the small memento that her grandfather, who has dementia, has with him wherever he goes.
There’s an old photograph Amy Roberts’ grandpa keeps in his wallet. The image has faded, and the edges are a little frayed, but the memories attached remain, even if so much of her grandpa’s life now, as he sees it, feels like a jumble.
A 2022 analysis by the CDC estimated around 4 percent of adults aged 65 and over are living with dementia. It’s a condition that’s disorientating and distressing for the individual while heartbreaking for their immediate friends and family.
Amy, who is from Liverpool, has seen the impact play out firsthand with her grandfather, who now lives in a retirement home due to his condition. Looking back, she can almost pinpoint when her grandpa began to change.
“We lost my grandmother back in September 2019, and I feel this brought his dementia on quicker,” Amy told Newsweek. “They were the typical old school love, met at 15 and 17 at their local youth club, three kids and five grandkids in the suburbs of Liverpool.”
Amy has been told stories about how Robert joined the police force to support the family while her grandmother, Irene, was a civil servant before settling into life as a stay-at-home mom.
They were the bedrock of her mom’s side of the family, so when her grandma passed away in 2019, it was a loss that took its toll on everyone, not least Robert, who seemed to be struggling to process it.
“When she passed, we knew there was something going on because he still spoke about when she was going to come home even after the funeral,” Amy said. “That’s when he got the dementia diagnosis.”
Amy said her grandfather spent the next couple of years living with family, but things eventually got to a point where he needed specialized care. Though he was hesitant at first, Amy said Robert has learned to enjoy life at the retirement home.
“He has a best friend there, and they get up to mischief,” she said.
Amy regularly visits, taking her grandpa out for lunch or the occasional beer. Robert relishes these excursions, bringing a wallet full of “money” with him.
“It’s fake money now,” Amy said. “The bartenders at the pub allow him to give this in as if he is still paying for his own pint, and then we always pay for the bill properly as we leave.”
During one of these excursions out to the bar, Amy saw something she said made her “heart melt a little bit.”
“I noticed he had a distorted picture within his notes,” she said. It was a picture of a young, glamorous woman in a bathing suit. Amy was intrigued, so she asked her grandpa who it was. Robert replied to her proudly, “That’s your grandma, my Irene.”
In truth, Amy should not have been all that surprised. While so many of her grandfather’s memories seem to have faded, the one that still burns as bright as ever is that of Irene.
“His room is plastered with pictures of her and them together from throughout the years,” she said. “He mixes all of the grandkids and his own kids’ names up but never my grandma.”
There was something about the picture that made Amy reflect on “the difference between that old love and new love.”
She said: “Nowadays would anyone actually carry a picture of their loved one in their wallet or on their person, usually now it’s just all on our phones or our lock screen.”
It was a moment that resonated with others. Amy shared a video showcasing the discovery to her TikTok @amesxxxxxx, which has been watched over 200,000 times. There’s a deeper message to this special moment, though, one she hopes others watching will infer.
“Even when battling a disease like dementia, we can still recognize those closest to us at the worst of times,” she said.
The post Tears at What Widower Grandpa With Dementia Still Has in His Wallet: ‘Love’ appeared first on Newsweek.
